Underwater in the Chicago River’s main branch downtown — a space not many humans, even locals, are familiar with firsthand — Tim Rooney, 57, felt the rumble of the “L” in his bones.
On Sunday morning, he and some 260 others became some of the first people to swim in the waterway again after almost a century. It was the culmination of an event more than a decade in the making, raising $100,000 for research into ALS, a fatal neurological disorder known also as Lou Gehrig’s disease, and celebrating the river’s recovery from its polluted past.
“This was a great chance to see the city in a completely different way,” Rooney said. “And all the work that’s gone into it, to allow this to happen, to clean it up, is so much progress.”
Growing up in the Beverly neighborhood on the city’s far Southwest Side with his five siblings — two who would later develop ALS as adults — Rooney always wanted to jump in the river as a kid, undeterred by its murkiness after he once accidentally fell into the Cal-Sag Channel and didn’t feel ill afterward.
Dressed in bathrobes, waves of swimmers lined the riverwalk between the Clark and Dearborn Street bridges shortly after morning light broke early Sunday. They stripped to their bathing suits and, to the cheers and hoots of onlookers, jumped in. Doug McConnell, co-founder of event organizer and nonprofit A Long Swim, shook hands and shared hugs with those waiting to swim.
A spectator yelled to a man preparing to dive in: “Don’t drink the water!”
“That’s my buddy Don,” said Chris Sheehan, 59, of Oak Park. But he wasn’t worried. “I’ve swum a million open-water races,” he added, “in other rivers that are way worse.”
The Chicago River is the cleanest it has been in a long time, especially since the Clean Water Act of the early 1970s. In 2011, the Environmental Protection Agency declared the river safe for swimming. Today, the waterway is home to a thriving economy and restored wildlife, including migratory birds, beavers and turtles, as well as almost 70 species of fish — up from fewer than 10 in the 1970s.
“It’s hard to build empathy for the environment,” said Bridget Coughlin, CEO of the Shedd Aquarium. “We do it with animals. The brilliance of this is to do it with sports.”
Margaret Frisbie, executive director of advocacy nonprofit Friends of the Chicago River, said she felt proud of the waterway’s bounceback. Earlier this month, the organization received a global award — the Thiess International River Prize — in recognition of its work to restore the 156-mile Chicago-Calumet River system.
“It’s a fine day for the city of Chicago,” Frisbie said, eyes trained on the swimmers.
Homer Glen native Becca Mann, 27, crossed the finish line first in the 2-mile race, followed closely by Isaac Eilmes of Colorado Springs and Luke Maurer of Chicago. In the 1-mile swim, top finishers included Levy Nathan of Chicago, Olivia Smoliga of Tempe, Arizona, and Ryan Goble of Oswego.
Mann, a two-time national champion, also finished first in last year’s iteration of the Chicago River Swim, which was relocated to Lake Michigan when, just two months out, city transportation officials denied a permit citing safety concerns.
“Honestly, I love swimming in rivers,” she told the Tribune on Sunday. “I think that they’re the most interesting, because you have currents, you have bridges, you have turns. Just being in the river, surrounded by the city, was really an incredible experience.”
After watching the river get dyed for St. Patrick’s festivities and going on river cruises as a kid, daydreaming of swimming in it, it felt “surreal” to finally be able to do so, Mann said.
“It makes Chicago even better for me,” she added.
Despite progress in the river’s water quality, organizers took safety precautions, including daily monitoring three weeks before the event for fecal coliform bacteria to ensure it met federal standards.
Drinking or coming into contact with elevated levels of this bacteria can cause an upset stomach, vomiting, fever or diarrhea in people, like some athletes experienced last year after the open-swimming competitions of the Paris Summer Olympics in the iconic Seine River.
After the finish line — a yellow arched float under the Clark Street bridge — participants could wash off with a sprinkler before receiving their medals. “They should provide some soap,” a swimmer told medical emergency staff with a laugh.
During the race, Rooney fought off some nausea — not because of the water quality, but due to the physical exertion. Over an hour into the race, he approached the finish line. A stranger on the riverwalk encouraged him, calling out Rooney’s bib number: “Let’s go, 185!”
Sunday became his longest open-water swim.
“I was like, ‘All right, if we’re in the river, I’ll do 2 miles,’” he recalls thinking, “because how many chances do you get to spend that much time in the river?”
Between swim strokes, his thoughts were mainly with his family, which has been tragically marked by familial ALS several times. His aunt died of the disease in the 1990s, and then his mother in 2000. One of Rooney’s three brothers, John, was diagnosed in 2013 and died in 2016. Another one of his brothers also has it now.
“It’s genetic — it’s 50/50. I’m a (gene) carrier. It gets sent down to my kids, same with my nieces and nephews,” Rooney said. “So, they were on my mind during my swim. I’m doing this and I’m respecting all the people that I know and love that have died from it. But, really, I’m working toward finding a cure that’s going to sustain the rest of my family, for generations.”
Rooney’s three children and his brother Pete, 59, cheered him on Sunday.
“He’s an inspiration to everyone,” Pete Rooney said.