Expedia All Inclusive - Body Surfing - Five Strange Facts About Its History in Australia

Five major steps were taken to ensure that the behaviour of people bathing in the ocean or swimming in rivers would not offend early colonial standards of public decency, since swimsuits had not yet been invented. Australian beaches were empty of body surfers until the dawn of the twentieth century, strange as it now seems.

Banning daylight swimming within sight of any public place, passed in 1838, the authorities struck back with a new Act. They were not to be kept from the cool ocean waves, in the heat of summer, sydneysiders had always been resistant to attempts by officialdom to limit their freedoms and. The government of New South Wales introduced an Act that prohibited all ocean bathing in daylight hours, in 1833, 1.

Few of these unpopular functionaries were noted for a sense of humour, glorying in the title of Inspector of Public Nuisances. Which carried a fine of one pound Sterling - more than the weekly wage of an ordinary working man, beach Inspectors enforced the new laws. 2.

Bathing dresses were usually made from a heavy woolen serge and could contain up to ten metres of fabric. Dress codes that were ridiculously modest by modern standards remained in force. The first swimming championship was held in Sydney's Domain Baths in 1846. Public baths had been set up in Melbourne's Yarra River, by 1841. 3.

And the strict dress regulations remained in force until the 1930s, on men and women swimming together, the law had to be changed but the bans on Sunday bathing, by 1903. But none of the magistrates would convict him, william Gocher made three well-advertised daytime swims in a bid to force police to arrest him. When the owner of the local newspaper became fed up with a law that had led to many deaths because people swam at night, the first official challenge came in 1902. Freddie Williams and Tommy Tanna, among the first body surfers to publicly defy the laws against daylight bathing were two Manly Beach locals. 4.

(c) Dorothy Gauvin Its first use was to rescue a boy who would become world-famous as the aviator Charles Kingsford Smith. Which revolutionized life saving methods, a club had been constituted in February 1906 and one of its members introduced the reel, at Bondi Beach. The team was formally constituted in March 1907. At Sydney's Bronte Beach, victoria Barracks, by Major John Bond of the Medical Staff Corps, early rescue methods were based on those used in England and not until 1902 was the first club of regular lifesavers formed. Were the precursors of Australia's famed surf lifesavers, formed in 1894, and the Royal Life Saving Society, formed in 1882, the Royal Humane Society of Australasia. 5.