https://console.clubsonline.com.au/customitem/attachments/DrTimBarrett_Item4_MaroochydoreSLSCArchiveMaterial.pdf
Through the extensive research of Dr Tim Barrett for his book (The Queensland Swimming Association 1898 - 1998), we are better able to understand now, how swimming and lifesaving was conducted in the period prior to the opening of the Valley Pool in 1926.
As far as this affected the formation and operation of what we now know as the Maroochydore SLSC, it is therefore important to understand our part in that swimming history, as our surf club was not only operating within it (QASA), and the RLSSQ, but also provided to it, one of the early superstars of that sport of swimming (Joe Suosaari).
To follow Joe Suosaari's interesting swimming career, is to understand particularly how quaint and unsophisticated by today's standards were the venues and travel times associated with the conducting of that sport's championships both within Queensland and across Australia.
The link provided gives access to those archival files for any viewer wishing to delve more deeply.
However, we should at least expand here (on this site) on the development of the Maroochydore swimming and lifesaving (surf) club in the second season, through until the 1920s when the RLSSQ began the inter-club competition between this Maroochydore club, Mooloolaba (est. 1922), and Alexandra Headland (est. 1924).
The above photo shows the gathering around Cotton Tree for the 1919 Queensland Swimming Championship race...the 1320 yards Championship of Queensland. (Photo courtesy of the Evans family.)
The photo above is taken from the Suosaari Collection (Courtesy of Anne Margoc, Joe Suosaari and Lily Anderson's daughter). It shows how a group of interstate competitors to an Australian Swimming Championships in the early 1920s did travel at times.
