Changes

The next big change for the beach was the railway beginning in the 1840s and going through a boom period in the 1850s-1860s. Towns such as Blackpool in northwestern England began to transform as popular sea-side resort towns with large boardwalks built to accommodate the middle classes now visiting beaches. The railroad made accessing these towns not only easier but also affordable for many people. Queen Victoria popularized beaches by building her holiday home in the Isle of Wight, near a beach. Working conditions began to evolve with holiday periods given and factories beginning to institute one week in the year where they would close for maintenance. This created the opportunity for beach holidays to develop, although this mostly involved visiting a beach but often not swimming in it. Most of the actual time spent at a beach town was not on the actual beach but rather the boardwalks or if they people were on a beach other, non-swimming activities diverted people's attention. Fairs, carnivals, and showmen would all compete for people's money and time. At the beach, the bathing machines began to be installed on beaches along some of the towns. However, what prevented large numbers of people using the beach was that beach activity was usually considered not a family activity but rather the sexes were separated since it was considered immodest to swim in the presence of the other sex and in public. In factWomen were often frowned upon for swimming in general, even with the bathing rolling machines and swimming was often particularly seen as unacceptable for a married woman. Laws in England, such as in Suffolk, stated that a woman could not bathe in “a place at which any person of the male sex, above the age of 12 years, may be set down for the purpose of bathing." Swimwear, which covered nearly the entire body, was still considered immodest to see in view of the opposite sex. This made the beach less of a family activity and more an activity between friends or individuals wanting a swim (Figure 2).<ref>For more on activities at a beach in the Victorian period, see: Ferry, Kathryn. 2009.<i> The British Seaside Holiday</i>. Shire History 4. Oxford: Shire. </ref>

Although the UK is not known for having the best beach weather, it was English love of the beach that started a trend of mass tourism where people began to create and visit beach resorts in Europe and later the United States and North America. In France, the French Riviera began to be developed as a popular beach area, particularly Nice. Interestingly, it was often visiting British in these towns rather than locals that led to the initial development of the French Rivera. However, in the 1870s , more people began to see the beauty and fun of going to the beach and throughout Europe beach towns began to develop. Monte Carlo, the famed gambling place, developed as a town visited by tourists in the 1870s to enjoy the seaside views and beach with gambling developed as an alternative diversion. Interestingly, it was continental Europeans who began to also influence bathing and swimming culture. In Europe, attitudes towards nudity and exposing one self were far more lax than in Britain. The idea of stripping to minimal clothing or even being nude in going for a swim developed already by the 1870s, although this was not universal and many frowned upon this even in Europe. In the United States, the late 19th century also began the trend of seaside towns and resorts. Florida, New Jersey, and other coastal places began to develop resort towns. In England alone, there were 100 resort towns with more than 50,000 people by the end of the 19th century. The seaside holiday and spending time on a beach now became part of the normal holiday cycle, although swimming was not common for many people at the beach and sunbathing on a beach was frowned uponall together.<ref>For more on the spread of seaside towns and resorts in Europe, and its wider influence, see: Borsay, Peter, and Jan Hein Furnée, eds. 2016. <i>Leisure Cultures in Urban Europe, c. 1700-1870: A Transnational Perspective</i>. Edited by Peter Borsay and Jan Hein Furnée. Studies in Popular Culture. Manchester: Manchester University Press. </ref>