Swimming

There was even a swimming pool behind the schoolhouse that was twenty feet square and five feet deep for them to play in. The pool was also used as a baptismal font. For the girls, bathing suits were made out of linsey dresses (plain cotton and wool) with pantalettes (long pants worn under their dresses) for the girls. The boys wore shirts and overalls. Brigham made them a bath house out of an old band wagon where they could change their clothes. It had benches on each side and a roof on top.


Sometimes Brigham and the children liked to soak in a warm spring about a mile from the house. He also loved to take visitors, along with a few of his children, to the Great Salt Lake. It took a full day to go to the beach and back because it was twenty miles away. Everyone changed their clothes behind a huge black rock – boys on one side and girls on the other. Swimming in the lake was a fun experience because the salty water held them up. They could float or roll in the water without sinking.