How racism kept Americans out of pools

Code Switch

NPR

Society & Culture

4.6 • 14.5K Ratings

🗓️ 27 August 2025

⏱️ 36 minutes

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Summary

This week, we're looking into the history of public swimming pools in the U.S., and the legacy that pool segregation has had on swimming skills in the country today. Earlier this year, Jasmine Romero found herself surrounded by four- and five-year-olds, ready to take her first ever swim class. Jasmine, who is in her mid-thirties, has had a fear of swimming all her life. It's a fear that was passed down from her mother, and spread to all of her sisters, too. But the Romero family isn't alone. People of color have long been afraid of the water — and with good reason.

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0:00.0	Support for NPR and the following message come from the Walton Family Foundation, working to create access to opportunity for people and communities by tackling tough social and environmental problems.
0:11.9	More information is at walton family foundation.org.
0:15.9	Just a heads up, y'all. This episode contains a little salty language and a reference to sexual salt.
0:22.5	What's good? You are listening to Code Switch from NPR. I'm Gene Demby. And Jasmine Romero
0:28.2	is going to her first swim class. You walk in the doors and the humidity and the smell of chlorine
0:36.3	hits you hard. I can't even see the pool and I smell of chlorine hits you hard.
0:36.2	I can't even see the pool, and I'm already, like, in the environment of it. My hair's frizzing up. And, you know, and I walked in, I was like, hi, I'm here for the swim classes. And I look around, and it's, like, nothing but, like, four and five-year-olds and their parents. and I'm the only grown-ass adult that's like,
0:56.7	Hi, I'm here only grown-ass adult that's like,
0:58.7	Hi, I'm here for the swim class.
1:02.0	Her instructor said, that was fine.
1:06.0	She was like, okay, yeah, you know, you can go get changed in here.
1:10.0	And I'm literally, like, changing into swim clothes around, like, little kids that are are looking at me like, why are you here?
1:15.5	She's there because she wants to conquer her fear. Her fear of the water. She's had it her whole life.
1:21.5	Her older sisters all have it. And they inherited this fear from their mom.
1:26.0	My mom grew up in San Miguel in El Salvador, which is a town that is not that close to the water.
1:32.2	And I don't think she ever had the opportunity really to go swimming as a kid.
1:36.7	And, you know, my entire life that I've ever known her, she has had this anxiety around the water.
1:43.0	That anxiety of the water, it's a family thing.
1:46.6	Yeah, but it's also much bigger than the Romero women.
1:51.3	So in the U.S., about eight out of ten children from households with incomes below $50,000 a year have few to no swimming skills.
1:59.6	That's according to the American Red Cross. About 64% of black children have few to know swimming skills. That's according to the American Red Cross.
2:02.1	About 64% of black children have few to know swimming skills. For Latino children, it's 45%. For white
	...

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