Columbia and Pennsylvania opened the racing season for the colleges at the Passaic Regatta, where the eights met in a mile and a half race, and Columbia won by a second and a half. The Columbia eight had several other victories in open regattas, and went into their race with Har vard at New London with the greatest confidence, determined to avenge the shabby treatment of Harvard in the previous year. The Harvard crew had no such confidence ; they had gone through a season of trouble, several of the men had to be taken out for one cause or another after the crew had been selected, and they had lost their stroke-oar ; but the men had been well coached, and their misfortunes had really improved them. Columbia had far too much weight in the shell and were very sluggish. Harvard won by be tween fifteen and twenty lengths. In the Fresh man race a few days later Columbia put a very fair crew, but three " crabs " by the Columbia boys gave the race to Harvard, although it is likely that they would have won in any event.
Davis was in full charge at Yale this year, and another test of his theories was made —and a final one. He had a shell similar to the one of the previous year, with the men rowing in pairs ; and the craft was a full seventy feet long, with a big wind-sail on the bow. The men had been taught to row from forty-five to fifty, and had been given a tremendous amount of work. For five weeks before the race they had gone over the course every day on time and made good figures, but by the day of the race they were so badly overtrained that only a fraction of their real power could be applied. Folsom, the stroke, who for three years had made the fast pace, was in especially poor condition and should not have been allowed in the race. Harvard's crew had been brought along on the same principles as the previous year, and the lack of confidence, which would probably otherwise have beaten them, was supplied by the defeat of Columbia. But Yale was the only crew that could win in the minds of the generality; their improvements in style and equipment were thought to have rendered them invincible, and possibly they might have done something had they been in condition to row.
At the start, Yale dashed away at a stroke that is variously given from fifty to fifty-three, and the boat from a distance resembled a youthful water spout ; Harvard was at thirty-seven with a long, hard swing that contrasted with the pumplike action of Yale. At the half-mile, Perkins raised the Harvard stroke and they passed Yale ; from that point the race was settled. Folsom kept hitting up the Yale stroke, but there was no time — simply a slashing through the water, and Harvard went steadily on. They had five clear lengths at the two-mile, and at the finish it had increased to twenty, while Yale was vainly hit ting up a forty-five. A difference of 1.12 sepa rated the crews in spite of the Harvard time of 25.461, which is the slow record for New London.
This was the end of Davis and the " Donkey Engine Stroke " at Yale.
It was, however, an era of high strokes, and we find Pennsylvania rowing forty-four for a time in their Childs Cup race with Princeton, and Prince ton, trained by Hosmer, the professional sculler, often going to forty. Columbia had withdrawn from this four-oared race, and Princeton was the only entry with Pennsylvania. For a mile both shells lapped, and then Princeton, badly over trained, started to go to pieces, and Howell, who had fainted three times the year before when at stroke, was again out, and Pennsylvania won by a long distance.
The opening regatta of the Intercollegiate Rowing Association on Lake George was set for July 4, with Princeton, Cornell, Pennsylvania, and Wesleyan represented. Pennsylvania was supposed to have the best four, all of the men being veterans. A nasty wind blew across the course ; Cornell, having the sheltered station, sportsmanly asked that the race be postponed, but Pennsylvania and Wesleyan preferred to row, and the crews were sent off. Pennsylvania had two lengths over Wesleyan, the second crew, in the first half-mile ; but there Cornell came under the lee of Tea Island, and the lighter Penn crew, unable to buffet the waves, were soon overtaken and passed by the more robust Cornell four, who kept steadily on and won by sixty-two seconds from Pennsylvania, with Princeton a length in the wake of Pennsylvania. In the singles, which were rowed on the next day, G. B. Jamison, the captain of the Princeton four, beat G. A. E. Kohler, Pennsylvania.
The rowing had now divided into two sections, — the Childs Cup and the Intercollegiate Asso ciation for four-oared shells and the New London races in eights between the Freshman and Uni versity crews of Harvard and Columbia and the University eights of Harvard and Yale. Colum bia also rowed in the I. R. A. in fours, but they had withdrawn from the Childs Cup races, and in 1884 Cornell was invited to take their place. The feeling between the two schools was not friendly: Harvard and Yale, with rowing records before the others had even purchased a boat, felt that they were the leaders of rowing, while the others, resting on the results of the old Rowing Association, considered that speed was the best claim for preeminence and not the accident of being first born. Challenges passed to and fro from Cornell and Pennsylvania to Yale and to Harvard, but they were not taken up, and both Yale and Harvard desired to confine rowing to themselves, though Harvard was rather more liberal and had arranged matches with Columbia; but there was now talk of stopping these. It was a curious situation and one brought about by the fact that victory was more highly estimated than the elevation of the sport.