History of Swimming at High

Swimming had a sporadic start as a sport at High. 

A swimming club was formed in 1891, occasional races were held and a school swimming carnival took place on 11 December 1891. 

Late in 1900, a swimming club was again formed and about 75 boys joined. In order to encourage this movement, the Headmaster, John Waterhouse requested that the Department allow the School to take off the afternoon of Thursday 14 April 1901 to allow that the “swimming season may be closed by holding a school swimming carnival”.

Another swimming carnival was held in March 1906. This was said to be an “undoubted” success “from every aspect but the financial one”. One of the early problems with sport organisation at High was that there was no local community to target for fundraising. The boys and masters were therefore left to make up the deficit from this carnival. While swimming continued as a sport, this deficit prevented further attempts at a carnival in the immediately succeeding years.

There was a school swimming championship race in February 1909.  The school’s swimming champion, Jimmy Resleure, who had lost a leg years earlier in a tram accident, became an internationally known swimmer, and was almost selected in US Olympic teams on two separate occasions.

The Record, which commenced publication in December 1909, confirms a swimming club was still active in 1909, with boys going out to the Bondi baths on the School’s sports afternoon in summer until 1912. However, there was no school carnival in this period.

The formation of the School Union, in 1913, provided the support necessary for an annual carnival. The first of these took place on 12 March 1913 and the school swimming carnival continued annually (with a few exceptions) thereafter.

Support from staff has always been important. One particular contribution is that of Mrs Vivienne McCredie whose hard work and devotion to swimming, from the late 1970s until her retirement in 1997,  involved working behind the scenes at school carnivals keeping all the records of races and determining the finalists.

Combined High Schools competition

Swimming became a Combined High Schools sport in 1916 for the under 16 (“junior”) and under 14 (“juvenile”) competitions. The senior competition was inaugurated in 1917. High enjoyed reasonable success in the competitions, winning premierships at the annual CHS carnivals as follow:

• Senior: 1923, 1930, 1931, 1932, 1933, 1939, 1945.
• Junior: 1917, 1929, 1930, 1931, 1932, 1934, 1935, 1941, 1946, 1947.
• Juvenile: 1922, 1928, 1932, 1933, 1934, 1936, 1939, 1943, 1944, 1945, 1947, 1948, 1949.

High was also the Champion School on aggregate points at the CHS carnival in 1939, 1941, 1943, 1944, 1945, 1946, 1948, and 1949.

The School’s CHS success began to wane in the 1950s. The increase in high schools across the State led to the establishment of zone and regional carnivals from 1957. 

Great Public Schools competition

Originally, the GPS decided, in 1903, to allot an open championship swimming event to any GPS school that wanted to host it and allowed them, at their own expense, to award GPS silver and bronze medals to the first and second place getters. 

After High’s entry into the GPS in 1906, Sidney Alfred Willsher (1918) was the first  High boy to win a GPS swimming event - the 100yds Championship at the Grammar carnival in 1918. 

In 1958, High started hosting the GPS 220 yards medley race. The GPS Medley Relay race continued as a feature of High’s annual carnival into the 1980s. 

Yet, despite invitation races held at school carnivals and invitation carnivals held by some schools (from at least 1969), there was no official GPS competition and not all schools competed. 

High held its first GPS invitation carnival as a centenary event on 4 March 1983. High did not hold another invitation carnival for the rest of the decade. After lobbying in 1989 by a group of five boys - Ben Hart, Keiran Hathorn, Vaughan Williams, James Coghill and Daniel Gal - High again hosted an invitation carnival on 24 March 1990.

The more demanding period of GPS involvement, starting in the 1990s, coincided with the term of Phillip Day (1965) as an enthusiastic and encouraging swimming master in 1989-2003. 

The official GPS swimming competition started in 2003, with a series of championship carnivals now mostly held at the Sydney Olympic Park Aquatic Centre. 

Old Boy swimmers

A number of Old Boys have represented Australia in swimming at Olympic and Empire/Commonwealth Games, including: 

• Ernest Henry (1923) at the 1924 Olympics; 
• Reg Clark (1932) at the 1934 and 1938 Empire Games; 
• Graham Dunn (1967) at the 1968 Olympics and 1966 Commonwealth Games (Silver - 110yd Butterfly); and 
• Graeme Brewer (1976) at the 1980 Olympics (Bronze - 200m freestyle), and 1978 and 1982 Commonwealth Games (Gold - 4x200m freestyle relay 1978, 4x100m freestyle 1982; silver - 200m freestyle 1978, 4x100m freestyle relay 1978, 4x200m freestyle 1982; bronze - 4x100m medley relay 1978). 

Arthur O’Connor (enrolled 1929) also represented Australia at diving in the 1938 Empire Games.

The school records of some of these Old Boy representatives remained on the books for decades. For example, Graham Dunn’s records for the open 50m freestyle and open 100m butterfly (set in 1967) were still standing in 2001, as were Graeme Brewer’s records (set in 1976) for open 100m, 200m and 400m freestyle.