Jim Ellis (swimming coach) facts for kids

James Ellis (born 1947) is an American swim coach. He started the PDR (Pride, Determination, Resilience) swim team in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This team was special because it was one of the first mainly Black swim teams for young people in the city.

Coach Ellis led the PDR team from 1971 to 2008 at the Marcus Foster Recreation Center. Later, from 2010 to 2023, he moved the team to the Salvation Army Kroc Center. A movie called Pride was made in 2007 about his life and the amazing things his swim program achieved.

Jim Ellis's Early Life

Jim Ellis was born in 1947 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and grew up there. He started swimming at the Highland Park pool, which had recently become open to everyone, no matter their race. As a teenager, he worked as a lifeguard at this pool.

The Highland Park pool was very large and used for swim competitions. In the 1950s, there was a legal case about the pool to make sure everyone could use it. The court decided that public pools must be open to all people, regardless of their race.

Education and Swimming

Ellis went to Westinghouse High School, which had many Black students. He was honored by having his name placed on the school's Wall of Fame. He was a competitive swimmer in high school.

He continued swimming in college at Cheyney State. This is a historically Black university near Philadelphia. He also studied mathematics there.

Coaching Career Begins

After college, Ellis wanted to be a teacher but couldn't find a job right away. Since he had been a lifeguard, he became a water safety instructor in West Philadelphia. Later, he became a math teacher at a high school in Philadelphia, where he taught for many years.

The PDR Swim Team

In 1971, Jim Ellis created the PDR swim team. PDR stands for "Pride, Determination, Resilience" or "Philadelphia Department of Recreation." The team started at the Marcus Foster Recreation Center in Nicetown, a neighborhood in Philadelphia.

The PDR team is known as the first African-American swim team in the United States. Coach Ellis helped break down old ideas and made swimming more diverse. His teams were very strong and competed well both locally and across the country.

The PDR program became famous for training top swimmers. Many team members went to the Olympic swimming trials for every U.S. Olympic team from 1992 to 2007.

By the 1980s, swimmers from Ellis's club were earning college scholarships. They also set national age-group records. By 2019, it's estimated that over 100 of his swimmers had received college scholarships.

Many talented swimmers joined Ellis's team because of his great reputation. Michael Norment, for example, became the first Black swimmer on the U.S. national team. He later became a swim coach himself.

Pool Closure and Relocation

Coach Ellis led the PDR team until 2010. In 2008, the Marcus Foster Pool, where the team practiced, closed because the building and pool needed repairs. Ellis then moved his team.

For a while after 2008, Ellis coached his team at La Salle University in Philadelphia. In the summer of 2008, he also taught swimming at Kelly Pool in Fairmont Park.

The Movie Pride

In 2007, the movie Pride was released. This film tells the story of Jim Ellis and how he worked hard to start the PDR team. The actor Terrence Howard played Jim Ellis in the movie and was praised for his performance.

The movie showed some challenges, but Ellis said that facing "nasty prejudice" from other coaches, as shown in the film, was not very common for his team. However, he knew that some forms of unfair treatment did exist.

Coaching at the Kroc Center

In the spring of 2010, the Salvation Army Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center opened in Nicetown, Philadelphia. This was the same neighborhood where Ellis's PDR team used to practice. The Kroc Center was a huge project, costing $108 million.

The center has a special pool called the Jimmy Moran Competition Pool. It's 25 meters long with 10 lanes, perfect for lessons, water polo, and swim meets. Jim Ellis helped design this pool. The movie Pride, released a few years earlier, may have helped bring attention to Ellis's program, leading to this amazing new pool.

Since late 2010, Ellis has been the coach of the Salvation Army Kroc Aquatics (SAKA) program at the Kroc Center. As of 2023, the pool and Ellis's program have been open and active almost all the time. Sometimes, his program is still called the Philadelphia Department of Recreation Swim Team, even though it's no longer directly connected to the city department. By 2011, he had a competitive team of about 40 swimmers and also worked as the Aquatics Director.

Awards and Honors

Jim Ellis has received many awards for his work:

• In May 2007, he received the President's Award from the International Swimming Hall of Fame.
• In 2015, he was named one of the "30 Most Influential People In Swimming Over the Past 30 Years" by USA Swimming and Speedo.
• In 2019, Ellis was inducted into the American Swimming Coaches Association Hall of Fame.

See also

• Inspirational instructors portrayed in films
• Pride (2007 film)