The first time I saw a rowing boat, and I use the term loosely, was on the Hopkins River at Warrnambool, around 1962 or thereabouts.

I was home from boarding school in Hamilton on holidays, and together with a good mate Bill O’Dwyer who went to Xavier, plus two other boys, we were asked if we would like to try rowing. Why not we thought, something to do in the holidays and a lot different to the usual football, cricket and athletics that we did at school. We rode our bikes to the sheds on the Hopkins River at the appointed time, I am pretty sure the same building is still there. We were shown around and introduced to the rowing boat, a four. It was clinker built, that is long pieces of wood running the length of the boat, overlapping to ensure the boat would not leak. 

It was painted a sort of greeny blue, inside and out, and there was a lot of paint, probably to seal the boat and keep it from leaking. The next challenge was to get it into the water, it weighed a ton and was on a sort of sled that we rolled towards the river.

There were two rope handles on either side of the boat to assist with lifting this “tub” into the water, as for lifting it onto your shoulders forget it!

The seats were on brass runners and there seemed to be a lot of sharp edges everywhere. None of us had appropriate shoes or socks so our feet went under another brass piece over your instep and another piece for you heel to rest on. Nothing was adjustable except the position of the stretcher as far as I can recall.

I cannot remember much about the row at all but I can remember that we all got sore bums and skin rubbed of our heels and feet in general.

It goes without saying that we did not rush back for a second time, the surf and sun were much more attractive.

Fast forward about six years and like most young blokes my age, new to city life and generally chasing the opposite gender, I attended the Sunday night dance on Albert Park Lake run by the Power House Rowing Club. It was always well attended and there were always plenty of girls in attendance.  On one of the Sunday nights I was there a bloke got up on the stage between dances and made an announcement that the Rowing Club was looking for new Members and anyone who was interested to meet downstairs in the foyer.

A few of us, including mostly boys from the country, went down and met the Club Captain Terry Goss. “Anyone rowed before?” he asked to which I responded “Yes”.  I didn’t tell him it was only once and it wasn’t a good experience!!

The following Saturday afternoon I went along and met other Club Members and I was impressed that boats had improved a lot, much lighter for a start.

I started rowing in a four with various people, Nigel Cook,  Hal Greer and Peter Morrow were three that I remember, Terry Goss was our coach and Joe Hutterer also helped out with coaching. At this stage I had met Geoff Pullin who coxed most of the more experienced crews, such as Maiden eights and fours.

The system was much different then, you started in Novice, progressed to Maiden, then on to Junior and eventually Senior. In Novice you were allowed one win in all boats, but if Regattas were grouped into a series of say three, there was the otential to win three races in the one class. So the options were pairs (they were coxed and tub or open boats), fours that had to be tub or reg as we call them now, no racing boats were permitted, and of course eights.

The rules were complicated so much that when I crossed the line first in a sculling race on the Yarra at this time, an Official disqualified me as there was some other rule that no one knew about. 

I do remember my first race on the Yarra, it was from the “Half Mile”, today we know it as the 800 metre start, in a Novice four. My first of many attempts to win in this division.

November meant one thing to all the Club Members, DIMBOOLA!! The stories I had heard were legendary and not fit for publication, always a large contingent of PHRC members attended this regatta on the Saturday and it was followed by a Regatta at Horsham on the Sunday. My first win for PHRC was at Dimboola, Novice eight, and yes, I was in the bow seat.  It was my only race at the Regatta and the final was about 9am.  The bar opened early in those days, so it was all a bit of a blur from lunchtime onwards.

As the season progressed Hal Greer and I won Novice Pairs at Edwards Lake in Preston, the shortest race on the Calendar, although Bendigo probably has that honour now. Hal Greer lost most of his right hand in an accident when he was young. His hand got caught in the power take off on a tractor, so he had to row stroke side as he only had a partial thumb and little finger on his right hand. He had spent months in hospital having bone grafts to construct a thumb so he could have some sort of grip. 

When I look at the photo now, I think of all the people who have passed through the Club since I joined over 55 years ago, some still around. Geoff White was recruited at the dance maybe a year after I was, I must have still not won Novice fours, so Captain Terry Goss put me into a Maiden four, the next class up. Now I was allowed in a racing boat, it was the “Syd Williams” and seemed very narrow compared to what I had been rowing in, mainly a tub boat called the “John Gully”.

We were entered in the Metropolitan Regatta on the Yarra, the race was over a mile, the start was from the landing just East of Punt Road Bridge, and they did use a shotgun to start the race in those days. The crew was stroked by Graham King, he was from QLD and worked in a bank, 3 seat was Peter Galbraith a mining engineer, Glenn Ross in 2 seat, Hugh Smith coxswain and Max O’Brien our Coach. Max’s formulae for winning was “Row Hard”!  I don’t recall what Glen did, but the first time I met him he turned up to training in a brand new white E Type Jaguar convertible.  

We trained on the Yarra then as the lake was full of weed, we had temporary boat racks between Richmond and Melbourne rowing clubs, not ideal but we managed. 

Captain Terry Goss said it would be good experience for me to row with the older boys, he told me that we probably wouldn’t win and to do my best.

The photo......

We must have won our heat and went to the final, the photo was taken from Swan Street Bridge by Club Legend Bill Willis, we were on our way to a big win, the second crew was coming through Swan Street as we crossed the finish line, the official margin was “easily”. We only won one other race in that combination, as the rules dictated. It was a very good crew, we just clicked. 

We rowed a thousand races with Whitey. Geoff Pullin decided to start rowing after years of coxing and became a very good stroke of several Novice crews. He also put on about 15 kgs with a massive gym program.

I ran into Glenn Ross quite a few years ago, of course we reminisced about our crew. Rowing is a fantastic sport, a sport for life. I just hope those of you who read this get as much enjoyment out of it as I still do. Every time I am out in the boat I am looking for improvement. 

Yours from the “Bow Seat”.
John O’Dowd