Once a natural swimming spot known as ‘the bogey hole at South Nelson Bay’, the Bronte Baths were built in 1887 when entry was fourpence for adults and tuppence for children. These days the pool is open to all for free and after a major upgrade in 2006 to take it back to its more natural, uncluttered roots, it now looks much the same as it did more than 130 years ago.
In the early years the baths were leased to private operators including Henry Alexander Wylie in 1895, who taught his daughter Mina to swim there before she went on to win a silver medal in the 1912 Olympic Games. Other Olympians to regularly dive into the Bronte pool include Evelyn Whillier, who represented Australia in the 1936 Berlin Olympics and won gold at the 1938 Empire Games, and Bronte Campbell, who trained in the pool before bringing home gold and bronze from the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.
The Bronte Baths are also known as the Bond Ocean Pool to honour the lifesaving pioneer Major Bond. And it’s said to be where the Australian Crawl got its name. In 1901, a 15-year-old Solomon Islander named Alick Wickham used the stroke, which was common throughout his home islands but never seen in Australia before, to win a race. Legend has it prominent swimming coach George Farmer said ‘look at that kid crawling!’ before going on to recruit Wickham and training him to become one of Sydney’s top swimmers.
