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the council pool and we were
at council schools.’ Gillian’s
husband Tim, who had
learned to swim ‘in a clean
sea-water pool in the West
Country’, got a shock when
he had his first school lesson
in Reading in 1948 at the
King’s Meadow men’s pool:
‘the water was cold, green
and dirty, the surfaces slimy,
the surroundings falling to
pieces.’