A brief history of Nude Recreation Week
How a grassroots celebration became the most visible week in American naturism
Every July after the fireworks, another kind of celebration begins on American soil. Nude Recreation Week is the most widely recognized observance in North American naturism, but as with many things, its origins are mostly forgotten. It’s a history shaped by clashing ideals, uneasy alliances, and the enduring tension between leisure and liberation.
The tradition began in the late 1970s when Lee Baxandall, a politically-minded publisher and cultural critic known to most as the founder of The Naturist Society (though that came a little later), joined forces with Eugene Callen, a beach activist and founder of Beachfront USA, to create a nationally coordinated event they called National Nude Weekend. Baxandall saw it as a chance to confront America’s discomfort with nudity while also bringing naturists together in a shared public moment. The idea had been gestating since 1976, but the first major promotion came in 1978. Over time, and with growing participation, the two-day event expanded into what we now know as Nude Recreation Week, strategically placed each year just after Independence Day.
In the decades since, the event has generated thousands of media stories, provided untold PR value for nude recreation, and transformed what was once a fringe experiment into an enduring cultural tradition that doubles as a rare public foothold for the movement.
Philosophy vs. promotion
By the mid-1990s, the event had earned the backing of the country’s two major naturist organizations: The Naturist Society, founded by Baxandall in 1980, and the American Association for Nude Recreation (AANR), formerly the American Sunbathing Association. The week became a blend of public outreach, club promotion, media strategy, and grassroots celebration.
One flashpoint in its evolution came in 1985, when Baxandall circulated a flyer for National Nude Weekend that struck a far more philosophical tone than some in the movement were prepared to embrace. His message took aim at the cultural forces that both repress and commodify the naked body, positioning naturism as a kind of antidote to both puritanism and pornography. While thoughtful and provocative, the flyer was rejected by ASA Executive Director Arne Erickson, who felt the material was too intellectual and not sufficiently promotional.1
If they were in competition, the promotional approach largely won out over a philosophical one. The 1999 issue of The Bulletin made no mention of naturism as a philosophy or a movement; instead, it encouraged clubs to host upbeat events and take advantage of a rare spike in public interest: “With the media focused on nude recreation more than at any other time of the year, everyone involved in nude recreation can become a walking, talking billboard for the benefits of their chosen lifestyle.”2
And clubs got creative: Elysium Fields hosted a comedy show for domestic violence awareness; Hidden Valley offered balloon rides; Turtle Lake Resort put on a clothing-optional car show; Nirvana Sun Resort raised funds for Habitat for Humanity; a park in Ontario threw a strawberry festival. Canoe rides, nude fun runs, blood drives, and music festivals all took part in making the week more than just symbolic.3 Taken together, the patchwork of themes and tones from club to club reflected a movement still lacking a unified message—but gaining far broader visibility than ever before. In its diversity, Nude Recreation Week invited newcomers to experience social nudity through fun, curiosity, or cause. That accessibility may have come at the cost of philosophical coherence, but it helped ensure the week would endure.
It may not rise to the level of a grand philosophical standoff, but the tension between nudism as a recreational lifestyle and naturism as a cultural critique has been a persistent undercurrent. The event was never exactly intended as a protest, but Baxandall—with his radical, activist background—surely had social progress in mind. Clubs, especially landed ones, have naturally focused more on growing attendance and boosting membership than confronting the systemic causes of body shame. But if Nude Recreation Week has come to represent anything other than a good reason to get naked, it’s the uneasy but enduring marriage of those two approaches.
Contemporary reflections
More recently, Nude Recreation Week has come to include International Skinny Dip Day, held on the second Saturday of July. For many, it’s a playful and accessible entry point into social nudity. But the underlying tensions that animated the week in 1985 haven’t gone away. In fact, they may be more relevant than ever. As Snider (2023) observes, “Social media platforms regularly censor or ban accounts with nonsexual nudity... while boosting accounts that promote sexual exploitation, disinformation, or violence.”4 Baxandall’s critique of nudity as both repressed and commodified feels prophetic in a world where a cartoon butt can be flagged as inappropriate while corporate algorithms elevate outrage and titillation.
Today, Nude Recreation Week is part marketing campaign, part cultural tradition. In recent years, its public visibility has arguably been eclipsed by the rise of International Skinny Dip Day, now the week’s most recognizable media hook. Framed as a fundraising effort—most notably by SkinnyDipDay.org for the Fistula Foundation—the event has embraced a strategy of lighthearted mass participation in exchange for charitable support. It’s been remarkably effective at drawing attention.
What’s notable about Skinny Dip Day is that much of it happens in public. Events take place on beaches around the world, creating moments of visible, collective nudity. One imagines Baxandall and Callen would have appreciated that. While the philosophical tone of Baxandall’s original rhetoric may no longer be front and center, the spirit remains. The event’s simplicity and broad appeal echo the same dynamics that once helped Nude Recreation Week gain traction. For those who trace the tradition’s roots, the week still represents something more than just a reason to get naked. 🪐
More reading:
Snider, S. (2023, Fall). Lee Baxandall’s 1985 promotion of National Nude Weekend. Pages of History, 15(3).
Sikes, J. (1999, May). Get ready for Nude Recreation Week July 5–11. The Bulletin, pp. 1, 16.
(Sikes, 1999).
(Snider, 2023).
The photo of Zuma beach brought back fond memories. The beach was also known as Priates cove. The beach was well attended. Unfortunately the LA County public works dynamited the cliff above and littered the beach with rocks and boulders. Plus the County passed a law that banned nudity in county.