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“Blending memoir, history, and social commentary, 'The Pool Is Closed" offers the reader a stunningly perceptive look at the meaning of race, inequality, and community in contemporary America. Palmer writes with humor, verve, and elegant clarity. She connects past with present, explores many conundrums of modern urban life, and relates her deep affection for aquatic environments. A thoroughly enjoyable read.” ~Jeff Wiltse, author of "Contested Waters: A Social History of Swimming Pools in America"Join us at the The Garden Club at Wild Heaven Brewery West End to celebrate the Atlanta author Hannah Palmer's follow-up to her acclaimed 2017 book "Flight Path." Palmer will discuss "The Pool Is Closed: Segregation, Summertime, and the Search for a Place to Swim" with AJC senior editor Mike Jordan on Wednesday, October 16, at 7 PM.
This event is free and open to the public. Copies of the book will be available for purchase at the venue.
About the Book
In 2018, while teaching her kids to swim and working on urban river restoration projects, Hannah S. Palmer began a journal of social encounters with water. As she found herself dangling her feet in a seemingly all-white swimming pool, she started to worry about how her young sons would learn to swim. Would they grow up accustomed to the stubbornly segregated pools of Atlanta? Was it safe for them to wade in creeks laced with urban runoff or dive into the ever-warming, man-made swimming holes of the South? Should they just join the Y?
But these weren’t just parenting questions. In the South, how we swim—and whether we have access to water at all—is tied up in race and class. As she took her sons pool-hopping across Atlanta, Palmer found an intimate lens through which to view the city’s neighborhoods. In "The Pool Is Closed," she documents the creeks behind fences, the springs in the sewers, the lakes that had all but vanished since her own parents learned to swim. In the process, she uncovers complex stories about environmental history, water policy, and the racial politics of public spaces.
Nothing prepared Palmer for the contamination, sewage, and bodies that appear when you look at water too long. Her search for water became compulsive, a way to make sense of the world. "The Pool Is Closed" is a book about water: where it flows and where it floods, who owns it, and what it costs. It’s also a story about embracing parenthood in a time of environmental catastrophe and political anxiety, of dwindling public space and natural resources. It chronicles a year-long quest to find a place to swim and finding, instead, what makes shared water so threatening and wild.
About the Author
Hannah S. Palmer is a writer and designer from the Southside of Atlanta. She earned an MFA in creative writing from Sewanee: The University of the South, and she is the author of "Flight Path: A Search for Roots beneath the World's Busiest Airport" (2017). Through essays, memoir, and public art projects, she explores how hidden histories and wildness shape our lives in the urban landscape.
About the Conversation Partner
Mike Jordan is an Atlanta-based multimedia journalist and senior editor leading Black Culture coverage at The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Jordan's career began in Atlanta's music industry at LaFace Records and evolved to reporting for national and international publications, including The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, National Geographic, Rolling Stone, and others. Jordan has also served in top editorial leadership positions at Cumulus Media, Cox Media Group, Resy, Thrillist -- where he launched the Atlanta edition in 2008 -- and Atlanta radio station WVEE, where he served as digital program director. Jordan is also a board member and executive committee member for the Atlanta Press Club, and a 2023 James Beard Foundation Award finalist.
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Wild Heaven Beer (West End Brewery & Gardens), El Tesoro, 1010 White St SW, Atlanta, GA 30310, United States,Atlanta, Georgia
