Tourists enjoy the rare opportunity to walk in water as they visit Badwater Basin, the normally driest place in the US, in Death Valley National Park, Inyo County, California on February 18, 2024. Badwater Basin, an endorheic basin in Death Valley National Park, was flooded by Hurricane Hilary in August 2023 and recent rains in California. It is the lowest point in North America, at 282 feet (86 meters) below sea level. (Photo by David Swanson/AFP Photo)

With temperatures soaring and summer well underway, countless Americans will be spending their Independence Day weekend at the beach. Here we revisit some classic images from the turn-of-the-century to the 1930's of vacations by the sea, from Coney Island to Santa Monica.

Only after World War II did the secret spill: Ōkunoshima, located in the Inland Sea of Japan between Hiroshima and Shikoku, was the top-secret site for manufacturing chemical warfare. When the factories were closed down, a number of exotic wild rabbits were seen freely roaming the island. They were assumed to have been the test subjects for the chemical weapons, which the military failed to eradicate when the factory was demolished.

Life-sized body cast statues of “Another Place” created by the artist Antony Gormley look out to sea on April 12, 2011 in Crosby, England. Prospective Liberal Democrat candidiate Jack Colbert says the upkeep of the statues costs GBP 250,00 annually and they should be scrapped with the money being spent on frontline services. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Professional adventurer Alison Teal has become the first woman to paddle out into lava during a volcanic eruption into the sea. Amazing shots of the extreme surf session shows the daredevil riding her pink surfboard up to the base of Kilauea Volcano. Photographer Perrin James snapped the brave explorer within feet of the lava as it flows into the ocean. Its the first the volcano in the Big Island of Hawaii has erupted since 2011. Here: Alison Teal paddles out to Kilauea volcano in Hawaii as it eruopts into the ocean. (Photo by Perrin James/Caters News)

A man stands next to the body of a migrant child washed up on a beach in Canakkale's Bademli district on January 30, 2016 after at least 37 migrants drowned when their boat sank in the Aegean Sea while trying to cross from Turkey to Greece, Turkey's state-run Anatolia news agency reported. The migrants, who included those from Myanmar, Afghanistan and Syria, set sail from the Canakkale province to reach the nearby Greek island of Lesbos, Anatolia said. (Photo by Ozan Kose/AFP Photo)

A fishing boat that was ran aground by the sea while moored in the port of Coquimbo, some 445 km north of Santiago, during the eve's earthquake on September 17, 2015. A million people were evacuated in Chile after an 8.3-magnitude quake struck offshore in the Pacific, killing at least 10 people and triggering tsunami waves along its northern coast. (Photo by Martin Bernetti/AFP Photo)

More than 400 people stripped off and ran into freezing waters to celebrate the autumn equinox – and raise money for charity at Druridge Bay, Britain, September 25, 2016. It was the largest turnout the North East Skinny Dip has ever seen in its five-year history, and it was also the first time it has ever rained on the morning of the event. Revellers gathered from 5.30am on Sunday at Druridge Bay, in Northumberland, before baring all in the North Sea. (Photo by David Charlton Photography)