Just think YMCA and high schools pre-1970s used to have male students swim nude. Go research the topic and you will find female students posting with fully nude male students, male students swimming nude in front of stands full of people, etc...

I've seen those pictures that MNluvthongs mentioned. I went to high school in Chicago and the boys swam nude but it was only for gym class... we wore suits for competition. The girls never saw us nude although one time a female gym teacher came in while we were swimming. I guess I was an exhibitionist even back then because I was in line for the diving board and stayed out of the water while the rest of the guys jumped into the water to hide themselves from her.

Like I said, the girls were kept separate from us so I don't know about the girls attempting to get a rise of the nude boys. Nude swimming ended in my school during my 3rd year. The school said it was because of improved filtration equipment and modern swimsuit materials. All I know is I hated the high waisted trunks we had to wear and racer suits were a few years off yet.

TRACI -- I don't know if the trends from the past were good or bad for the guys. On the one hand, having to run around nude in front of both men and women (and other girls/women their same ages) probably was embarasing. On the other hand, if a guy was interested in exposing himself, what a great way to do it. A guy (young man) who had to go naked probably learned to fit in with the masses. This sort of made them disappear I would think. It might have made these boys more comfortable in thongs and other minimal swimwear as they got older. Going nude in this situation, with classmates and others doing the same thing might also have helped these guys to think more along the lines of "this is normal behavior". If nude swimming is introduced when a boy is very young, then it could seem as natural to he boys as board shorts are today. RANDY -- I was probably at the end of this trend. We swimmed nude at the Y and at school. At school, the sports manager had a small office that overlooked the pool area, and volunteer students, usually girls, worked there helping with keeping attendance etc. There were no complaints by the boys when these girls could look out the window and seen them around the pool nude. This was part of the jump from elementary to junior high school. Surprisingly once the novelty of the situation wore off the office girls hardly noticed the nude guys. Even when guy's tried to shock them with boners, the girls had sort of a yawn reaction. I went to a tiny public school that was so small that some classes from different years were combined. All the kids knew each other and many regardless of their sex or age had skinny dipped in front of each other. TRACI -- I never went to any school where anyone practiced nudity. Both boys and girls would even skip showers and stink the rest of the day to avoid having to take their cloths off. In my high school, there was an ongoing prank where new students (usually kids who just moved to the area) would not know where the locker rooms were. They were badly marked, and the maze of hallways leading to them were confusing enough to make finding the appropriate locker room confusing. Other students, both male and female would tell the new students directions to the wrong lockerroom. If the new student was male, then they were told how to get to the girl;s locker room and visa versa.

I like this part : https://drgeraldstein.wordpress.com/2018/06/03/when-boys-swam-nude-in-public-high-schools-update/ It would be great to have similar rules : In an effort to minimize bacteria, keep pool filters from clogging and ensure swimmers were clean, swimwear should be of the simplest and minimal type.

It is interesting to note past trends. From the sound of it for 50 years YMCAs and high schools had nude swimming and even mixed photos of men and women's swim teams. https://clothesfreelife.com/naturist-wiki/naked-indoor-swimming-in-u-s/

I remember swimming nude at the Y and at summer camp, but not in school, because my school didn't have a pool. In HS we did occasionally go to a local junior college's pool, but always with swim suits. At the Y, swimming lessons were gender segregated, but at the end of class there was an open house day for parents, and my recollection is that most of us boys still swam nude (I certainly did). Parents were no big deal, but many sisters also came, so invariably I would run into at least one girl I knew. I never cared, and I don't recall anyone ever making a big deal about it. Summer camp was coed, but swimming lessons (outside) were segregated. Suits were optional for boys, but girls had to wear something, often just their underwear (since the instructor was a man, we were told). At the start I remember many boys being shy and bringing suits, but they were teased, and eventually were pressured by the rest of us to go naked. Occasionally the instructor was absent, and the sub was often a woman, but the rules didn't seem to change. Somehow, the girls always figured out how to spy on us, which caused many of the boys to jump in the water or otherwise try to cover up, but most of us didn't care. When the last week came swim periods were open-ended and coed, so we were all warned ahead of time that we might want to wear something. Several of us saw no reason to wear suits, as most of the girls had already seen us, so we decided to just "forget". They grumbled a bit, but let us swim anyway, especially after we explained all the girls had already seen us. By the end of that week, at least half the guys were naked and no one made an overly big deal about it. Great fun, and its too bad that culture changed.

We had some stadium type seating on one side of the "Y". Since the place was a long trip for many people (downtown) it was not unusual for parents and other family members to sit in them and watch the full lesson. Usually I took the bus, but if we had some other place to go, or if the weather was bad, like snowy, etc., my Mom or Dad would bring us. Dad always found something else to do, but Mom would sit there, watching the boys, and knit. My sisters also watched the boys, but after a few lessons lost interest in our nakedness and read or worked on homework. At the end of each class, we had a boys-only open swim for a quarter hour or so before we took showers in a communal shower room and went home. Some parents came every day we had classes with or without other kids, and would hold our dry clothes for us. After the shower and drying off with the "Y" towels, they would go out and someone would bring them a new towel from home and they would stand there, still nude, between the bleachers and pool and dry off the rest of the way. They then put their cloths on and left. They did have a strict rule that people could not go into the bleachers when a male swimclass was in progress and people in the bleachers could not go near the pool. Family members of all ages and sexes were acceptable as spectators, and I had a couple of casual girl friend from the neighborhood or school who would also sit in the bleachers and watch before we left for the day. Usually we would go someplace else together, like shopping at some of the down-town stores. I remember one girl I knew coming down with me and after the swim training we went to buy her a pair of Levi's, get something to eat at a stand-up hot-dog place we sometimes went to, and then went to see a movie before going back home. It never bothered me that much to be seen nude since I liked the feeling of not having to wear a swimsuit (permitted but only worn by a few of the other boys). We had only Speedo-type swimsuit and they always seemed to cling too tight and were down-right uncomfortable. The other boys were just as comfortable nude, and as DavyJ says, we always seemed to run into girls we knew. The girls also were not offended, perhaps since those that came to watch knew what to expect if they went along. Occaationally a girl from school or visiting would join the group of spectators and while some were surprised at the boys being nude, most said they did the same thing wherever they came from but most other places had rules preventing most spectators of either sex. The practice of male nudity spread to other places where we swam in the summer. There was a small river or large creek nearby that had a falls big wide falls about 15 feet tall. It was just one of the many unremarkable rivers and falls in the area. Like most, it had a very deep but safe pool at the bottom of the falls. As young teens we would often go there with our male and female friends to swim, eat in the forest, and sometimes camp. Another place we would go was to the Little Miami River and some high cliff hanging falls in what they now call the Glen Helen Nature Preserve. Guys would swim naked at all these places, and even into college, it was not unusual to see that the men were nude and the women were not at these same summer swim areas.

Another thing about male nudity and probably influenced by the nude swimming culture was the fact that at the time, male models were usually used in art classes and in college this was a work-study type job. Females were paid at least minimum wage that usually was much more than the work-study salaries. Even in high-school, we had male nude models who wanted to get extra credit for a class and since everyone had seen most of the males nude anyway, it was no big deal. The boys did have to get a release signed by their parents, but I never heard a boy saying the parent would not sign the release if the boy didn't mind being a model. The only issues I heard was that some of the boys thought they should be paid the same as the women, something the schools eventually did from what I understand.

This is so interesting and I wish I’d been born earlier so that I could have enjoyed it. Such a shame that things have changed! One question to those of you lucky to have been around at the time; what about erections? We’re they frowned upon and had to be hidden or were they just ignored?

Ohiothonger said: "The practice of male nudity spread to other places where we swam in the summer. There was a small river or large creek nearby that had a falls big wide falls about 15 feet tall. It was just one of the many unremarkable rivers and falls in the area. Like most, it had a very deep but safe pool at the bottom of the falls." I also remember swimming at various other "unofficial" places as well, and the custom was still the same; most boys naked, most girls not. But there were always a few girls that, usually in the name of "equality", or sometimes on a dare, would also go naked, which we boys greatly enjoyed. If parents were around, as they often were, any naked girls generally got harassed and told to "put something on", but it seemed no one cared about us boys.

MBthong said: "One question to those of you lucky to have been around at the time; what about erections? We’re they frowned upon and had to be hidden or were they just ignored?" My experiences wer when I was younger, so I can't say. I do remember older boys being around, but don't recall any "issues". By the time I reached puberty, this had all pretty much stopped.

There were occational erections, and the boys with them generally were embarased. We were told the first day that if this happened, just take a break, and keep things out of sight until it passed. Some of the youngest kids had no idea what the teachers were talking about, especially since they used terms like wood, and spit up instead of penis or ejaculation (a reason for mandatory expulsion from the program) pun intended. What was interesting was that the girls who were comfortable with their brothers or their male friends or whatever swiming nude did not seem to mind seeing the erections. They just took them in stride, just like they had the whole nudity things. I assume this is because they had been raised not to be shamed by the male body and perhaps had been in other situations where boys were nude or sported boners. Today's parents probably could be arrested for explaining to their daughters about the various conditons or reactions a man's body can be in. If girls knew more now, and understood sex better, there probably would be fewer unwanted children and probably less sexual experimentation as well. If a guy had "too many" erections or showed himself off a lot with one, he was given a warning, his parents were then called in, and if things kept "up" (pun intended) the boy would be kicked out. We didn't seem to have exhibitionists all that much back then, but if a man got an erection if front of the others, children or adults, they were permanently kicked out and supposedly reported to the cops. I don't know if this really happened, or if it was just something made up like the "magic" pee chemical they talked about and occaitonally demonstrated. There was supposedly this chemical that if someone peed in the water, it would make the water turn a color. With the tinted water, the instructors and lifeguards would know who peed in the water because the color would surround the kid. No kid wanted to be surrounded by an area of colored water and so they would go elsewhere to pee. I later learned that this was just some PH monitoring chemical that changed color when the acidity of the water changed. In the fake demonstations they would take some apple juice or other yellowish colored liquid, add a little lemon juice or some other mild acid and then pretend this was pee. They then would add the "pee" and the water (which had the clear PH stuff in it, and it would change colors. In reality any acidic fluid (even real pee) would have worked just as well. One thing I wonder about is if it was healthy and no bg deal for women to see men naked, why has it always been a bit deal for men to see women in the nude. Perhaps the desires to be able to be nude in front of men was part of the reason for the two-piece swimsuit and bikini. When thongs were available to both men and women, the thong swimsuit became more popular on women but not as much as on men.

Always swam naked at the Y and later on the swim team practices in high school too Loved it

Looking at those old photos it is kind of surprising the nonchalant looks of the adult women. Nowadays you could not get them in the picture like that! Can you imagine such events on social media?

The Y has changed a lot! I go with my kid so we go to the family change room and due to covid there's only 4 people in the pool at a time and I was the only one with a kid (and therefor the only ones in the change room) so we had a nice long hot naked shower before we left. Then a lady who works there approaches us as we're leaving and tells us that nudity is not allowed in the change rooms. I don't remember anyone else coming in but apparently she or someone did come in to use the bathroom while we were in the shower. Even if it was busy I don't think using the showers naked should be banned, we are getting too conservative. Well, I guess next time I'll wear my thong.

Nudity is not allowed in the change rooms, shower? How does one dress out or dress into clothes without getting naked. How does one take a shower without nudity involved. That is an insane policy. I wouldn’t be going to this place with those policies.

Haha, crazy eh? To be clear this was the FAMILY change room. There is also a MENS changeroom and a WOMENS change room. The family change room has separate stalls you are supposed to change in, although the showers are public. If it was busy it would be weird to be nude in front of moms, dads and kids but we were literally the only family booked for that time slot.

I've also been there with my family when a mom and child came into the showers while we were using them and took just her bottoms off to wash them. Grabbed a towel afterwards and did the same with her top. It's not like it never happens. Maybe females can get away with it easier than male's. It's a shower, I would expect nudity and I would also expect people to not stare or care.

There was a time when swimsuits were made of wool and people did not swim that much or if they did they had changing rooms connected to the shore. People walked out to them and jumped in nude. This was probably before 1920 from what I understand.

Male nude swimming MANdatory! https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2023/06/03/naked-swim-instruction/

Another article about required nude at ymca- single sex pool https://whyy.org/segments/remember-when-nude-swimming-was-required/