A horn blared, and a horde of half-naked souls of all shapes and sizes sprinted through the brisk morning air. With a collective whoop, they dove to their watery finish line - a bone-chilling Dorchester Bay.
It was a mad dash into 39-degree waters that those who watched safely from the shore called half-mad.
But devoted polar-bear plungers insisted this was the perfect way to ring in the New Year.
About 500 shook off the champagne cobwebs yesterday morning for the L Street Brownies' traditional New Year's Day swim, and twice that many cheered them on.
One of the oldest polar bear groups in the country, the South Boston stalwarts have braved the wintry waters each year since 1904, and the popular spectacle has inspired countless others to do the same.
Rich and Lynda DelloIacono from Dedham got married New Year's Eve. Yesterday, still dressed in wedding attire, they took the plunge again.
"Whew!" said Lynda, 34, shivering in a soaked white dress. "I lost my breath!"
Catching his breath after his swim, the new groom said the morning dip was an ideal end to a magical night. Cold feet didn't matter now, after all.
"That felt really great," he said. "Exhilarating."
It was the debut Brownies plunge for Shoshanna Ehrlich, a 51-year-old from Brookline.
Her first go-round, she ran into the Atlantic, then ran out just as quick. But she regrouped, summoned her nerve, then dove in head first.
"It's really, really, really cold," she said back on shore, wearing a bathrobe and sipping coffee from a mug as though she were sitting at her kitchen table. "But it was worth it. I wanted to actually swim, but I think I only took about three strokes."
Her friend Sarah Leinbach, 70, who watched the proceedings bundled in a winter coat, hat, gloves, and scarf, made a New Year's resolution to give it a go next year.
"OK, I'll do it," she said, a bit halfheartedly.
For some, the dunk wasn't just good fun, it was a rite of purification, a kind of chilly baptism.
"We washed our ills away," said Marilyn Cushing, 66, from West Roxbury. "Here's to a great '08."
Watching the festivities, which included swimmers in Santa and New Year's party hats and other holiday garb, Billy McLeod said the New Year's swimmers were amateurs.
"They're just here once a year, we're here all the time," said McLeod, a 62-year-old from Quincy who belongs to the L Street Running Club. "We swear by it. It's great for the legs, the lungs. I like to take a steam, then take a dip, then take a steam. Makes you feel like a million bucks."
Jack Dever, Brownies president, agreed. A quick dip in the ice-cold water is refreshing, he said, good for body and mind.
"It strengthens the immune system, lowers the blood pressure," he said. "It releases your endorphins. It's a feel-good thing."
