This memoir, written by a Junior Varsity oarsman from the class of 1963, relates how a squad of unathletic kids at a non jock school carrying the normal heavy academic work load that all MIT students carry somehow managed to live up to a legendary sprint and in their senior year became the "lightweight crew to beat." In the telling of the story we catch a glimpse of what life at MIT is like as well as see how competitive intercollegiate athletics can be integrated with serious academic studies..
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The cover photo, allegedly taken by Pete Staecker, ‘64, shows the Harvard Boathouse dock as it appeared at about 6 AM on Sunday, March 31, 1963 after it was allegedly painted by an errant unauthorized group of oarsmen from MIT.
Welcome to my website.
In 2003 I completed an 80-page booklet about my rather unremarkable rowing experiences while an undergraduate at MIT between, 1959 and 1963. I was assisted and encouraged in this effort by my coach from those days, Gary Zwart, who like me still lived in Cambridge, and my friend and fraternity brother, Bob Vernon, '63 who was the coxswain of great ability, and Lauren Sompayrac, '63 a great stroke and friend. To the best of my ability with the assistance of Gary, Bob and Lauren, the details in the memoir are accurate. We had access to a few records and we discussed the many events for which we had slightly different memories and eventually arrived at a consensus that we all felt comfortable with. I made 50 copies of the memoir and handed it out to the oarsmen and fraternity brothers who were at our 40th reunion. To my surprise I received a lot of positive feedback--in two cases complaints that they got so engrossed that they stayed up till 3:00 AM reading it and go so excited that they then couldn't sleep. Of course, this is a very small select audience, but I nevertheless decided to have the book available to a broader audience by placing it with a Print-on-Demand publisher. Hence the book is now available on Amazon.com and many other online booksellers.
The author, Jack Lynch, after a race in 1963. We can see the side of Dick Resch, '61, a fraternity brother, former oarsmen and here lightweight freshman coach.
Official three-way tie between MIT, Cornell and Navy at the 1962 Lightweight Championships at the Eastern Sprints held in Worchester, Massachusetts. This of course is the varsity race and that year I rowed in the third boat.
As a result of that three-way tie, the MIT lightweight varsity went to Henley England in the summer of 1962. Bob Vernon '63 has written a memoir of that experience and a visit they made to Henley 45 years later. He has many wonderful photographs and descriptions. Click on the photo of the 1962 MIT Henley boat or on the link below to get a PDF file of the memoir.
