The Polar Bear Plunge: Time to Chill Out for the Special Olympics

Almost anywhere there is cold water, it seems, this January and February, human "polar bears" are running and leaping to jump in. Many folks are taking the plunge especially to help raise funds for the Special Olympics.

It was 1916 when Gustav Marx and his merry band of friends decided to plunge into the icy waters of Lake Michigan in January. The local newspaper dubbed the daring (depending on your perspective) young men "polar bears" and the rest, as they say, is history. Jim Stingl, writing in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, tells of Garth Gaskey, a resident of Brookfield, whose 2008 polar plunge will be his 57^th consecutive Lake Michigan-in-January swim. Gaskey also will celebrate his 80^th birthday five days after the plunge.

Today, various versions of the "Polar Plunge" are becoming a winter tradition. Maine has its Lobster Dip, a New Year's Day polar plunge that , according to Phil Geelhoed, president and CEO of Special Olympics Maine, has raised about $40,000 a year for Special Olympics. Several other events will be held in Maine, as well as up and down the coasts, including in Virginia Beach, Virginia---and even in Hawaii.

In Hawaii, land of the gentle trade winds and sparkling aquamarine waves, the water had to be iced down to qualify (sort of) as a polar plunge. North Carolina boasts the "first state-wide polar plunge" in North Carolina history. The mass jump will be held in N.C.'s beautiful Outer Banks.

Not all cold-water dips are fund-raisers. Sometimes they occur because, apparently, the call of the chill is irresistible. Scientists at the Natural History Museum's (U.K.) research bases in the Antarctic take a polar plunge, not once, but four times a year! That would be in what passes, in the Antarctic, for spring, summer and mid-winter, and at a time known felicitously as "the Last Sunset."

Occasionally, as in 2007, the Antarctic "swimming hole" takes quite a bit of preparation. That year, the base engineer had to use a gas-powered auger with a five-foot long drill bit to poke through ice that had formed over the previous three months. Then a large heating coil was submersed in the hole to prevent ice from overtaking "plunge" plans yet again.

(The Antarctic scientists don't completely rough it, however. Once the swimming hole is opened, a cabin on a sled---called a "wanagan" by New Zealanders---is brought in and a stove for heat is fired up inside.)

A participant in one of the 2008 Antarctic plunges said it was very frightening---to post a photo on her blog of herself in a bathing suit, that is---not to jump into the icy sea. At least in the Antarctic, there will never be complaints such as those that appeared in a December 18, 1922 article in the local Milwaukee paper: the headline read, "Polar bear club disgusted to find lake too warm."

Many folks will be taking the plunge---literally---for good causes this year. While it is a very cold event, it is a warm-hearted way to support the work of the Special Olympics and other groups that work to make the world a better place.

Sources:

Jim Stingl, "Polar plunging boasts long, chilly history in Milwaukee," Journal Sentinel.

Clarke Canfield, "Chilling out! Polar plunge fund-raisers proliferate," Times Argus.

"Looking for more information on Polar Plunge?," Polar Plunge.

"North Carolina Polar Plunge," N.C. Polar Plunge.

"Antarctic Conservation Blog: Polar Plunge," Antarctic Conservation Blog of the Natural History Museum.

"Antarctic Conservation Blog: Taking the Polar Plunge," Antarctic Conservation Blog of the Natural History Museum.