Not-So-Dirty Water

“How did I know you’d be the last one?” a man gleefully bellows over the cheering crowd as he admires a swimmer completing a course during the Charles River One Mile Swim. By way of answer, the breathless athlete hauls himself onto the dock and wraps his heckler in a soaking bear hug, drawing loud, laughing protests from his friend, who had, until that moment, remained dry.

The Charles River Swimming Club (CRSC), which organizes the One Mile Swim, has for 20 years played host to thousands who have taken the plunge to swim a neat loop of buoys in a stretch of water better known for warnings than welcomes. Organizers chose a Latin slogan, Quid illud aqua inest? which translates to, “What is that in the water?” The slogan, of course, winks at doubters and gives a nod to that century-old feeling of trepidation about the Charles that still lingers in the Boston psyche.

In fact, many people are still hesitant to swim in the event. Not only because the open-water mile-long course is a demanding athletic endeavor, but also because, for years, the River was treated as a residential and industrial drain for the city.

Now, at great cost of time, effort, and resources to modernize pipes and water treatment, the river has been coaxed back toward being not only a place to swim, but even a place to frolic. There are still some serious caveats about the river water after large rainstorms, thanks to the contaminated bottom sediment and legacy drainage systems. And as-yet unaddressed overflows can still cause temporary deterioration in the river’s water quality. But the CRSC makes something once unthinkable look inviting. An urban river is becoming a place for people once again, even if swimming in it is only permitted once or twice a year.

As swimmers take their mighty lap between Longfellow and the Mass Avenue bridge, they are celebrating the city’s progress and urging us to continue to see urban rivers as something special.

“You’ll pop your head up to get a bearing, see MIT to one side, the Boston skyline to the other and the Longfellow straight ahead,” says Frans Lawaetz, a co-founder of CRSC. “A little wave of giddiness will hit as it sinks in that you really are swimming in the Charles!

“I overheard a woman whose son was in the race leaving a voicemail to her husband,” he continues. “The way she described the scene, the emotion in her voice, how she wished he could be there, it brought a little lump to my throat, and I realized this is something special, even for those who don’t jump in.”

In what has become a recent One Mile Swim tradition, after the last swimmer has clambered up the dock ladder, MIT’s Metro Polo team jumps in for a rollicking exhibition water polo match complete with taunts, jests, and barely intact boundary lines that shift in the wind to the amusement of onlookers.

A Multi-Generational Effort

As playful and exuberant as CRSC presents itself, it is among the ranks of the new vanguard taking up a multi-generational effort to improve the urban waterway space for city dwellers. From the 1880s to 1910, Charles Eliot conceived the regional park system, and Frederick Olmsted designed the first “Charlesbank” beaches to provide people with democratic access to nature and exercise. In the early 20th century, James Storrow spearheaded efforts to stabilize water levels, while his widow, Helen Storrow, later funded the expansion of the Esplanade parkland to ensure it remained a “joy for the city’s millions.”

By 1955, however, as an unintended result of blocking the tides, street runoff, industrial toxins, and biogenic waste emulsified and settled in the river basin, which led officials to prohibit swimming in the Charles for decades. The formerly tidal Charles River basin could no longer be washed out into Boston Harbor.

The metaphorical tides could not be dammed, however, and began to turn in 1965 with the founding of the Charles River Watershed Association. Improvements accelerated in the 1990s, when John DeVillars launched the EPA’s cleanup mandate. In 2000, Renata von Tscharner founded the Charles River Conservancy to make swimming in the Charles a reality again. Not to mention the massive impact of the Deer Island Wastewater Treatment plant and an alphabet army of allies: MWRA, BWSC, CLF, DRC, MassDEP, Esplanade Association, and so many others.

Honoring the River

Celebrating that history, the CRSC, which was founded in 2005, plunges on each year—not only celebrating each athlete’s accomplishment, but also the work of so many who continue to renew the River. In fact, swimming has gone from something fully banned to specially permitted twice a year at events like these. Beyond swimming, and as confidence in river health grows, windsurfers and hydrofoilers now also cool off in the water on hot summer days as they toy with the dividing line between watercraft use (permitted) and swimming (still not broadly allowed).

After the One Mile Swim ends, the course empties, the buoys are collected, the lifeguards kayak in a line to Community Boating’s docks, and the slow, familiar current of the Charles resumes. On shore, swimmers wrap themselves in towels and spectators linger a little longer than planned. No one seems in a rush to leave.

“What’s that in the water?” the swimming club’s slogan asks. At least today, the answer is obvious: us.

The organizing team for CRSC is Kate Radville, Frans Lawaetz, Amy Whitesides, Jen Downing, Sheryl Bierden, Pat Costello, and Noel LaPierre.

Zachary Kinnaird works as an attorney at Philips. He has swum in the Charles River.

Photograph courtesy of Charles River Swimming Club