OUTDOOR SWIMMING POOLS (LIDO) ON THE VLTAVA RIVER IN PRAGUE FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE 19TH CENTURY UNTIL THE BEGINNING WORLD WAR II
Abstract
We can talk about the first outdoor swimming pools in our area at the beginning of the 19th century, when swimming and bathing of the general public as well as active leisure time began to develop. At the first, people used the right places in the wild, until later they began to build mainly on the rivers lidos and rivers baths, which offered people, besides the opportunity to swim, also other sports and social activities.
The gradual extinction of swimming pools and river baths took place at the end of the first half of the 20th century, mainly due to the construction of artificial swimming pools and thanks to the construction of the Vltava cascade, which led to the cooling of water in Prague and, last but not least, the building development capital city. After a short introduction to the emergence of outdoor swimming pools in the territory of today's Czech Republic at the beginning of the 19th century, the article outlines an overview of the most famous swimming baths and swimming pools in the Czech lands and Czechoslovakia until World War II.
The main part of the thesis is an overview of swimming baths on the Vltava river in Prague, which originated from the beginning of the 19th century until the beginning of World War II.