Rule number one was no bare feet on the beach after dark once the sparklers were lit. This wasn’t a Club rule, per se, but a highly recommended parents’ rule. Nobody wanted anybody to step barefoot on a hot sparkler wire. But no matter how many times we were reminded, there were always kids who would get caught up in the moment, forget the rule, and they'd learn the hard way. The biggest advocates of rule number one were those who had learned for themselves the consequences of ignoring it.
The Fourth of July at the Ponte Vedra Club in the 1970s was always a well-anticipated culmination of several weeks of preparation and several days of celebration leading up to one annual activity-packed day at the Surf Club. For everyone involved, it demanded attention, and to many, it seemed as if every family with a Club membership was on hand for the annual summer summits being held at the beach. It was a PV tradition as old as the Club itself and one of the seasonal benchmarks that defined continuity in the community when everyone came together as one family to celebrate the national holiday, Ponte Vedra Style.
The schedules and itineraries would circulate ahead of time and members were required to register for activities. Most years through the ’70s, there was an adult cocktail party on the night of July 3 with drinks around the adult pool and dancing on the Surf Club patio. Youth activities began in earnest at 9 a.m. on the Fourth with an open swim in the Olympic Pool. Marco Polo was scheduled for 9:30 a.m. at the shallow end. “See Aquatics Director for more details.”
Early mid-mornings on the Fourth were reserved for practicing for the “Crazy Diving Contests” that were scheduled for later in the day. The Surf Club’s signature high dive was removed in the late ’70s, but before that, high-dive cannonballs were a very popular Fourth of July competition worth entering. It required, however, nerves of steel. Crazy Diving was an opportunity for some creative aquatics with points awarded for entertainment.
By 11 a.m. nearly every lounger in the Olympic pool area was being used in some form or fashion. Parents, grandparents, visitors and guests sunned, tanned and enjoyed a day of elevated poolside service. A pool bar would be set up as an amenity on the grass nearby and bloody marys, planter’s punches, gin and tonics, and whiskey sours began to be poured at 11:15.
A box of short pencils would always be sitting next to the stack of hand-written charge slips filled out with names, member numbers and guest signatures, all the things needed to start a tab. Kids could sign for cherry Cokes, which were a Club staple made with real cherry juice, Coca-Cola, and topped with cocktail cherries.
When the competition began, the funniest dives easily won the early rounds until finally the Craziest Diver was crowned by the lifeguards after winning votes by popular applause. Extra points were always given for the largest splashes and the worst form.
Competition for the biggest cannonball was intense. The biggest jackknife splash was another category. There were ribbons for just about everything on the Fourth of July: depth endurance, cross-pool swimming races, beach runs and relay races. It was all packed into six hours of exercise with events on the beach, in the surf and at the pool.
Some considered the Fourth to be the busiest day of each year at the Surf Club and very little was ever left to chance. By the Bicentennial, the “Spirit of ’76” had become a day-long Olympic Pool Rally that few would forget.
The activities director had built rest periods into the schedule in the form of ribbon ceremonies for each activity. “Lunch on the Patio” was a planned activity that required pre-registration. For kids, the Olympic pool would be “closed” for lunch from noon until 1 but adults were allowed to free swim.
When the pool reopened, it was nearing time for the most anticipated activity of the afternoon. Over lunch, the lifeguards had moved two of the large wooden lifeguard chairs into place on either side of the pool’s deep end. The chairs’ two front legs would sit over the raised pool edge and directly on the skimmer drain that ran around the pool’s perimeter.
With a lifeguard on each chair, whistles would clear the pool of lingering swimmers and kids would begin gathering along the sides at the deep end. Patio service had brought a few large ice-cold watermelons up to a table behind the lifeguard shack where the lifeguards had been coating them generously with Vaseline. The watermelons were then be carried around to the diving boards where other lifeguards lifted them up, walk to the end of the boards and toss them into the center of the deep end.
When everyone was ready, and with the melons mid-pool, the head lifeguard would stand, cup his hands around his chin and nose and ask in a loud voice, “Are you ready?” A collective reply would fill the pool area. The Surf Club manager, dressed in a blue blazer, would begin waving to encourage more cheering and some of the dining room and kitchen staff dressed in all white would come up and stand at a distance to watch the tradition unfold.
The goal, of course, was to get the watermelons to the shallow end of the pool, up the steps, and to the tables that maintenance had set up there. “Watermelon on the Beach” was the afternoon’s capstone and it would be served to anyone who asked for a slice until 4 p.m. It was a Fourth of July tradition at the Surf Club for as long as there had been a pool at the Club to swim in.
The head lifeguard drew everyone’s attention. “Get set!” All the kids would lean forward, some standing in the skimmer drain with their toes curled over the edge as they were taught on the swim team, while others stood on the pool’s raised edge to gain a height advantage. The lifeguard raised his whistle and when the sound hit our ears, everyone jumped in, dove in or belly-flopped in. Immediately the cheering around us was muffled as our heads went under water. The swarm headed towards the watermelons with arms, legs and splashing feet converging on the center of the pool.
The first ones to their marks were always surprised by how slippery Vaseline-coated watermelons floating in water could actually be. Some kids wore swimming goggles, some wore white tee shirts, and a few had zinc oxide on their noses. Girls were still required to wear swim caps up until the mid-’70s. The athletic swimmers found the slippery prizes elusive. Some tried to make waves and push the melons with the force of water without touching them. Others tried grabbing them while treading water, thinking they could use the melons as a flotation device. The watermelons had other plans. As soon as someone had their arms around one of them, it would slip out and bob in a different direction.
It didn’t take long to figure out that teamwork was the only way to get the prize to the shallow end, or at least shallow enough to get a firm foothold. Once we could touch bottom, the tall kids had the advantage. Teamwork was still needed to cradle the watermelons, and it was nearly impossible to go it alone. Everyone was using their own technique and most years it took at least three kids per melon to get them up the steps. Some kids headed to the sides out of sheer exhaustion, and the lifeguards stood by with rescue poles just in case.
The adults were cheering and encouraging the teamwork, offering experienced suggestions where they could. The excitement turned to focused effort as each watermelon found its own carrier supported by a team of other kids making sure the fruit made it to the table. A nearby cart with half a dozen watermelons fresh from the refrigerators in the kitchen stood by just in case one or more of the trophies slipped from the young arms and hit the red bricks.
The entire activity exhausted everyone, and it took several minutes to reorient ourselves once the watermelons had made it safely to the carving tables. The Vaseline was wiped off with white towels, and in a well-rehearsed staff sleight of hand, aided by redirection supplied by the lifeguards distributing white towels to wet swimmers, the floating watermelons were replaced by the fresh standby watermelons moments before staff began slicing.
As kids, it was up to each of us to manage our own emotions that the taste of fresh watermelon signaled the day was now winding down. The pool was reopened for open swimming until 5 p.m. and the Club staff had now turned their attention to setting up tables on the playground. The Fourth of July at the Surf Club in the 1970s was a day to remember.
Families would begin arriving for the fireworks at dusk to set up their beach chairs facing north. The double-high chain link fence gates from the Boulevard to the playground next to the adult pool would be left open and remain open all evening. Both Club and Association staff and volunteers would control access. It was a night when members of the Ponte Vedra Community Association and members of the Ponte Vedra Club would come together as they did annually for the Lighting of the Christmas Tree on Lake Vedra. It was a community event for the entire community, but names of those attending needed to be in the roster for entry.
Jacksonville Beach would start their fireworks first and their display would become the backdrop for the PV fireworks. The rockets were the responsibility of the PV Volunteer Fire Department with the help and support of the Surf Club lifeguard staff. The set-up always began a few days earlier with a portion of the beach being roped off near the Catamaran Garage on the far side of the playground.
Club maintenance would set up a wooden platform as a temporary deck on the beach off the Surf Club between the high tide mark and the bulkhead. This would become the launch pad for the Ponte Vedra fireworks. The volunteer firemen would begin lighting the canisters midway through the Jacksonville Beach display and, from our vantage point, it seemed the entire beach was lit up in celebration. We could see Atlantic Beach fireworks and Mayport’s. When our fireworks began, the spark plumbs were sent out over the surf, trailing off into the tide. Looking north towards Jax Beach as he was lighting a fuse one year, John Veal said laughing, “This should get their attention.” Seconds later the aerial flash and boom out above the waves rivaled anything the Flag Pavilion and Jax Beach Lifeguard Station could offer.
Almost everyone had a sparkler in hand, and some kids held four in each hand while running on the beach and waving their arms in giant circles. By 9:45, the display was over and the long day was done. Everyone would head out through the playground gates and towards their cars that had been parked anywhere the adults could find a spot.
Occasionally, we'd see some of those parents walking slowly with one of their kids who was walking even slower and with a slight limp. “OK. So. Remember,” the parent would console, “next year, no bare feet on the beach after dark once the sparklers are lit.” It was Rule Number One for any Fourth of July celebration in the 1970s and applies to this very day in this smartly casual place of all places, Ponte Vedra Beach. Happy 250th, America.
