Published: June 15, 2009 09:22 am      

35 years on duty

London man begins 35th year as lifeguard at Levi Jackson Park pool

By Carl Keith Greene / Staff Writer

He’s an ex-Marine, retired school teacher and will turn 56 next week.

He’s spent more years as a lifeguard at London’s Levi Jackson Wilderness Road State Park’s swimming pool than any other guard.

Steve House settled into a guard’s chair Sunday afternoon and his trained eyes skimmed the surface of the pool, ready to give aid to those who might be in distress.

Thirty-five years ago, he made his first survey of the pool, opened in about 1958, and one of the first state park swimming pools in southeast Kentucky.

House said he’s seen lots of changes at the park and the pool during his time there, which accounts for more than two-thirds of the time since the first pool was built.

In fact, he’s seen the recent destruction of the 1958 pool, which was financed mostly by local contributions, and the construction of a modern water park-type facility.

House said he liked the old pool better than the new one. “In the old pool, you could dive, it was deeper.”

He said he’s spent the summer at the pool because, “I’ve always loved the swimming pool and I’ve loved to swim. I just love to be around the water.”

In fact, he’s passed that love of water on to his children and even a niece and nephew.

His sons, Jared, 24, and Shay, 21, are spending the summer as beach guards at Hilton Head and Myrtle Beach, respectively.

“They’re wanting me to come down there and I’m seriously thinking about it,” he said, and added, “I might just do that.”

His niece, Sarah Wilder, is a guard at Trooper Island and nephew Seth Wilder is a guard at the London Country Club.

His time at Levi Jackson has been quite rewarding, he said.

“I have met a lot of wonderful people out here,” adding that a lot of people he met at the old pool still come back to the new pool.

That includes people who routinely come to the park campground who brought their children to the pool and those children are bringing their children to the pool.

“I’ve made a lot of friends out here, people from Ohio, Missouri, Virginia, Tennessee,” he said, then recalled some of the guards he’s worked with, Barbara Curry, Nancy Allf and Marcia Combs.

Speaking of the guards he’s working with now, he said, “These guards are great guards. They weren’t even born when I started.”

House said if he had to do the job all over again, he’d jump at it.