Dr. Tom's Lifeguard Chronicles

By Dr. Tom Griffiths

As an adolescent, Dr. Tom Griffiths’s first job was picking up papers on a beach for twenty-five cents an hour. He then turned a part-time seasonal job as a lifeguard into a meaningful and lucrative career, saving lives along the way. Dr. Tom’s Lifeguard Chronicles details how he became one of the world’s leading water safety experts
over a career spanning nearly four decades.



Lifeguards, professionals in the recreational field, and anyone who enjoys water sports and water safety will want to read Dr. Tom’s Lifeguard Chronicles. Young adults entering the field of aquatics, those already in the field, and those anticipating retirement will also find this book to be valuable. Teaching professionals how to
excel in their careers, Dr. Tom’s Lifeguard Chronicles includes a plethora of tips from the award-winning author, speaker, and inventor who was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame as the Paragon Award Winner.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Aquatic Safety Research Group
• Release date: Mar 31, 2024
• ISBN: 9781662940507

Book preview

Prologue

Long-lasting Memories

Ahh, the ole swimming hole. Secluded as they are and often accompanied by a babbling brook, fish, frogs, and turtles, people are drawn to these magical gems in nature. But along with these beautiful aquatic settings come hazards and risks. Cliffs inviting jumpers and divers, hidden stumps and rocks hidden under the surface, and snakes and snapping turtles are often accoutrements to the swimming hole. Murray’s Laurel Lake was a glorified and improved swimming hole with many of the above features but without the hidden dangers. Many who liked swimming holes were attracted to Murray’s because it offered an improved, safer, and supervised alternative.

The Griffiths family at their swimming hole before discovering Laurel Lake (me, Walter, Ray, Monica, and mother Frances)

Whether it’s an ocean, beach, or dammed-up stream, many people enjoy the chemical-free environment and the allure of nature. When I spoke to lifeguards and members of Laurel Lake alike, I was inspired by how passionate their recollections were. Murray’s Laurel Lake most definitely fostered unique bonding, experiences, and memories—at least it felt that way to me and many others. I continue to dream about Murray’s in my sleep, usually hoping it will reopen for my children, my grandchildren, and me. Perhaps the most popular memory was of the best-tasting hot dogs and hamburgers they had ever had. But all those I spoke with unanimously agreed that they didn’t just love the place; they loved everything about it and wished they could go back to Murray’s in the summer. It is for these people and these memories that I write this book.

Look for Dr. Tom’s Tips at the end of each chapter for additional insights and inspirations!

Chapter 1

A History of Frank Murray’s Laurel Lake

Manual Labor

It was a man-made lake in the most literal sense, dug by hand prior to the Great Depression and then enlarged once again by hand around the Second World War. It all started with farm dwelling number one hundred and forty-seven, owned by sixty-two-year-old John Murray, who was married with three children in the 1930s. John Murray was born in Ireland in 1862 and became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 1884. His wife Margaret was fifty-one years old at the time. Daughter Jenivive, twenty-one, was a schoolteacher. His son Francis (Frank), eighteen, was a chauffeur, and his son Peter, sixteen, was a machinist. While all the children could read and write, none were enrolled in school. It makes sense they did not attend school, at least for Frank, because he was one of the few people in that region to own a car. No time for school when you had wheels at that age. In fact, when he wasn’t chauffeuring, he was driving up and down spacious Central Avenue in neighboring Pearl River, New York, picking up very impressed girls for free rides in his car. He loved speeding down the famous road that still today hosts soapbox derbies.

He soon learned that he could easily outrun the cops, who were on horseback. Unfortunately for young Frank, the cops quickly learned that while his old vintage Ford could beat them going down Central Avenue, his car was no match for their horses going back up Central Avenue on his retreat to Jersey.

Perhaps most significant about the hardworking Murray family was their location on twenty-one precious acres of farmland, blessed with natural pure water springs and a pond on the plot, which they owned since before the turn of the century in 1897. It wasn’t just any pond but the body of water that would come to foster memories, careers, families, and save lives far into the future. Starting out simply as a farm pond for thirsty cows, it did not seem as significant as that water would later become.

An Evolution

During the 1930s to 1960s, the pond began evolving at the hands of the Murrays. It was man-made in every sense of the word by the family, future creators of Frank Murray’s Laurel Lake. The Murray family did not believe in women working, and there were absolutely no machines involved in the project. It was picks, shovels, and wheelbarrows. The fact that the lake was dug by hand must have nurtured the pride in ownership the family, and especially Frank, possessed.

Frank realized there was money to be made at the lake, but his father had owned two bars that had burned down to the ground. Frank was the one who would take charge of the entire operation. Why other family members were not as interested in being part of the Laurel Lake management team is still a mystery to me. It’s evident why the lake would come to be known as Frank Murray’s, but remains a mystery how the Laurel got injected into the name.

While there was abundant sand trucked in and water to swim in at Murray’s Laurel Lake, John Murray’s fear of fire was so great that he would not allow any additional buildings to be constructed on his property. The only building used during that time was the front entrance to the park, which was the Murray family’s converted farmhouse. The original farmhouse was two stories high but was lowered to one story when it was dedicated solely as the club’s entrance.

Photo of Murray’s taken from earthen dam, circa 1940s

The pond evolved into a popular swim club over many years because it was blessed with pristine natural springs. Originally, the lake was known simply as Murray’s Club, but as it grew, it officially became Murray’s Laurel Lake. Some continued to call it Murray’s, some simply called it Laurel, and others called it Jerry’s, as the entrance to the lake was in Jerry’s Villa’s parking lot.

Initially, the expanded farm pond almost touched Summit Avenue to the north, but as the popularity of the automobile and alcohol grew simultaneously, so did the propensity for tossing beer and alcohol bottles from the speeding cars directly into the lake, to the amusement of many except those working at the lake. One for the road seemed socially acceptable and was religiously practiced. In order to prevent it from becoming a depository of bottles, the lake was eventually moved away from the road by hand. The sandy, spacious north beach replaced the shallow waters of the northernmost portion of the lake.

After completing the final configuration of the swimming lake, gravel was wheelbarrowed in, again by hand, in order to place firm, clean gravel on top of the squishy mud. Tons of gravel were moved by wheelbarrow over the beach on narrow and wobbly wooden planks and dumped into the muddy lake. This work was performed day after day for an entire summer, and the laborers consumed huge lunches and liquids in an attempt to squelch the hunger generated by the arduous and repetitive manual labor.

The labor did not stop there, as the lake would be expanded by hand a couple more times. The lake was further dug out and enlarged to provide an even more appropriate swimming hole for John Murray’s grandchildren. The shimmering lake could be seen by passing motorists and pedestrians who noticed the delightful watering hole, even though it was now beyond throwing distance. Before long, it attracted strangers passing by who started dropping in to swim and cool off during the hazy, hot, and humid days of summer. Those who swam in the glorified farm pond paid John Murray a quarter for the privilege.

By the early 1940s, the swimming hole dug by the Murray men and their friends was generating more income than an entire calendar year of farming. Certainly running a swim club in the summer months would be more attractive and enjoyable than working on a farm year- round, the Murrays must have thought.

A Business Boom

The popularity of Murray’s Laurel Lake grew immensely after World War II, along with the economy. Returning veterans learned to appreciate swimming during survival skill training while in the service, producing baby boomers who needed to be taught how to swim by their water-safety-conscious parents. As the pond became more popular, it was expanded once again to accommodate more swimmers, using shovels and wheelbarrows until it reached a water surface area of approximately three acres. This is when a true transformation took form, as John Murray replaced the family farm with a private, for-members-only swim club that was half pool, half lake and eventually resembled a waterpark with rafts, slides, diving boards, and fountains.

Frank, being quite the entrepreneur, completely took over the swimming operation in 1945 when his father died. He creatively ran the lake operation until his own death in 1977. Frank constructed many buildings and amenities throughout his tenure. I can remember him repeatedly saying, My father would turn over in his grave if he knew I was building this, as he referred to a new bathhouse or an expansion of the dance hall or concession stand. Most of the first buildings added at the lake were recycled from soldiers’ barracks at Camp Shanks in Blauvelt, New York. These wooden barracks were constructed during World War II to house soldiers prior to shipping them off to fight in Europe. Mr. Murray must have been one of this country’s first true recyclers. Everything placed on the Laurel Lake property always seemed to come from another time and place.

A Not-so-Distant Memory

After Frank’s death, his wife, Grace Murray, and their granddaughter, Diana, assumed responsibility for running the private swim club until it closed in 1982, sold as a site for an office development. In the 1950s and 1960s, Murray’s hit a peak of fifteen hundred members, many of whom still reminisce about the place. I worked there (although much of my time there felt more like pleasure) with my brothers and sister for most of the 1960s on the beach patrol, picking up papers on the beach and garbage in the picnic groves, and in later years, finally becoming a lifeguard. But now, rather than a lovely lake with a fountain, stream, picnic groves, and woods, Murray’s was replaced by one hundred and thirty-seven thousand two hundred and fifty square feet of office floor space and a paved parking lot large enough for five hundred and fifty-nine cars.

In August 1977, before the office plans were approved, a five-member zoning committee of the planning board actually recommended to the mayor and the council of Montvale, New Jersey, that the township purchase the private swim club to provide more land for recreation. This wasn’t such a crazy idea because the borough’s 1969 master plan indicated that Montvale did not possess adequate public or semipublic land, but committee members had strong reservations about the town operating a swim club. As it turned out, the town of Montvale never purchased the land, nor did members or Murray’s employees who showed interest in preserving the space for their children and grandchildren.

Paradoxically, during the same period, Lake Nanuet, a private membership lake very similar in size and scope to Murray’s, experienced a positive outcome. Just a few miles across the border in New York, Lake Nanuet was being obtained by the town of Clarkstown for the recreational pleasure of residents. Rather than buying the lake, Clarkstown was actually paid $41,500 to take it along with twenty-seven acres of parkland. Developer John Knutsen gave the lake, parkland, and money to Clarkstown after purchasing the former Townline Day Camp. Why? In return for the lake and land, Knutsen was allowed to build a housing development around the park with greater density than was formerly allowed; instead of constructing one hundred and thirty-eight homes, he was allowed to build one hundred and sixty-six after the trade. It sounded like a good deal. I thought, Now that’s progressive thinking for you, but why couldn’t Montvale have done the same with Frank Murray’s Laurel Lake?

Belatedly, perhaps members of Murray’s knew that the lake could have and should have been saved. Lifeguards remember with great sadness the very last day Murray’s Laurel Lake was open to the public in September 1981. Members and guests held hands around the lake and simply would not leave because their love of the place was so strong. When the traditional seven o’clock announcement came over the loudspeaker for the last time, warning the lake was closed, people sat down on the rafts and refused to exit the water. The lake that was cherished by thousands could not come to an end this way. Not knowing what to do, the lifeguards called the police, but apparently darkness finally ushered the patrons out.

Bruce Brotherston tells of the final demise of Murray’s in this partial excerpt as it appeared in my book, Better Beaches (1999):

People today still remember those hotdogs, hamburgers and French fries as being the best they have ever tasted.

The Guilfoyle family members treated us lifeguards like royalty. I thought about how nice those people were to the lifeguards, and how on really hot and busy days when we couldn’t make it over for our mandatory ice-tea breaks because there were too many people in the water, they would hand deliver cold drinks to all four guard towers around the lake, to our row boats and roving lifeguards as well.

You never forget people like that. I can still smell the perfume Mrs. G. would have on as she would grab me by the ear or cheek and drag me over for some spareribs or chicken that she and her husband Bill had prepared especially for the guards. Well, most of the giant old apple tree was still there but of course the tables were gone, and in the damp night air, in the beam of my light, I could make out the natural lay of the land and I hear and saw and smelled my own youth as if it all just happened. Laurel Lake could do that to you, though.

Of course, you could only sit in the head lifeguard chair if you earned the right. While all other lifeguard chairs were made of wood, the head lifeguard chair was made of steel and anchored directly into the concrete perhaps transferring and instilling a sense of power to those who were chosen to sit there.

Unfortunately, Bruce died during the final stages of this book’s writing. His positive experiences and fond memories of Frank Murray’s Laurel Lake are not uncommon. People who went there to work or swim simply loved the place and are impassioned about their sense of loss of such a fun, clean, and safe family place. It was a time when kids rode their bikes just about everywhere, and if there was a destination too far to bike, hitchhiking was considered a safe alternative. Many kids often walked to Murray’s with their bathing suits tightly wrapped and rolled up into towels before the popularity of backpacks. Motorists approaching any pedestrian with a tightly rolled towel tucked up under the armpit would slow down and then yell out, Going to Murray’s? Kids would happily jump into the Good Samaritan’s car and arrive at Laurel Lake safely a few minutes later.

Pool Popularity

As society changed and became significantly more fast-paced, and with the popularity of swimming pools that were chemically treated, family membership lakes dissipated throughout the country in favor of the pristine waters of pools with organized activities and teams. Although sad and indeed unfortunate, this was not an uncommon fate for popular swimming holes. Pools simply became more popular. There were more pools with better water quality, safety, and amenities. Buildings, pools, and other sites replaced many open-water recreation areas. Pools were being constructed at a much faster rate and therefore were much more accessible.

As for pools, homeowners had two choices in terms of construction. Aboveground pools were basically round or square plastic pools that could be inexpensively purchased and installed by the homeowner. Our family went through two of these smaller pools before discovering Murray’s. Only families with better incomes could afford in-ground pools, which were mostly larger rectangular pools and made expensively in the ground with lots of reinforced concrete. A diving board was often situated in the deep end, while either steps or a ladder were located in the shallow end. Diving boards are less likely to be installed in residential pools today because catastrophic neck injuries easily result from a diving board used in a relatively small body of water.

The popularity of swimming pools grew steadily after the Second World War and continues to this very day. Residential swimming pools came into fashion because the latest vinyl liner technology used to construct aboveground pools inexpensively was now incorporated into in-ground swimming pools with spectacular results. Vinyl-liner, in-ground pools could be built beautifully and inexpensively at half the cost of the concrete in-ground pools. Private membership lakes simply could not match the convenience, cost, privacy, and water clarity that could now be found in one’s own backyard.

Once backyard pools abounded, public and private commercial pools were not far behind. Diving boards, swim teams, and lifeguards who inadvertently babysat children for free were advantages of the swim clubs that also began to dot the country during this period. It was only a matter of time before home pools and public pools would replace the aquatic recreation once provided by many man-made and natural lakes where the water was left unfiltered and chemically untreated in most cases. While Frank Murray tried his best to circulate the water and disinfect it daily with hundreds of HTH chlorine tablets and later with gas chlorine, he could not filter it and keep the water nearly as pristine as what was found in the heated, chemically treated, and filtered water in swimming pools popping up across the United States. Plus, age-group swim teams in public and private pools became the rage, and this was, and continues to be, a clean sport that attracts all genders. Finally, an increased demand to escape the hectic life in crowded cities created a desperate need for land for both businesses and homes.

Strangely Familiar

In 2010, I sat down in the offices of attorney Neil Weiner to give a deposition as an expert witness testifying on behalf of the plaintiff for a drowning case that occurred a few miles downstream from Montvale at the Graydon Pool in Ridgewood, New Jersey. Graydon Pool was a man-made lake very similar in design and operation to Murray’s Laurel Lake. Ironically, Mr. Weiner’s offices sat directly on top of where Murray’s Laurel Lake used to be.

During that deposition, I testified for the plaintiffs, opining the city of Ridgewood did not come close to protecting guests in Graydon Pool the way we did at Murray’s Laurel Lake nearly fifty years earlier, thereby contributing to the drowning death of a ten-year-old Korean boy. Later I gave the same opinions in front of a judge and jury.

After my testimony, the original jury verdict awarded $10 million to the family of the drowned boy. It was especially rewarding for me to testify in the Graydon Pool trial because many of my professional opinions in this case were formulated back in the 1960s and 1970s at Murray’s Laurel Lake, proving how truly progressive Frank Murray’s water safety practices were.

Postcard picture of Laurel Lake, circa 1950s Note the in-water lifeguard chair in the middle and large slide in the background.

Resources:

1920 Federal Census, Montvale, New Jersey

Bergen Record, August 31, 1977.

Journal News, Nyack, New York, Saturday, December 11, 1971.

Dr. Tom’s Tips

• Passion, hard work, and having a vision can go a long way.

• Recognize and maximize the impact