Temptations on the Thames

The London School of Economics BC eight clearing Hammersmith Bridge in the 1965 Tideway Head of the Thames Regatta. Only a mile of the four to go! The article writer Bill Lanouette is pulling in the six seat.

American rowing historian William Lanouette writes:

HTBS’s recent and lively stories about “Fuller’s Head of the River Fours” bring to mind just what riverside breweries can do for rowers – besides sponsoring regattas.

In the 1960s, I rowed in the London School of Economics Boat Club eight from the University of London’s boathouse at Chiswick, a village on the western side of London. From the UL boathouse, when we turned upstream on the Thames to row past the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, we inhaled the freshest of country air. But when we turned downstream from Chiswick and rowed to Putney Bridge (a reverse of The Boat Race course) we encountered the tempting aromas of breweries.

Fuller’s Chiswick Brewery

The eight was always lively on the downstream piece, and gliding with the current we barely broke a sweat. But the four-plus-miles we pulled back upstream from Putney were always a haul; worsened by two mighty distractions. Off Chiswick Eyot, a slim island just past Hammersmith Bridge, we caught whiffs of hops and malt from Fuller’s Chiswick Brewery, a sprawling complex along the shore. On the upstream pull we were tired and thirsty – and now made especially thirsty for beer. (Why we seldom noticed these aromas rowing downstream I can’t explain. Maybe we weren’t yet breathing hard enough?)

Beyond Chiswick our lungs and thirsts cleared for another mile until, just past Barnes Bridge, we neared Mortlake and a looming brick structure that threw its shadow across the river. This was Watney’s Stag Brewery, in those days a Victorian industrial hulk. And its aromas were much closer and much more pungent than Fuller’s.

Watney’s Mortlake Brewery

From Watney’s to the boathouse we had nothing more in mind than beer. But after showers, I discovered an English convenience never known when rowing in the USA. There, just off the locker room, was a bar, maintained by the boatman, and with a lovely river view. The workout and its temptations were now resolved!

More on 'Shaved' Blades

HTBS has received two e-mails related to the entry about Ran Laurie’s ‘narrow blade’ that was posted on Friday 27 September. In one e-mail rowing historian Bill Lanouette, who recently wrote on HTBS about Thomas Eakins’s ‘newly’ discovered rowing painting, writes:

That’s a fascinating exchange about English strokes using narrow blades. As a stroke myself I would have loved to use such an oar, but in the 1960s at least, when I rowed in England, all blades were the same size. And, honestly, as a stroke I’m glad they were because you couldn’t feel the poise and power of the crew – and know what pace to set – if you weren’t just as exhausted as the other guys.

The second e-mail came from another rowing historian, Tom Weil, who on this matter writes:

As Guy Nickalls [seen in the photograph] was casting about to improve his 1921 Yale crew, which he had termed ‘gutless’, he saw the performance of one J. Freeman, who had just stroked Yale’s very first 150 lb. crew to victory in the American Henley on the Schuylkill. He put the lightweight Freeman into the stroke seat of the New London crew, and equipped him with a shaved blade. Nickalls was fired by the Yale Committee because of his unfortunate comment, but his parting contribution to the Yale varsity, wielding his shaved oar, led the ‘gutless’ crew to victory over Harvard.

There is an interesting photograph showing Guy Nickalls and freshman coach Giannini at Yale’s training quarters at Gales Ferry on 10 June, 1915 (© Bettmann/CORBIS), here.

Are there any more ideas out there about a stroke’s narrow or ‘shaved’ blade? If so, please send it to: gbuckhorn – at – gmail.com

Another Eakins Rower

Thomas Eakins’s Wrestlers (1899) at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA).

Rowing historian William Lanouette is now editing the manuscript for his forthcoming book, Racing to Oblivion, about the Biglin brothers, Thomas Eakins and the rise and ruin of professional rowing. Doing research for his book, Bill came across a painting with a remarkable “missing” link to the sport of rowing. Bill writes,

Thomas Eakins (1844-1916) made his many rowing images between 1871, with Max Schmitt in a Single Scull, and 1874, with Oarsmen on the Schuylkill depicting a four that included Schmitt. In between, he created many sketches and pictures of the professionals John and Barney Biglin in a pair, and of John in a single. But art historians have said that his last rowing picture was that of the four on the Schuylkill.

And yet, Eakins still had rowing on his mind after 1874. A preliminary sketch for his most famous portrait, The Gross Clinic (1875), showing Dr. Samuel D. Gross in an operating theatre at Philadelphia’s Jefferson Medical College, had been worked over an image of yet another rower.

At the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) recently, I discovered an 1899 Eakins oil painting depicting wrestlers (see on top) clenched on a mat. But there in the background, filling fully a sixth of the canvas, was yet another rower! Not on water, but pulling a primitive erg that gained its resistance from ropes and pulleys hoisting suspended metal weights.

Although not set on water, this may be Eakins’s last rowing picture.

Bill Lanouette’s book Racing to Oblivion will be published by Harvard University Press in 2014.

Poetry Of Motion

Yesterday, rowing historian Bill Lanouette sent me a photograph (see above). At first, I thought it was the famous Biglin Brothers rowing a pair under the bridge on the Schuylkill . But how could that be, as Bill said it was a photograph taken by Joel Roger showing Bill and his rowing buddy Chuck Levy rowing under Key Bridge on the Potomac? Well, there are for sure some similarities, don’t you think? (see Thomas C. Eakins’s painting of the Biglin brothers below.)

Bill, who is an expert on the Biglins, writes that there is a big difference, however: The Biglins have matching shirts! I also heard that rowing historian Bill Miller noted that the Biglins are rowing a starboard-stroked pair, while Bill and Chuck are in a port-stroked boat. Either way, both pictures show what the great rowing coach Steve Fairbairn called “the poetry of motion.”

Talking about poetry, yesterday, the Swedish Academy announced that this year’s Nobel Prize for Literature goes to the Swedish poet Tomas Tranströmer, an excellent choice, I think. I spent most of the evening yesterday re-reading a book of Tranströmer’s collected poems, in Swedish, of course…

Potomac Is Flooding

On Sunday I received an e-mail from rowing historian Bill Lanouette, specialist on the professional Biglin Brothers. Bill had read my entry how I had lost my nice ‘Boater’ and now he very generously offered me his old, vintage straw hat, which did not fit him anymore. He couldn’t remember which size it is, and he has it down at his club, the Potomac Boat Club. Bill promised to take a look at the hat size, but it’s not that easy right now. He writes:

“[…] but it won't be until later next week or weekend because the Potomac is flooding this weekend and I won't be visiting the boathouse. […] For the third time in two months the Potomac is above flood stage. If you've been to the Potomac Boat Club, this means water is over the ramps and docks and seeping into the first-floor boat bay. These ramps normally slant down to the float and the river, but in April and again this weekend they are themselves floating. Driftwood and other debris plus fast and swirling current are all hazards.

Normally, the river is measured at a level of 2.5 to 3.5 feet. Small boats are advised to stop rowing above 5 feet. Flood stage (picture above on top) is 10 feet, and in this and the previous floods the level reached 12 feet, so about 9 feet above normal flow.”

Well, the photograph says it all, Bill. I do hope everything goes back to normal as soon as possible. Indeed, the weather has been strange this spring…