The season of 1883 marked the culmination of the high-stroke idea, and the defeat of all the crews that went to extremes caused a general lowering of strokes for 1884. In the previous year every crew had gone high, though none quite so far as Yale, and in this year the pendulum swung far back, and few rowed above forty, even while spurting. The strokes generally lengthened, and the slide was longer and used to the full extent of every man, though Yale, with Cook again in charge after the failure of Davis, did not use quite their full slide and had a longer body swing ; the "leg-of-mutton oars " went to the museums as relics of the age of unreason.
Pennsylvania and Cornell had very evenly matched fours this year, and their two contests were most exciting. The Penn four— Dicker son, bow, Lindsay, Gray, and Sergeant stroke made a remarkable record ; they were light men, and did not average one hundred and sixty pounds, yet they won every race that they entered. Penn sylvania and Cornell first met in the Childs Cup race, which was rowed on the upper Schuylkill, about six miles above the ordinary course, with the finish at Flat Rock Dam. Cornell and Pennsyl vania were on opposite sides of the river, with Princeton in the centre ; but Princeton soon was out of the race by poor steering, and the other two kept down so far apart that it was hard to estimate the leader ; as they closed for the finish it was seen that Cornell had an advantage, but Sergeant sent up the Pennsylvania stroke to thirty-nine and brought Penn over with half a length to spare.
This was the first year of Charles E. Courtney with the Cornell crews, and Ellis Ward was with Pennsylvania, as he had been since the start of rowing there. These two men have been retained by their respective institutions since that time ; a break of a few years occurred in the connection of Ward with Pennsylvania, but Courtney has been at Ithaca continuously ; there was not a marked difference in the styles which each taught. Cornell had a slightly harder catch and did not swing quite so far as Penn, making less use of the body and more of the arms, but the general features of the two strokes were nearly identical.
Harvard, having beaten Yale for two years, thought rather well of themselves in 1884, and imagined that their race with Columbia would be a procession. Harvard's eight were heavier and more mature than usual, but with that innate love of novelty that has always marked the Harvard rowing, Perkins, the stroke of the previous year, was rowing at seven, and Bryant was at stroke.
Columbia had a light and very young crew, which the prophets said could not row four miles.
Harvard started at thirty-eight and Columbia at forty ; for the first part Columbia led, but at the mile Harvard had the advantage. All this time the Columbia stroke had never dropped below thirty-eight ; a fine spurt at the two-mile flags brought Columbia even with Harvard. Then the greater strength of Harvard, though they were rowing a dull, lifeless stroke, took them ahead, and coming into the last mile they had a full length ; thus it was until the last half-mile, when Columbia whipped up their pace to forty, and sustaining it for the whole distance, came steadily up on Harvard ; but the final effort of Harvard was effective, and they retained three-quarters of a length of their lead.
The Harvard coaches believed that the close race was due to a poor arrangement of their crew, and, though the Yale race was less than a week away, they began to make changes : Perkins shifted back to stroke, the two bow men were changed, and an effort made to put more life into the crew. Louis K. Hull, the former Yale cap tain, had been coaching Yale, under the direction of Cook, and they had made an entire change from the " git thar " stroke to the former style. Yale and Harvard rowed nearly the same stroke : both long, with more body than slide, and a little too much of a heave at the catch to be quite smooth; the recovery was moderately slow, but the pace ran up in the race, and neither crew was below thirty-six at any time. It was a hard race, fought out in the third mile ; Yale had a length at the end of the first mile, but then the boat went into the slack water of the east shore, while Har vard was in the full force of the stream, which was high and swift ; Harvard went steadily on past Yale, whose spurts counted little in the dead water. At the Government Dock, Yale began to hold their own, though they were ragged, and one man caught a crab that gave Harvard a lead of three-quarters of a length. On the third mile the courses were equal, and Yale went forward like an arrow, with a stroke of forty, and at two and a half miles they had a full length lead. The race was over ; Harvard fell back to thirty-four, and Yale to thirty-eight, and, adding to their lead, at the finish they had easily five lengths. The time was 20.31, the fastest that the course had ever been made in a race, due to a following wind and a fast stream. The Columbia Freshmen beat Harvard easily on the same day at New London.