"After we'd moved to Edison, there was a resentment that we had broken into the community," Holmes says.
Even at the age of 13, Holmes felt the animosity. The neighborhood had a private swim club that opened up to anyone who participated in the Memorial Day parade. Holmes was in the band.
"I arrived at the pool on Memorial Day having marched in the parade with my uniform still on, and they called the police," he says.
The pool managers and the police department told Holmes' mother that her son was not allowed in the pool. She started to ask why, but then she stopped herself. Instead, she told Holmes to crawl under the turnstile and go into the pool.
