The West Pier’s Incredible Fancy Divers and Aquatic Entertainers

This talk tells the story of the West Pier’s famous fancy divers and aquatic entertainers. Their shocking performances of dives such as ‘Back Forward’, ‘Swallow’, ‘Wooden Soldier’ and ‘Moleberg’ were magnets enticing people to hurry to the end of the pier to marvel and wonder at daredevil feats.

The watery entertainers included women such as the famous Zoe Brigden as well as Gladys Powsey and Victoria May. There were male divers too: early on they were self-proclaimed professors - Reddish and Powsey - while later Walter Tong became a seaside star. The Great Omani (Ron Cunningham) continued the tradition into the 1960s.

Fred Gray is the West Pier Trust’s honorary historian and author of Walking on Water: the West Pier Story published almost 30 years ago.