This was on my facebook from the Louis Armstrong House Museum.
"We cannot stress too strongly how important it is for you all to vote today and every day to help preserve Pops's home in Queens. There's a lot of money up for grabs and you can help the Louis Armstrong House Museum to get the money to keep his home in great condition so that it's a place that we and future generations can visit to honour Louis Armstrong's name. Please vote today and every day!"
voted for Armstrong house yesterday, but I also see the Astoria Olympic High Dive is on the table. I've passed that baby more than a thousand times I bet on my circuits around Astoria Park. I thought it was off limits because of liability issues. Still...I am afraid of heights.
voted for Armstrong house yesterday, but I also see the Astoria Olympic High Dive is on the table. I've passed that baby more than a thousand times I bet on my circuits around Astoria Park. I thought it was off limits because of liability issues. Still...I am afraid of heights.
Astoria pool was our go_to spot to cool off in the midst of sweltering summer days.
Diving tower was always closed except for 1 time that I know of in my lifetime.
They staged the Olympic trails there for swimming & diving for the 1964 games. Watching them race in lanes a very very cool thing to see as a kid! Back in the day were very few NYC public schools with swim teams and facilities ( my guess hasn't changed over the years)
Coverage by Jim McCay et. al from ABC's Wide World of Sports!
It's official:
That's an old fart memory if there ever was one
edit: Having found some history on the pool was built in 1936:The labor and construction came from the Works Progress Administration (WPA), and it's grand opening was for the 1936 Olympic trials, which I did not attend;-))
Last edited by Mike Schwartz; April-28th-2012 at 02:00 PM.
Dude, I "swam" in that pool too last decade. And glad I didn't catch anything. It's basically a gigantic wading pool now and the deeper lap pool was closed except for early mornings because the lifeguards couldn't be responsible for watching the hundreds of kids there in open swim. (Really, they should have just put up a barrier because I think the pools were close, but separate - not sure though.) I always felt bad that kids in the city were in school until the third week of June (so late!) and that's when the pool would open. And then directly after 4th of July, Rite Aid would put up there back-to-school wares. (F*$%ing Rite Aid!) Give the kids a break. Sheesh!
The dive pool was surrounded by a link fence all the time I lived there ('98 to '09). It was very large and very deep, but empty with vegetation growing through the foundation. My macabre imagination always imagined that someone had died there. The whole setting is the largest pool area I've ever seen, even though, like I said, it's largely shallow wading. It was not well maintained though. The female anteroom was frightening with dirty water over large sections of the floor. And the pool's foundation was crumbly and needed to be redone. They put vinyl in one pool here to prevent that, but vinyl gets air pockets too and is problematic over a large area.
Right on, Ron. I saw it from the link in the other thread first and commented there. Those are my old "stomping grounds." I love Astoria Park. It also has great views of upper Manhattan. You can't see from this photo but there ARE beautiful tall trees now that compliment the monolithic approaching spans. The tower on the right always reminded me of the hunchback of Notre Dame. I think those are 200 feet easy. That's the East river and I always thought it was cool when gigantic barges would go through there.
And the dive pool. It's gross and not really the way I described it, but you can probably understand why I thought someone died there. Eeek.
Last edited by tippy; April-29th-2012 at 04:47 PM.
It's the Welfare Island Bridge; the only one by foot or motor vehicle from Queens to (now) Roosevelt Island. It's south on Vernon Blvd from Astoria Park area.
A few blocks north of the bridge is Rainey Park, our little league practice field for years
Last edited by Mike Schwartz; April-29th-2012 at 06:56 PM.
Oh wait...Roosevelt, that's South right by Queensboro Bridge. I had a coworker friend who lived on Roosevelt, it was being gentrified, but I never went. I would have trekked across that bridge if I'd known about it.
It's now fallen to 15th. At the very least let's try to beat the tugboat!
Hey, I've voted for Louis' house, and will again, but I dig tugboats, too. In fact, this was one of my very favorite books as a young child, along with The Little Engine That Could.
i also dig lots of other stuff like the Apollo and the Henry St. Settlement, aside from the NY Public Library, of course. but i will still keep voting for Satchmo's house.
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Originally Posted by tippy
It's basically a gigantic wading pool now and the deeper lap pool was closed except for early mornings because the lifeguards couldn't be responsible for watching the hundreds of kids there in open swim. (Really, they should have just put up a barrier because I think the pools were close, but separate - not sure though.) I always felt bad that kids in the city were in school until the third week of June (so late!) and that's when the pool would open. And then directly after 4th of July, Rite Aid would put up there back-to-school wares. (F*$%ing Rite Aid!) Give the kids a break. Sheesh! 
