Bill Edwards, who was 80 in 2003, is best known today for his car racing activities with his son Peter. Bill was once well known as a successful swimmer and one of the founders of the Heath Town Swimming Club. In the remainder of this article he remembers some of the swimming teams and the events in which they participated. He has also kindly allowed us to use some of the excellent photographs of the teams from his collection.

Just after the war we demobbed and formed the Heath Town Swimming Club. Arthur Robbins who used to be a councillor was one of the founders. I was captain of the water polo team.

A lot of the men have now passed away. They made Heath Town famous and went to the national championships.

Bill Edwards

Heath Town Baths

The 1948 International Team

In 1948 a team from the swimming club took part in an international competition at Tilberg in Holland. Bill Edwards on the far right, won a gold medallion in the 200m breast stroke. Several other team members gained second and third places in their events.

Women:
1st left is Freda Holt who won a silver medal, 4th from the left is Gladys Morcom, 5th from the left is Thelma, 3rd from the right is Hazel Peace, backstroke champion, on the far right is Jill Cooke.

Hazel Peace and Bill Edwards trained with Johnny Weissmuller for a week at the Derby baths in Blackpool. Johnny became famous as the silver screen's first Tarzan. He was the first person to swim 100m in less than one minute. His 59 second record was made at the 1924 olympics in Paris. At the games he won 3 gold medals for swimming and a bronze medal for water-polo.

Sadly she passed away on 19th January, 2010 at the age of 91.

I must thank Gordon Brown, ex-Heath Town swimmer, water polo player, and coach, for the information.

The first and second teams photographed on 8th October 1953.
Front row:
2nd from the left is Ivor Bickley, next is Jimmy Sidebotham who was a famous water polo player and to the right is Philip Cooke the referee. He became one of the leading olympic referees in the country and has since died.  On the far right is Bill Edwards.

Back row - left to right:
? , Ken Roper, Brian Moore, ? , Alf Bowen.

The team won the prestigious shield after winning a series of events across the country.

left to right:
Alf Bowen, free style; Alan Treen, back stroke; Bill Edwards, breast stroke; J.V. Watkiss, the club president with the shield; Joe Smith; Jeff Evans, free style.

back row - left to right:
Phil Cooke, a diving champion and referee who used to go around the local clubs doing charity work. He used to do high dives and death dives from out of the roof into the shallow end. He was Jill Cooke's brother. Next is Tommy Hulme a diver, then Bill Edwards, a diver and breast stroke champion.

back row - left to right:
Bill Edwards, unknown tall goalkeeper who could stand in the 6ft end with the water only coming up to the bottom of his chin. On the right is Freddie Heath.

front row - left to right:
Brian Moore, Alfie Bowen, Tommy Sidebotham, Tommy Hulme, .

Bill is seen here diving from the high diving board at the Kingfisher club. Bill was 200m breast stroke champion because of his ability to swim under water. He still holds the record for under water swimming at Heath Town Baths, where he swam four lengths under water. He was a frogman in the war and learned how to breathe under water. This can be a big advantage in a race because you can swim faster under water.

Bill has suffered for his success in the sport. He had a terrible accident in one of his polo matches, when he lost an eye in a clash with Michael Hands.

Another view of the baths

The view of  the baths from the cemetery

We would like to thank Bill Edwards for his help in producing this article.

David Patten has kindly sent us some interesting photographs from his family archives and we have included them here. They were taken in the 1940s and feature some of Heath Town Bath's swimming teams. He tells us that his grandfather, Harry Patten, was club president and ran a concentrated coaching campaign at the baths from 1962.