Pages

▼

Monday, May 3, 2021

Yesterday's Casino pool and today's Fort Lauderdale Aquatic Center

            Florida State Archives

 


By Jane Feehan

The Las Olas Beach Casino and Pool, first built about 1915, attracted both pool swimmers and day trippers to the beach. The wooden structure underwent replacement in 1927 with a Mediterranean building designed by Fort Lauderdale architect Francis Abreu. The municipal complex included an Olympic-size pool 60 by 165 feet, and three to 12 feet in depth. The $125,000 structure officially opened Jan. 29, 1928.

A story in the Fort Lauderdale Daily News (Nov. 24, 1941) claimed “the pool is filled several times weekly with 420,000 gallons of filtered salt water pumped by three wells from more than 20 feet of rock and shell and sand. The chlorinating system is one of the best in the south.” The municipal building also included a wading pool for children and hundreds of lockers for visitors.

The same story touted the Las Olas Beach Casino and Pool as the “training ground of champions as well as one of the finest pools in the south.” It also hosted an annual national aquatic forum, which drew “the country’s outstanding swimmers and divers from schools and colleges in every corner of the land … [it] is a dripping wet trial session for pet strokes, new dives, water ballets and other natatorial kinks.”
Casino Pool 1966

The building sat just south of Las Olas Boulevard. It was demolished in 1965 to make way for new development. That year the buzz in town:  Fort Lauderdale was to be the "Swimming capital of the world."

The International Swimming Hall of Fame (ISHOF), constructed a block or two west of the old Casino, was dedicated in 1965. The swim meet in December 1966 drew more than 2,000 participants. CBS sports was on hand to broadcast the event, "a CBS Sports Spectacular."

The ISHOF, now the  Fort Lauderdale Aquatic Center underwent renovations and opened January 2023. Ground was broken in October 2024 for the new ISHOF museum.
  
It has been a long time since the city was the "swimming capital of the world" or was the site of a televised "sports spectacular." 

Copyright © 2020, 2021, 2024. All rights reserved. Jane Feehan.


CBS and international swimming:
https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2020/09/17/cbs-sports-international-swimming-league-october-16/

Other sources:

Fort Lauderdale News, Jan. 29, 1928
Miami Herald, March 8, 1965
Fort Lauderdale News, Dec. 25, 1966

Tags: Fort Lauderdale history, swimming history, Fort Lauderdale in the 1920s, Florida history, architect Francis Abreu, film research

Florida State Archive/Florida Memories - mid century



at