Closure of North Tonawanda Pool is the end of an era, article (Samantha Christmann, Buffalo News, 2023).htm

Closure of North Tonawanda Pool is the end of an era, article (Samantha Christmann, Buffalo News, 2023).htm

As a kid in North Tonawanda, every summer morning in 1988 was the same ritual. I would stretch on my purple swimsuit, still damp from the night before, roll up my towel, tuck it under my arm and slam through the screen door on my way to the Memorial Pool.

It was a two-block trip, waving to the watchful elders sitting on porches or working in gardens, and keeping an eye out for the Monarch butterflies that seemed to be everywhere in those days. A tangle of bicycles thrown down under the big willow tree signaled that my friends had beat me to Payne Park and I’d usually find them pumping away on the swings, trying to make it over the top bar.

Together, we’d make our way to the giant, brick, above-ground pool and, though my friends had seen it a million times, I’d always point to my great-uncle’s name on the plaque outside the entrance: “Built by Joseph M. Wrazin,” my grandma’s brother. It was the most prestige a working-class kid from the avenues could get.

Built just after World War II as a memorial to the veterans, the pool was designed by noted engineer Wesley Bintz. Its patented design, with locker rooms on the first floor, made it easier and less expensive to build and maintain than other models, according to Tegan Baiocchi, an architectural historian in Michigan. To this day, when I smell chlorine, all I can picture are those locker rooms. I can still hear the slam of the metal lockers and the echo of my friends’ laughter bouncing off the walls.

I taught myself to dog paddle in the 3-foot-deep shallow end, when I was young enough that my teenage sister, Loree, would deposit me there, then run off with her friends. Life really is sink or swim sometimes.

Of course, one day, I became a teenager myself, teasing and spraying my hair before a trip to the pool and spending the whole time trying not to get it wet so I could look good for Seth, the gorgeous head lifeguard.

The deep end was for the diving boards and ‘the Plat,’ an elevated platform from which the most daring kids would plunge. I made it up to the second step once before chickening out and having to endure the catcalls of all the cool kids who had witnessed my shameful attempt.

The pool used to close for dinner time, signaled by all the lifeguards blowing their whistles at once, and we’d dry off by lying on the sidewalk at the park, baking in the sun. We’d take a few more trips down the tornado slide, waxed for maximum speed with Burger King cups from across the street, and head home.

I’m sure my mom fed me before “night swim,” but I can only remember eating popsicles, seated on the hardwood floor in front of the TV, wet hair dripping and fans roaring in the background.

Those were the days.

Neglected but still popular, the pool has deteriorated. The city has been faced with the choice of spending $2.5 million to restore it to its former glory, or pay $6.5 million to build a new one. Last month, the city chose the latter.

When I found out, I sobbed.

The tears, I’m sure, were more about nostalgia than the city’s decision. Getting older, losing loved ones, living in the real world. The pool’s closure was just an excuse to cry for days gone by.

My own family became less reliant on the Memorial Pool as we moved away, our kids grew older or we opened pools of our own. Recent trips to the pool were made more as a visit to an old friend than out of a desperate need to cool off.

But somewhere in those tears was sadness for all of the kids in NT like me, who would never experience those magical days again. I know they’ll create magical days of their own if the proposed replacement pool is ever built.

But there’s the rub.

Campaigns to tear down Bintz pools are usually paired with grand plans for a replacement pool, but instead – when funds can’t be secured – cities end up slapping down a concrete splash pad, which costs a lot less. And even if the same-sized pool does come, all those kids are roasting in record heat as they wait the years it will take for the project to materialize.

And though it checks every box for historic preservation, a designation to the Register of Historic Places requires support and approval from an NT administration that is excited to knock it down and start over. A motion to protect the pool was tabled a year ago and never heard from again.

So, I’ve come to terms with the fact that the pool, as so many of us know and love it, will be soon be gone forever.

From now on, it will only exist in our minds, which, I guess, is the only place it really exists anymore, anyway.