"Jimmy" Progress Update

I have completed the first draft of the introduction and chapter one and have begun writing the second chapter. This chapter will describe our family roots and what I have discovered from my genealogy research. It will serve as an overview to introduce Jimmy’s childhood and cover the years from his birth in 1909 to 1927 when the swimming team at the Germantown Boys Club was disbanded and he began swimming for the Philadelphia Turners. I will also write about his brother Howard and some of his early escapades.

Additional research is necessary to complete this and subsequent chapters. I will be making a trip to the library at Swarthmore College to see what information I can obtain about the 1938-1972 swimming teams. I plan to contact the Swarthmore swimmers who do not have published email addresses. I want to visit Lower Germantown to locate Jimmy’s early homes as well as to find out if his “second home”, the Germantown Boys Club is still in operation and to see if they have any old records from the 1910’s and 1920’s. A nostalgic tour retracing his childhood may add some atmosphere to the book. I also want to determine if the Philadelphia Turners is still in existence, because Jimmy’s greatest swimming accomplishments took place while he swam for that organization.