On this day: First Person to Swim the English Channel

Monday, 25th August 2014 by

On August 25, 1875, Captain Matthew Webb became the first person to swim across the English Channel, from Dover to Calais. His second attempt at the feat took him close to 22 hours, and while a straight-line swim would have only been twenty-two miles, he is believed to have swum close to forty in an era when navigation was harder than today.

English Channel

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Ian Brown lives in Ottawa, Canada, and spends his spare time perusing maps to find new routes to ride on his orange bicycle.