The 1949 Cornell lightweight crew team (foreground) wins its final race of the season against Princeton on the Cayuga Inlet. Team members, from left, are Carl Ulrich, Bob Post, Laurits (Larry) Christensen, Chuck Warren, Paul Zimmerman, Norman Baker, Towner (Buck) Buckley, Dick Elmendorf and Dana Brooks.
Sometimes defeat can make a greater impact than victory. That is the case with Cornell's 1949 lightweight crew team, who met this June 22 for its 50th reunion. As winners of the American Henley Regatta, the team expected to place in the starting lineup in the world's premier crew event, the Henley Royal Regatta, in Henley-on-Thames, England, in 1949.
The teammates had raised the money for the trip and were loading their shell onto a boxcar in Ithaca that would take it to New York City for transfer to a steamer, when they learned that they would not be competing because of a technical error.
The British had set an unusually early deadline for applications that year, and the team's application had arrived one day too late. To make matters worse, Princeton, the only other U.S. team that had qualified and a team Cornell had defeated twice during the regular season, made the trip and went on to win the international Henley.
"It was heartbreaking," said Carl Ulrich, who rowed the number one spot for Cornell. "To be all set to go and then to learn that we were ineligible. And then when we heard that Princeton, whom we had defeated twice that season, had won the race! That was a tough moment for all of us."
Instead of driving the teammates apart, however, the disappointment served to cement a bond that has lasted 50 years. The teammates have had reunions five times since 1949 on the shores of Cayuga Lake, to reminisce about what almost was and to catch up on all that has happened in each other's lives. They compare notes on career paths none could have predicted -- ranging from celestial navigator for explorer Thor Heyerdahl's transatlantic voyage on the reed boat Ra (Norman Baker, of Windsor, Mass.), to farmer in upstate New York (Paul Zimmerman, of Canandaigua), to director of athletics at West Point (Ulrich, of Laurinberg, N.C.). They introduce their wives, children and grandchildren to one another and compare plans for retirement. In 1978 they donated a shell to Cornell and dedicated it in memory of Paul Zimmerman, who rowed the number five spot and died in 1976.
"I honestly don't think we would have stayed that close if we had made it to Henley in 1949," said Dana C. Brooks, the team's coxswain. Now a professor of anatomy at the Weill Medical College of Cornell in New York City, Brooks said: "It's funny, but not racing that summer has left almost as strong a mark on our lives as racing would have."
Their recent reunion began in Ithaca, with the team members and their families arriving at the Statler Hotel on June 22. On two mornings they descended on the Cornell boathouse on Cayuga Inlet. Todd Kennet, current head coach of Cornell's lightweight crew, arranged for them to row out onto Cayuga Lake, where the teammates had spent most of their Cornell crew careers. The Ithaca leg of the reunion ended with a dinner boat cruise on the lake.
Capping off the reunion on June 28, Ulrich, Baker, Brooks, Bob Post (of Mantaloking, N.J.), Chuck Warren (of Marlow, N.H.) and their wives departed for Henley-on-Thames, where they watched this year's crew races.
"For most of us, it was our first time at Henley. We were nostalgic for our missed opportunity, but we felt that we had formed a remarkable group of friendships. The experience kept us close together," said Brooks.
Ulrich said that his teammates (who also include: Towner (Buck) Buckley, of San Diego; Laurits (Larry) Christensen, of Glenview, Ill.; Bob Collins, of Snyder, N.Y.; and Dick Elmendorf, of Glenshaw, Pa.) are the only former Cornell classmates with whom he keeps in touch.
"We bonded so much because of the hours we've spent as well as the disappointment we suffered because of an administrative error in the athletics department," Ulrich said. "Those kinds of experiences draw people together."
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