YALE AND HARVARD ROWING Harvard and Yale discovered a year earlier than Cornell that the hybrid English stroke would not do, and a revolution took place in the systems of each. " Bob " Cook had assumed the whole charge of the Henley trip of Yale, and he came back with ideas for changes in the stroke that he had first learned abroad many years be fore. Before Yale went to Henley, they had a system at New Haven that could not well be bettered, and it is the only system that has ever been worthy of note in this country. The style was settled upon, and there were graduates who knew the stroke and could take up the prelimi nary coaching one from the other, and bring the eights steadily on until just before the race, when Cook would round out the crews and bring them to the proper point.
When Cook returned from Henley with his new ways, he did not have the help of these younger men who had learned in the old school ; it was either try a new stroke or do without Cook, and the rowing men elected to give Cook the full power. He spent the entire training period at New Haven, and took up the work of coaching from the start, although for some years he had done no preliminary instruction, and was not at the time well fitted for the work. He evolved a long stroke with a short slide and a very hard catch, and also brought in the narrow English blades and tried various other experiments. Yale beat Harvard in 1897 and 1898, and all might have gone well, but Cornell was in both of these races and simply rowed away from Yale. The younger element in the rowing who had been doing the yeoman work in previous years came forward and Cook left New Haven, while E. F. Gallaudet, stroke of the 1892 and 1893 crews, began the task of restoring to Yale a system of rowing.
Harvard was in somewhat the same situation ; Mr. Lehmann's coaching was too much of a change. The English stroke could not be taught in a year or in two years ; it meant a complete change in methods — a restoration of the fixed seat, and a thorough mastery of rowing on a fixed seat before attempting a slide. Harvard had not devoted the necessary time to this preliminary instruction, and had not sufficiently developed the abdominal muscles before going into the shells. It would have required years
for a real test and many beatings in the mean time from Yale. Rather than go through this fire, haunted by the thought that perhaps, after all, the stroke could never be adapted to the American student, Harvard went back to the stroke that Mr. Storrow had stood sponsor for, and gave E. C. Storrow the full charge in 1899 and 19oo.
Mr. Lehmann's visit did not do much toward the betterment of Harvard's rowing from the purely mechanical standpoint, and he did not leave many smooth working oarsmen ; he left rowing in a chaotic state, but he did help in a far more important and enduring manner. When Mr. Lehmann went to Harvard, rowing had reached its lowest level from the viewpoint of pleasure ; the strong men went in for the crew as a matter of duty and loyalty, prepared to spend a half year in the galleys for the sake of the Uni versity. The Weld Club, organized in the early nineties, had done something toward the better ing of the spirit ; but it is not until the time of Mr. Lehmann that one finds a real desire to row springing up at Cambridge. The Newell Club came into being, and with it the system of club crews that has done so much for Harvard's boat ing spirit. The men who wished to row were di vided between the two clubs in as nearly an even manner as possible ; there were professionals at the clubs, and every class in the University put out an eight and sometimes two eights from each club, while the men who rowed in single shells and working boats were innumerable. The regattas brought out twenty or more eights, and the system closely simulated that of the English universities with the classes and clubs substituted for the colleges. Still following the English sys tem, two eights were selected from the best of the men in the club races, and from these two eights, as in the " trial eights " abroad, the Univer sity eight was selected. The trouble with the system from the racing standpoint is that the men in the clubs are taught by professionals and then handed over to amateurs who teach differently, and the result is always an ill-assorted University crew. But in the broader view of sportsmanship, the system is admirable.