The Near North Side neighborhood was packed with people for more than a century. People need places to hang out and cool off in Omaha’s hot summers, and in the late 1940s the City of Omaha Parks Department decided to build a swimming pool to serve the community.

By this point, the Logan Fontenelle Housing Projects had become strictly segregated, with white families living in one area while African Americans lived in another. However,  North 24th Street, which was North O’s main street, was still successful. Businesses packed the corridor from Cuming Street northwards, with customers, workers, owners and others swarming the area constantly. Old timers called it a “sea of glass on a sunny morning” because of the amount of gleaning glass shining at them!

Meeting An Unmet Need

The city’s established pools like Peony Park, Miller Park and elsewhere maintained discriminatory policies against allowing Black people to swim. The City decided to build a pool to serve African Americans as well as whites, and located it across the street from the housing projects.

Not content with merely opening a pool, the City merged the pool plans with the design of a new Kellom School. The plan called for the school building to operate as a city-run community center on weekday evenings and on the weekends. Combined with the pool, the thinking was that the community’s recreation needs would be satisfied. This model was heralded nationally for being progressive.

Val Peterson, the governor of Nebraska, officially opened the pool in 1952.

Who Used the Pool?

The Kellom Pool was used by both Black and white people throughout its existence. In the early decades, when the projects had people of both races living there, the pool was used by many residents. In the later decades when the projects became strictly African American, whites came to the pool from other neighborhoods through nonprofit and government programs.

As an integrated pool serving low-income folks and others, there was charity involved. A nonprofit called United Community Services collected used swim trunks to give away at the pool. For several decades the ARC facilitated swim days at the pool for its clients, and the City of Omaha used the pool for summer programs through the 1990s.

There were near-calamities at the pool. In 1955, a 33-year-old woman named Frenchy Jones was spotted lying on the bottom of the pool near the diving board. A lifeguard and another swimmer pulled her out and the lifeguard gave her artificial respiration. When the fire department arrived in five minutes with a resuscitator, she was revived and taken Children’s Hospital, where she recovered.

In 1956, a beginning swimmer named Robert Wisner, Jr. went into the 12-foot deep end of the pool. Rescued by a 17-year-old lifeguard named Tom Pedersen, Wisner was give artificial respiration until a fire department rescue unit arrived. Wisner survived, and Pedersen was recognized for saving his life.

The pool was used to bolster the community’s self-image. For instance, Whitney Young, Jr. was the Executive Director of the Omaha Urban League in the 1950s when he personally brought groups of Black youth to the pool to swim. He later became an acclaimed national civil rights leader,

For a few years, the City of Omaha Parks Department held a competition to select “the Queen of Kellom Pool.” According to the Omaha World-Herald in 1961, “Nearly 12 hundred persons attended the beauty contest.” That year, the final competition was held at the Music Box, where 15-year-old Gail Elaine Moss was crowned the Queen of Kellom Pool. The next year, Pam McCullum, a 17-year-old from Topeka, won the award.

Kellom Pool is Demolished

In 1980, the City of Omaha received a $250,000 grant from the National Park Service Urban Park Recovery Program to cover the cost of renovating the swimming pool and bathhouse.

The Kellom Pool was closed by the City of Omaha in the late 1990s. The site was demolished at the same time the Logan Fontenelle Housing Projects were demolished, in 1998.

Today, the site of the pool is part of the Omaha-Council Bluffs Metro Area Planning Agency’s parking lot. Part of the Omaha Lead Superfund Site, the entire Near North Side neighborhood continues to struggle to overcome years racist policy-making, systematic discriminatory practices, and social abandon. The absence of the Kellom Pool serves as a cherry on top of a bitter desert of benign neglect by the City of Omaha and Omaha’s civic leaders.

You Might Like…

• A History of Kellom Elementary School
• A History of Omaha’s N. 24th Street
• A History of Omaha’s Logan Fontenelle Housing Projects
• A History of Redlining in Omaha

MY ARTICLES ABOUT THE HISTORY OF OMAHA’S NEAR NORTH SIDE
GROUPS: Black People | Jews and African Americans | Jews | Hungarians | Scandinavians | Chinese | Italians
EVENTS: Redlining | North Omaha Riots | Stone Soul Picnic | Native Omaha Days Festival
BUSINESSES: Club Harlem | Dreamland Ballroom | Omaha Star Office | 2621 North 16th Street | Calhoun Hotel | Warden Hotel | Willis Hotel | Broadview Hotel | Carter’s Cafe | Live Wire Cafe | Fair Deal Cafe | Metoyer’s BBQ | Skeet’s | Storz Brewery | 24th Street Dairy Queen | 1324 N. 24th St. | Ritz Theater | Alhambra Theater | 2410 Lake Street | Carver Savings and Loan Association | Blue Lion Center | 9 Center Variety Store | Bali-Hi Lounge
CHURCHES: St. John’s AME Church | Zion Baptist Church | Mt. Moriah Baptist Church | St. Philip Episcopal Church | St. Benedict Catholic Parish | Holy Family Catholic Church | Bethel AME Church | Cleaves Temple CME Church | North 24th Street Worship Center
HOMES: A History of | Logan Fontenelle Housing Projects | The Sherman | The Climmie | Ernie Chambers Court aka Strelow Apartments | Hillcrest Mansion | Governor Saunders Mansion | Memmen Apartments
SCHOOLS: Kellom | Lake | Long | Cass Street | Izard Street | Dodge Street
ORGANIZATIONS: Red Dot Athletic Club | Omaha Colored Baseball League | Omaha Rockets | YMCA | Midwest Athletic Club | Charles Street Bicycle Park | DePorres Club | NWCA | Elks Hall and Iroquois Lodge 92 | American Legion Post #30 | Bryant Resource Center | People’s Hospital | Bryant Center
NEIGHBORHOODS: Long School | Logan Fontenelle Projects | Kellom Heights | Conestoga | 24th and Lake | 20th and Lake | Charles Street Projects
INDIVIDUALS: Edwin Overall | Rev. Russel Taylor | Rev. Anna R. Woodbey | Rev. Dr. John Albert Williams | Rev. John Adams, Sr. | Dr. William W. Peebles | Dr. Craig Morris | Dr. John A. Singleton, DDS | Dr. Aaron M. McMillan | Mildred Brown | Dr. Marguerita Washington | Eugene Skinner | Dr. Matthew O. Ricketts | Helen Mahammitt | Cathy Hughes | Florentine Pinkston | Amos P. Scruggs | Nathaniel Hunter | Bertha Calloway
OTHER: 26th and Lake Streetcar Shop | Webster Telephone Exchange Building | Kellom Pool | Circus Grounds | Ak-Sar-Ben Den

MY ARTICLES ABOUT CIVIL RIGHTS IN OMAHA
General: History of Racism | Timeline of Racism
Events: Juneteenth | Malcolm X Day | Congress of White and Colored Americans | George Smith Lynching | Will Brown Lynching | North Omaha Riots | Vivian Strong Murder | Jack Johnson Riot
Issues: African American Firsts in Omaha | Police Brutality | North Omaha African American Legislators | North Omaha Community Leaders | Segregated Schools | Segregated Hospitals | Segregated Hotels | Segregated Sports | Segregated Businesses | Segregated Churches | Redlining | African American Police | African American Firefighters | Lead Poisoning
People: Rev. Dr. John Albert Williams | Edwin Overall | Harrison J. Pinkett | Vic Walker | Joseph Carr | Rev. Russel Taylor | Dr. Craig Morris | Mildred Brown | Dr. John Singleton | Ernie Chambers | Malcolm X
Organizations: Omaha Colored Commercial Club | Omaha NAACP | Omaha Urban League | 4CL (Citizens Coordinating Committee for Civil Rights) | DePorres Club | Omaha Black Panthers | City Interracial Committee | Providence Hospital | American Legion | Elks Club | Prince Hall Masons | BANTU
Related: Black History | African American Firsts | A Time for Burning | Omaha KKK | Committee of 5,000

MY ARTICLES ABOUT THE HISTORY OF PARKS IN NORTH OMAHA
PARKS: Adams Park | Miller Park | Fontenelle Park | Kountze Park aka Malcolm X Park | Hummel Park | Levi Carter Park | Jefferson Square Park
PRIVATE PARKS: Danish Vennelyst Park | Omaha Driving Park | Charles Street Bicycle Park | Omaha Rod and Gun Club | Carter Lake Club
AMUSEMENT PARKS: Kiddieland and the Pleasure Pier | Lakeview Amusement Park | Cortland Beach | Trans-Mississippi and International Exposition
RELATED: Kellom Pool | Omaha Municipal Beach | CCC Camp | Ames Avenue Bridge