author

Frank Eugen Dalton

An early swimming instructor and method-maker, he wrote a practical guide that treats swimming as both a lifesaving skill and a learnable craft. His work has endured as a window into how the sport was taught in the early 1900s.

1 Audiobook

Swimming Scientifically Taught: A Practical Manual for Young and Old

Swimming Scientifically Taught: A Practical Manual for Young and Old

by Frank Eugen Dalton, Louis C. Dalton

About the author

Frank Eugen Dalton is known for Swimming Scientifically Taught, a practical manual on swimming for beginners and experienced swimmers alike. In the book, he is identified as an instructor in scientific swimming at the Dalton Swimming School and as the originator of the Dalton Method.

His best-known book was published by Funk & Wagnalls and appears in multiple early editions, including 1912, 1918, and later reissues. The work also includes a chapter on advanced strokes by Louis C. Dalton, suggesting that swimming instruction was a shared family effort.

Reliable biographical details about Dalton himself are scarce in the sources I found, so much of his public legacy comes through this book. Even so, the manual makes his interests clear: careful technique, water safety, and the idea that swimming should be taught in a systematic, practical way.