In 1974 Oregon Masters Swimming had its first State Championship. As far as I know there are three swimmers from that meet who are still involved in OMS: Ron Nakata, Alice Zabudsky, and myself. Karl VonTagen was also there, but I have not seen him at a meet for a while.
I bring this up as the Aqua Master archives only go back as far as 1981. What happened to the seven years of reports that the Old Barnacle wrote about the early history of OMS before 1981?
Is there someone out there who still has early Aqua Master articles on their computer; or you may have put them on a back-up drive that still works? If so, please check and send copies to Alice and our webmaster who can add them to our current website.
These records are invaluable for those of us who were there, and to anyone who might want to see what swimming was like so long ago. I take great delight that I swam in the same events as Lavelle Stoinoff and Jim Bigler, and in the first national championship meet held at Mt. Hood Community College.
2019 marks the 45th year that OMS has been officially in operation. Hopefully in 2024 some recognition of 50 years of Masters swimming in Oregon could be made. It would help a great deal if we could find Old Barn’s records of the first years of OMS swimming.
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Put on your schedule for this coming summer to swim at Whiskeytown near Redding, September. 8. Let’s help the Redding area recover from their catastrophic fire.