OPERATION BOOTSTRAP
BEFORE sunrise and after sunset the banks of the Connecticut have echoed all spring to the wooden clacking of the coxswain's steering handles marking the beat for the eight-oared shells that crawled up the river and then shot downstream on the spring current. Mixed with these sounds were the rumble of oarsmen's seat slides and the irregular sucking sound of oar blades pulling through at the end of the strokes. All these were music to the ears of Dartmouth's oarsmen, whose numbers are surprisingly large.
Practicing early and late, in fair weather and foul, is a part of "Operation Bootstrap," in full swing this year for Dartmouth's crews. In an effort to make up for time, weather and geography, the crews even began in mid-winter on the rowing machines.
All this activity is student-directed and student-run. It receives considerable alumni support. Thaddeus Seymour of the English Department coaches the varsity crew for the sheer love of the sport. A former Princeton oarsman, he has been helping as best he could, between teaching and preparing to take his Ph.D. orals.
Peter C. Buhler '55 of Great Neck, N. Y., is freshman coach, and W. Hartwell Perry '55, of Newton, Mass., is coach of the three lightweight crews. They have a corps of student managers who keep Dartmouth's flotilla of eight shells and two launches in condition.
"Dartmouth has a real hurdle to surmount in our lack of open water when the rowing season begins for other institutions," says Coach Seymour. "But we think we have two possible answers to this. One is the use of a 16-oared practice barge, and the other is a tank for indoor rowing in winter."
Seymour would put the barge, once he obtains it, in the Connecticut or White River near where they meet. It is in this area that the ice breaks up earliest.
"The first few days might be on the brisk side," Seymour says, "but I believe that we could be on the water within four days of the time that Yale first sends out its crews in the spring."
This talk of Yale may make some readers wonder what Seymour is talking about. This also is part of "Bootstrap" - a real effort to see if Dartmouth can't step up a notch in Eastern rowing.
The plain and simple fact is that rowing at Dartmouth in the past two years has suddenly established itself as one of the most popular undergraduate athletic activities. And the oarsmen want to compete with other Ivy League colleges and socalled "Class A" rowing schools.
For example, no fewer than 150 freshmen signed up for rowing last fall. At the very outset this figure, through sheer lack of shells, had to be cut arbitrarily in half.
The same lack of equipment keeps the Dartmouth varsity heavyweight squad down to twenty rowers in the spring, or two boatings plus spares. Other rowing colleges cut down to four varsity boatings. The spring squad - freshman, lightweight and heavyweight boatings - numbers about eighty oarsmen.
Despite these handicaps, Dartmouth has had a phenomenal record in rowing in its league. For two years running the varsity has won at the Dad Vail Regatta, and this year the junior varsity and freshman crews also won, making a clean sweep for Dartmouth. During the dozen or more years that Dartmouth has rowed in the regatta, the varsity has consistently placed among the top half of the competing crews.
Equally good is the record of the varsity lightweights. Under Captain Al Congdon '55 of Mamaroneck, N. Y., they beat Columbia and Yale by substantial margins, lost to M.I.T. by three-tenths of a second, and in the Eastern Sprint Championships finished less than a third of a length behind winning Princeton.
Wins were so impressive and the losses so close that the lightweight crew and Coach Perry plan to fly to England this month to row in the Royal Henley Regatta on the Thames, June 29. Their shell and equipment already have been shipped by freighter.
Near the finish line of the Henley course a few miles north of Hanover.
Varsity coach Thaddeus Seymour (left), former Princeton oarsman, with Hart Perry'55 (center), Rowing Club president and coach of the lightweights.
The varsity lightweight crew which will race in the Royal Henley Regatta in England in June.
BILL FAUNCE '56Club president next year
AL CONGDON '55 Varsity lightweight captain
AL GRAHAM '55No. 2 in the varsity crew
TOM FEAD '56Bow of the varsity crew
KEN RAGLAND '57 A junior varsity "heavy"
BILL DEL AN A '55Captain of the varsity crew
The boathouse is the gift of former Governor Alvin T. Fuller of Massachusetts.
President Dickey, who has a keen, personal interestin the Rowing Club, watches the varsity crew winover Amherst in Hanover.
Another Dartmouth victory and into the drink goes the coxswain.
