I grew up in Levittown at a time when it was teeming with kids. There were always enough kids in the neighborhood for a pick-up game of baseball or touch football and on summer nights many of us would look forward to sleeping out in a tent in the back yard at one of our houses. It took us a full year of saving S&H Green Stamps to get our tent.

Although “sleeping out” is the term we used for our parents, there really wasn’t much sleeping involved and one of the favorite pass times in the middle of the night was midnight swimming. In Levittown’s early days, the Levittown Public Recreation Association (LPRA) managed public swimming pools, one of which was located in the Indian Creek section.

One particular summer night after talking until midnight we decided to head to the pool. Now absolute stealth was required, because the pool manager lived on Ice Pond Road right across from the pool and was known to be a light sleeper. There was a wooded lot across from the pool that extended behind the nearby church and transitioned into a field of tall grass and weeds. We made our way to the woods and took off all the clothes we didn’t need for swimming; in my case, I was down to my underwear. After climbing the fence, we quietly slipped into the pool and swam around. When it was time to go, the older brothers among us decided as a dare that we each had to jump off the diving board before we could leave knowing that this would wake up the pool manager. Unfortunately, I was the last to jump and the inevitable happened – my underwear were left behind when I hit the water.

There was no time to search around and I got out of the pool as quickly as I could, raced to the fence and delicately climbed over. When my feet hit the ground on the other side of the fence, I looked up to see the police car coming down Emilie Road. Being naked gave me extra incentive and I ran as fast as I ever did across the parking lot toward the woods. However, it’s not easy to outrun a police car equipped with a V8 Police Interceptor engine. There was no time to retrieve my clothes in the woods and I ran through the field of tall grass (ouch) with the police car in hot pursuit. I’m not sure if they gave up the pursuit because of the rough terrain in the field or that they were laughing so hard at a 12 year old kid running naked through the field, but I was thankful none-the-less.

I spent some time in a nearby yard, catching my breath and looking up at the stars before I headed back to the woods to retrieve my clothes and make my way back through the neighborhood to our tent. I elbowed my way through the other sleeping kids and fell fast asleep. I gave up the sport of midnight swimming for good that night.

Written by Kevin Deeny and originally published in the Levittown Leader

[Author’s note: This true story became an important part of the opening in a novel set, in part, in Levittown – Snow Pictures]

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