National Register Listing

Deep Eddy Bathing Beach

a.k.a. Deep Eddy Pool; Eilers Park

301 Quarry St., Austin, TX

Deep Eddy Pool is an historic swimming pool located in Austin, Texas. It was built in 1916 and is now a city park. The pool is significant for its long history as an Austin recreation area and for its excellent example of New Deal-era park architecture.

In 1902 Mary and Henry Johnson, an enterprising brother and sister, turned a natural reservoir of deep cool water in the Colorado River on their father's land into a private recreational facility open to the public. With its easily accessible location at the end of a streetcar line, Deep Eddy thrived, and the Johnsons sold the bathing beach in 1915 to Austin businessman A.J. Eilers. Eilers built a pool on the site in 1916, and manager George Rowley brought in a new level of summertime entertainment with traveling shows, trapezes and movies. When business began to slow during the depression, Eilers sold the park to the City of Austin. Taking advantage of new money available through the New Deal, the City built a limestone bathhouse on the site in 1935. The new bathhouse followed recent trends in park building design; a compact floor plan with group changing areas kept costs down, open air dressing rooms provided ventilation and sanitation, and the rustic limestone exterior allowed it to blend into its natural setting. Today the property is eligible at the local level of significance under Criterion A in the area of Recreation, for its long history as an Austin recreation area, and Criterion C in the area of Architecture for its excellent example of New Deal-era park architecture.

Local significance of the district:
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 2003.