Synchronised swimming is a relatively modern sport, with evidence suggesting that German males first performed water-born artistic routines in the 1890s.
By the start of the 20th century, women took up the discipline, and Australian Annette Kellerman became a popular entertainer in the US with her displays of water acrobatics in glass tanks of water, while American Katherine Curtis continued to develop the art during World War I.
The sport developed throughout North America as water ballet, ornamental swimming, water shows and water pageants during the 1920s and 1930s, while the term ‘synchronised swimming’ is first though to have been coined by former Olympic gold-winning US swimmer Norman Ross at a much-heralded display at the Chicago World Fair in 1934.
The MGM studio’s spectacular and elaborate ‘aqua musicals’ of the 1940s and early 1950s further popularized water-born acrobatics. Their biggest star was Esther Williams, who would have represented the US as a swimmer in the 1940 Summer Games had they not been cancelled. She portrayed Annette Kellerman in the 1952 film Million Dollar Mermaid.
Rules had been developed for synchronized swimming contests prior to World War II, but weren’t recognized by swimming’s governing body, the Federation Internationale de Natation Amateur, until 1952. It first feature on an international swimming schedule for the 1973 World Championships in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.
Synchronised swimming – which is open only to women competitors – became an Olympic sport in the Summer Games in Los Angeles in 1984, with solo and duet events. The original were replaced by an eight-woman team event in Atlanta, USA, in 1996, but the duet returned to the Olympic program to join the team event for the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney, Australia.