Bangor Park Pool: WPA entrance
Description
Ben Miller writes in the Nazareth Patch:
“This beautiful art deco pool was one of the few above-ground municipal pools to be constructed in the country and like Nazareth’s Borough Pool, it was built by the WPA from 1937 to 1939. Though I was raised in Nazareth from birth, my mother and her family are from Bangor and this pool was a big part of their lives. In fact, my great-grandfather, John I. Correll, was a Bangor Councilman at the time and Project Chairman of the pool’s construction. He also oversaw the development of Bangor Memorial Park around it.
Bangor’s original pool was designed by Wesley Bintz of Lansing, MI. Bintz created the concept of municipal above-ground pools with bath houses underneath the pool deck. Over the course of his career, he designed a total of 128 of his above-ground masterpieces and boasted “A Bintz Pool is 25% to 40% cheaper to build than a sunken pool and bath house of equal size, performance, and details.”
When the citizens of Bangor decided to build a pool in 1936, they looked for someone to build it and price was a strong consideration with the great depression fresh in everybody’s mind. Bintz’s economically-minded sales tactic proved successful and he was chosen to design it. Construction on the pool was completed in time for the summer season of 1939 and it opened that year on May 27th to much fanfare.
The pool remained in operation for just over 50 years until 1990, when the borough decided not to open it to the public due to some serious structural deficiencies in the pool walls. Bangor Council hired a group to perform a feasibility study to help decide if the pool should be fixed or replaced. The results were scrutinized and debated for six years until the pool was was finally demolished in fall of 1996.
Construction on the new Bangor pool commenced immediately afterwards and in less than a year, it was opened to the public on June 23rd. A remnant of Bangor’s first municipal pool still survives today, with the original entrance to the pool preserved and used as the entrance to today’s modern bathhouse.”
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Bangor Park: new bathhouse, with WPA entrance
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Bangor Park Pool entrance: Plaque 1
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Bangor Park Pool entrance: Plaque 2
Source notes
https://patch.com/pennsylvania/nazareth/bp--by-special-request-bangors-first-swimming-pool (accessed Mar. 2018)
Project originally submitted by Evan Kalish on March 9, 2018.
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Before the old pool was demolished, PA Pennsylvania Historical Museum Commission required archival photo documentation. the photos and report were submitted to PHMC and approved prior to demolition. those materials should be available from the state.