In the Beginning
The following, penned by URI Crew co-founder Ralph Kopperman, is an article he first wrote in 1985. In honor of URI Crew’s 50th anniversary, we revived the story about URI Crew’s origins for, what is now, a larger family of rowing alumni to enjoy.
In my last year at Columbia (1961-1962), I joined crew. I wasn’t very good; I only made the third boat, and we lost more races than we won. But you don’t need to be good to get a lot out of crew. During that year, I lost 40 pounds and had muscles for the first time in my life. When I moved on to graduate school, I couldn’t give up rowing. So I paddled out of the MIT boathouse. The next year, along with some guys I met, I formed the MIT Grads. After two more seasons of mostly losing, I concentrated on schoolwork enough to get my degree. In the fall of 1965, I came to URI to join the Math Department. My first discovery when I arrived was that there was no crew. As far as I was concerned, there was nothing to do but set one up.
Registration then (and now, for all I know), was a mass torture session down at the gym. Faculty members sat at tables with course cards, which they handed out to students to register them for courses. I drew registration duty and for once turned this machine of pain to a good use. I made a six-inch rowing trophy that I had won stand sentry at the Math desk, watching a crew sign up sheet. It wasn’t long before the bait was taken. Bill Sonzogni, scion of a Philadelphia rowing family, did a double take in front of the little oarsman. Bill had brought a double up to URI the previous year, and practiced with another student. We brought each other up to date quickly, and agreed to meet after registration to make further plans. With his help, and that of others, the sign up sheet quickly filled, and a couple of days later we held a meeting of crew hopefuls and showed an inspirational rowing film. Between 70 and 100 came to that first meeting.
We were given a couple of old shells. I must admit that I’m not quite sure where they came from, but our biggest help during those early days came from Brown. Their coach, Vic Michalson, had developed a powerhouse crew with the smallest student body and one of the smallest budgets in the Ivy League (the Ivies don’t do much in the sports arena to turn out professionals, but in rowing, they’re the strongest). Only Harvard among all collegiate crews was consistently stronger than Brown in those days. Vic’s love of rowing and identification with a young, struggling program led him to help as much as he could.
Bill Sonzogni’s rowing club in Philadelphia also helped a great deal, but were farther from us. Our first home was at the remains of a yacht boathouse south of Wakefield. The boathouse was open on one side, and its docks were high above the water with pilings still higher, to tie on yachts. We had to walk the boats in and out of the water for our workouts there. The body of water on which we rowed is called Point Judith Pond on maps, but its local name, “Salt Pond,” better described our experience on it. Despite its saltiness, it froze, we froze, and tempers froze to brittle. The less committed (and more intelligent?) quickly dropped out, and by the end of fall workouts we were down to about two dozen.
Something had to be done, and over the winter, we got permission from the Boy Scouts to put a boathouse on their land near a dock at the south end of Worden Pond. Bill and I looked at some buildings that people were getting rid of. I particularly remember walking through a chicken house that a farmer wanted taken from his land. It was gamy, and it took Bill a couple of minutes to talk me out of it. We finally got a building which was too short for eights, but otherwise okay (we were desperate). We moved it to the land, cut it in two, and separated the pieces enough to fit in the shells. During the spring we built a new middle for it using wood donated (I think by the Wakefield Branch Company; Piet Langendoen, who worked for the Biology Department, arranged the donation). Worden Pond is shaped like a triangle, and the water was always rough on the side the wind was blowing at that day, but we could always get to water smooth enough to learn on.
In retrospect, my own strengths and weaknesses had a great deal to do with the existence and eventual shape of URI Crew. My main strength was that when I saw something that needed doing, I went ahead and did it; despite ample evidence to the contrary, I always believed I could do anything. I was also good at maintaining spirit through thin and thinner. I had more trouble turning thin into thick, or bad rowing into good rowing.
Thank goodness for the great help I had. There was sensible experienced oarsmen like Bill and Glen Prezkop; dedicated, inexperienced oarsmen, who were thinking carefully about what crew needed and how to get it, like Sam Kinder, Pete Stockman, Mike Specht, Herb Gumpright, Pete Palagi, Russ Dion, Dick Brooks, Bruce Silverman and many others. Their suggestions helped supplement my thoughts which then, as now, were scattered, and their ability with a hammer often mattered more than that with an oar. An important man early on was Al Divoll, whose skill with an oar was adequate, but whose skill and position with the student government got us some money which we needed for our early operations.
That spring we had our first races. The very first was against Drexel. It was rumored that their athletic director, John Semanik, liked to race teams that they could beat. Whether or not that was true, the great spirit and dedication of those who pioneered URI Crew wasn’t a match for the advantage in experience held over us by Drexel. We didn’t row very well, and we lost. But what was remarkable was not that we, rowed poorly, but that we rowed at all. And that fifty years later, URI Crew still rows, and well!
Since Ralph Kopperman’s involvement in the genesis of URI Crew, the program has seen a great deal of change. In the 50 years since its inception, it has spawned countless athletes that have gone on to dominate their field. URI Crew split in the late-90’s when the women were elevated to varsity status, and like the men, became regional forces making regular high finishes at A-10s, ECACs, and IRAs. Many of our athletes have continued rowing after URI and gone on to great success in national and international competition, including several Olympic medalists. Still others choose the professional arena; many of URI Crew’s alumni have gone on to be successful industry leaders in engineering, computers, politics, and business just to name a few….but none forget the time they spent with URI Crew.
Photographs: The original URI Crew boat house, Bill Sonzogni and his father holding the double that Bill brought to URI and helped spark the beginning of URI crew, men’s varsity eight on Worden’s Pond, and the boathouse (without its middle).
