THE SPORT OF ROWING the Universities of Melbourne and Sydney. Australia’s first race for eights was held in 1875 at the Melbourne Regatta. Schoolboy rowing also flourished in New South Wales and Victoria in the second half of the 19th Century. Isthmian Rowing: “Of all the schools, none has a record equal to that of Geelong [Grammar School, near Melbourne], where rowing, in comparison with other sports, occupies the same position as at Eton.6215 “To the Cambridge Eight it has contributed four oars [as of 1897], including the well-known heavyweight S. Fairbairn;6216 while in the memorable race of ‘86, when Pitman made his victorious rush on the post,6217 the school had an ‘old boy’ in each boat – Fairbairn rowing for the Light Blues and [W. St. L.] Robertson for Oxford.”6218 Amateurism In the second half of the 19th Century, questions of amateurism inevitably arose, but while the passion was as intense as it was back in Britain, the tone was slightly different. By the time they reached the raw continent of Australia, most British settlers had been no strangers to manual labor, and many were transported convicts. The society they formed was more egalitarian than at home, and arguments concerning amateurism in sport seemed less about class and more about fairness, less between class and more between colonies. Very early the competition between regions, each fiercely asserting the right to independently determine their own definition of amateur, seemed far more 6215 See Chapter 3. 6216 See Chapter 14. 6217 See Chapter 15. 6218 E.G. Blackmore, Australian Rowing, Isthmian Rowing, p. 261 Australian Professionals As a member of the British Empire, Australia was heavily influenced by English rowing. Professional single sculling had developed on the Thames in London during the 18th Century out of wager matches.6219 The Championship of England single sculling race was first held in London in 1831, a year after the Wingfield Sculls had been founded there for amateurs. For many years, only Londoners contested the championship, but eventually it attracted sculling champions from Australia and North America and was renamed the Championship of the World. Beginning with Edward Trickett in 1876, Australians held the title for twenty- two of the next thirty-one years.6220 Notable early Australian World Champions besides Trickett, the first non-Englishman ever to hold the title, were Bill Beach and Henry Searle. In fact, of the thirty-one individuals who held the title between 1831 and 1957, fifteen were Australian. Trickett and Beach are described in Chapter 11. The Clarence Comet One of the most memorable of the great 19th Century Australian professional scullers was Henry Ernest Searle (1866-1889), 5’10” 178cm 163lb. 74kg, the “Clarence Comet.” Famed British amateur Guy Nickalls6221 once sculled with him. Searle was the only 6219 See Chapter 2. 6220 en.wikibooks.org/wiki/The_Rowers_of_ Vanity_Fair/Searle_HE 6221 See Chapter 24. important than what they were actually arguing about. This never seemed to quiet down, even after the six original colonies became a federation in 1901. 1732
