Kellermann was one of the first women to wear a one-piece bathing costume, instead of the then-accepted pantaloons, and inspired others to follow her example. Kellerman's swimming costumes became so popular that she started her own fashion line of one-piece bathing suits. Kellermann helped popularize the sport of synchronised swimming, and authored a swimming manual. She appeared in several movies, usually with aquatic themes, and as the star of the 1916 film A Daughter of the Gods was the first major actress to appear nude in a Hollywood production. Kellermann was an advocate of health, fitness, and natural beauty throughout her life.

Early life[edit]

Annette Kellermann (frequently recorded as "Kellerman") was born in Marrickville, New South Wales, Australia, on 6 July 1886,^[1] to Australian-born violinist Frederick William Kellermann, and his French wife, Alice Ellen Charbonnet, a pianist and music teacher.^[1]

At the age of six, a weakness in Kellermann's legs necessitated the wearing of steel braces to strengthen them. To further overcome her disability, her parents enrolled her in swimming classes at Cavill's Baths, a tidal swimming pool in the North Sydney suburb of Lavender Bay. By the age of 13, her legs were practically normal, and by 15, she had mastered all the swimming strokes and won her first race. At this time she was also giving diving displays.^[1]

Swimming career[edit]

In 1902, Kellermann won the ladies' 100 yards and mile championships of New South Wales in the record times of 1 minute, 22 seconds and 33 minutes, 49 seconds respectively. In that same year, her parents decided to move to Melbourne, Victoria, and she was enrolled at Mentone Girls' Grammar School, where her mother had accepted a music teaching position.^[1]

During her time at school, Kellermann gave exhibitions of swimming and diving at the main Melbourne baths, performed a mermaid act at Princes Court entertainment centre, and did two shows a day swimming with fish in a glass tank at the Exhibition Aquarium. In June and July 1903, she performed sensational high dives in the Coogee scene of Bland Holt's spectacular, The Breaking of the Drought, at the Melbourne Theatre Royal.^[1]

Kellermann and Beatrice Kerr, who was billed as "Australia's Champion Lady Swimmer and Diver", were rivals, although Kerr's public challenges to Kellermann to meet in a competitive race went unanswered.^[2]

On 24 August 1905, aged 19, Kellermann was one of the first women to attempt to swim the English Channel. After three unsuccessful swims she declared, "I had the endurance but not the brute strength." The first woman to attempt a Channel crossing had been Austrian Baroness Walburga von Isacescu, in September 1900.^[3] She had made a previous effort the month before alongside Ted Heaton, but had to leave the water several miles out in the channel due to sea-sickness.^[4] Kellermann later challenged and defeated von Isacescu in a Danube race.^[5]

While in London a short was filmed of her performances and shown back in Australian venues.^[6] Kellermann helped popularize the sport of synchronised swimming after her 1907 performance of the first water ballet in a glass tank at the New York Hippodrome.^{[citation needed]}

In 1911, she appeared on Broadway in the title role of “Undine”, an aquacade specialty conceived by composer Manuel Klein and performed in repertory with the popular musical Vera Violetta that featured Al Jolson.^[7]

Swimwear line[edit]

Kellermann advocated for the right of women to wear a one-piece bathing suit, which was controversial at the time.^[8] According to an Australian magazine, "In the early 1900s, women were expected to wear cumbersome dress and pantaloon combinations when swimming." Although Kellermann later claimed to have been arrested at Revere Beach for public indecency while wearing one of her suits, there are no contemporary police records or news stories corroborating this, and she appears to have invented the incident.^[9]

The popularity of her one-piece suits resulted in her own line of women's swimwear. The "Annette Kellermans", as they were known, were the first step towards modern women's swimwear.

Film career[edit]

In 1916, Kellermann became the first major actress to perform in a nude scene when she appeared fully nude in A Daughter of the Gods.^[10][11] Made by Fox Film Corporation, A Daughter of the Gods was the first million-dollar film production. Like many of Kellermann's other films, this is now considered a lost film, as no copies are known to exist.

The majority of Kellermann's films had themes of aquatic adventure. She performed her own stunts including diving from 92 feet (28 m) into the sea and 60 feet (18 m) into a pool of crocodiles. Many times she would play mermaids named Annette or variations of her own name. Her "fairy tale films", as she called them, started with The Mermaid (1911), in which she was the first actress to wear a swimmable mermaid costume on film, paving the way for future screen sirens such as Glynis Johns (Miranda), Esther Williams, Ann Blyth (Mr. Peabody and the Mermaid) and Daryl Hannah (Splash). Kellermann designed her own mermaid swimming costumes and sometimes made them herself. Similar designs are still used by the Weeki Wachee Springs Mermaids, including her aquatic fairy costume first introduced in Queen of the Sea (1918, another lost film).

Kellermann appeared in one of the last films made in Prizma Color, Venus of the South Seas (1924), a US/New Zealand co-production where one reel of the 55-minute film was in colour and underwater. Venus of the South Seas was restored by the Library of Congress in 2004 and is the only feature film starring Kellermann known to exist in its complete form.

John Gale Alden (1884–1962) was an American naval architect and the founder of Alden Designs.

Early life[edit]

Alden was born in Troy, New York, in 1884, one of eight children, only four of whom survived. His family's summer holidays were spent on the Sakonnet in Rhode Island and on the Narragansett Bay,^[1] where he first learned about boats. He sailed his sister's flat-bottomed rowing boat using an umbrella as a sail and was said to be inspired by the local fisherman and regattas.

At 18 years old, his father died, and Alden made the decision to train as a naval architect. He took courses at MIT and apprenticed with prominent naval architects Starling Burgess and Bowdoin B. Crowninshield,^[2] starting in 1902.^[3]

In 1900, his family moved to Dorchester, Massachusetts, where the Grand Banks fishing schooners were docked. These were said to have inspired his later designs. A compulsive doodler, as a child he made countless sketches of the boats that were later to make him famous.^[1]

Career[edit]

In the winter of 1907, Alden undertook a voyage that would define his distinctive design trademark: The schooner Fame, owned by the Eastern Fishing company, had to be returned to Boston when her crew of 23 men had gone down with smallpox and there was no one left to sail her. Alden put together a crew of four inexperienced young men and one old salt to undertake the journey. During the weeks that followed, they experienced extreme winter weather of up to 60 mile an hour winds that turned the salt spray to ice. The boat, and the crew, completed the journey and it is said that Alden learned how to design a boat that would be resilient in heavy seas and what was important when a vessel was short-handed. His subsequent designs are admired not only for their grace and elegance but for their stability and for the fact that they can, generally, be sailed single-handedly if necessary.^[4]

After the voyage, Alden returned to the Burgess offices but left in 1909 to found his own company, the Alden Design Office in 1909.

Alden Design Office[edit]

The early years of the Alden Design were difficult and were said to have put a strain on his finances and on his marriage, which broke down after only three years. By 1917, business had improved and the offices were doing sufficiently well that by the 1920s, the office was able to employ specialist draftsmen. The approach Alden took was to discuss requirements with the clients, make the initial sketches and then hand over the work to the draftsmen to complete. Therefore, each boat designed by the firm had Alden's individual style stamped on.

By 1932, the Alden Design Office was known around the world due to the success of the "Malabar" designs in the offshore racing scene:

• In 1923, Malabar IV won the Newport–Bermuda race
• In 1926, Malabar VII won the Newport–Bermuda race
• In 1932, Malabar X won overall, with his other designs occupying the top four places.

When Alden achieved his great success in the 1932 Bermuda race, the yachting world was already beginning to see changes in boat design. Olin Stephens' yawl Dorade, which had already won the Transatlantic and Fastnet races in 1931, was the winner in Class B. Stephens followed this with another winner, Stormy Weather which won the 1936 Transatlantic Race to Norway by a wide margin.^[5] This began a long-running rivalry between the two designers. Alden's designs depended on a certain amount of inside ballast, where Stephens' adopted the idea of all-outside ballast. Stephens' boats were of lighter construction, using steam bent frames, rather than the sawn frames favored by Alden. Over the next thirty years, Alden designed over 1,000 boats,^[4] including the 63.5' schooner When and If for General Patton, though of them all the 744 Rena series have been considered the most admired. Eric Hiscock, a leading yachtsman of the time, said "I considered her to be one of the most beautiful yachts I had ever seen…quite perfect in (her) sea-kindly grace and harmony".

Al Spalding became the firm's chief designer after World War II, and occupied the role for fifteen years.^[6]

The Calais-Mediterranée Express was a French luxury night express train which operated from 1886 to 2003. It gained international fame as the preferred train of wealthy and famous passengers between Calais and the French Riviera during the interwar period. It was colloquially referred to as Le Train Bleu in French (which became its formal name after World War II) and the Blue Train in English because of its dark-blue sleeping cars.

History[edit]

Calais Nice Rome Express[edit]

In December 1883 the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits (CIWL) created its second luxury train after the Orient Express was introduced in June of that year. Due to contracts between CIWL's competitor, the Pullman Company, and the owner of the Mont Cenis Pass Railway, the Società per le strade ferrate dell'Alta Italia, CIWL could not use the Fréjus Rail Tunnel, so CIWL was forced to use the longer route along the Mediterranean coast. The connection between Paris and Rome was introduced as Calais Nice Rome Express,^[1] but it was reduced to Calais Nice Express after only one year.^[2] In 1885 several Italian railways merged and CIWL could buy the routes formerly served by Pullman, which made it possible to use the shorter Mont Cenis Railway. The train was to be named Rome Express. In order to serve British customers, the Calais-Mediterranée Express was created in 1886, but it lasted until 1890 before the Rome Express made its first journey.

Calais-Méditerranée[edit]

The Calais-Méditerrannée Express was introduced in the 1886/1887 winter timetable. In the winter of 1889/1890 the name was changed to Méditerrannée Express, due to the creation of the Club train.^[3] At the southern end, the route was extended to San Remo, but the portion north of Paris was taken over by the Club Train. After the introduction of the Rome Express on 15 November 1890, the two trains were combined between Paris and Mâcon.^[4] South of Mâcon, the Rome Express continued during the night over the Mont Cenis railway and the Méditerrannée Express ran through the Rhone valley to the Côte d'Azur.