Newcastle Rowing Club - A short history - with thanks to the author of the book  ' Just Add Water, The Times and Tides of Newcastle Rowing Club'  by Colin Charters a Newcastle Rowing Club Member.

European discovery of the site of Newcastle was by rowers. On 9th September 1797, Lt Shortland and a crew manning a whaleboat travelled up the coast from Sydney in search of escaped convicts.  They chanced upon a harbour and a river that Shortland named after Governor Hunter.  Thereafter, for around 100 years following settlement in 1804 transport around the harbour, local rivers and other waterwasy. depended on boats and those who rowed them  With a high proportion of the population porficient rowers, rowing during the latter half of the 19th century became immensely popular.

Novocastrians, like settlers in numerous towns in Colonial Australia, enthusiastically adopted rowing for competition and recreation.  An annual regatta held on Newcastle Harbour for more than sixty years was just one of many organised by local committees throughout the impromptu, one-off match racing contest.

NRC was the third rowing club to be established in NSW following the Australian Subscription Boat Club in 1859 (that soon disappeared) and Sydney Rowing Club in 1870.  Four active eras have been separated by several, occasionally lengthy, inactive periods.

THE FIRST ERA 1870 - 1874

Newcastle Rowing Club was formed by rowing enthusiasts at a public meeting in December 1870.  Rules were adopted based on those used by Sydney Rowing Club.    Five skiffs and four dinghies, all with oars, were purchased from a local watermen for 173  ( pounds).  They were stored in a rented tin shed on the harbour foreshore.

Rowing activities commenced on Tuesday 2nd January 1871.  The first competition event was a double scull race held three weeks later with a stake of 5 pounds a side.  On Friday 3rd March 1871,  just over two months after it inception, the club held its first regatta that comprised five events.  They were a handicap race in dinghies for members under 16 years old pulling a pair of sculls, a singel scull race, a pairs race, a double scull handicap race for watermen, and a double scull handicap race with cox.  The double scull races were in watermens skiffs, boats in common use around most waterways.  They all were wide, heavy, timber boats in rigged and with fixed seats.

Subsequent competition included a seven event regatta in May 1872, participation in a appropriate events at Newcastle Annual Regattas conducted during the era and held races between members.  Indeed, public demand led to the club organising both 1872 and 1873 Newcastle Annual Regattas which were a major sporting and social occasion in Newcatle for over 50 years.  The significant and historical feature on the 1873 event was the inclusion of a race for ladies.  In all likelihood, it was the first time a race for ladies was included in a regatta in NSW.  The initiative reflects great credit on the then club committee as races throughout the colony beforehand were only contested by men.

Despite what was regarded as a successful beginning, the club suddenly lapsed (the reasons are unknown) in July 1874.  The Club's boat fleet (all timber) of a light watermens skiff, 4 pulling dingies and two Wager skiffs, plus oars and sculls were sold.

THE SEOND ERA 1880 - 1896

In March 1880, the Enterprise Private Rowing Association (formed in 1878) changed its name to Newcastle Rowing Club.

On the 22nd July 1880, with 50 members and seven boats (four oared gigs and three pairs (skiffs), the club opened a newly erected boathouse on a site granted by the Government on Bullock Island (Carrington) near a bridge that crossed the western end of the harbour where the wheat silos now stand.  It was a 50ft by 40ft weatherboard building suitable for housing and launching up to twelve boats.  The work cost 146 pounds seven shillings and ten pence.  Extensions in 1885 costing 203 pounds, doubled the size of the boatshed and added a new dressing room and bathroom. 

During this era, the club held it own regattas and internal races as well as competing in other local regattas including those at Newcastle, Stockton and Maitland.  The presence of another club (Mercantile RC, located at Stockton) introduced the element of local rivalry.

It must be remember that at this time there were strick rules preventing any competition between amateurs and professionals.  As most of the better rowers were watermen who were classified as professionals, they were ineligible to join either club which restricted membership to amateurs. 

Highlights of this era were:

• The Club's first competitive appearance was in a race for gentlemen amateurs rowing four oars with coxwains in string-test gigs at the Newcastle Annual Regatta on 1st January 1881.
• The first time a crew from Newcastle had entered a regatta in Sydney.  At the NSWRA regatta on the Parramatta River on 8th October 1881, NRC competed in a race for maiden oarsmen in four-oar string-test gigs.  Subsequently, a NRC crew competed in a regatta on Port Jackson.

• The club hosted a Sydney club for the first time at its annual regatta on 29th March 1884.  North Shore RC sent a crew to contest the main event: a race for maiden oarsmen in string test gigs with cox over two and a quarter miles.  NRC rejects any responsibility for North Shore's boat losing the race as a result of being swamped by wash from a passing tug just two lengths from the finish line when clearly leading. 

• It was the most innovative period in racing boat design.  Todays rowers may be suprised to learn that the characteristic long, narrow, smooth-skinned shell with outriggers, swivel rowlocks, sliding seat and fin that we are familiar with today were all introducted to Australia in the latter half of the nineteenth century - over a hundred years ago.
  

• Rowing clubs emerged, spreading across the nation to eventually surplant the earlier forms of rowing such as local regattas and professional match racing contests.
• Rowing during the last half of the 19th century drew enormous crowds.  Newcatle's Annual Regatta for instance regularly drew crowds in excess of 10,000.  Every form of rowing event, even training sessions, enjoyed extensive press coverage and were watched by an enthusiastic public.  This interest was due, in part, to Australia's then dominacne of world championship sculling.  Edward Trickett (Australia's first world champion in any sport) won the title in 1876.  He was followed by Beach, Kemp, Searle, Stanbury, McLean and (Newcastle's) George Towns.  Collectrively, they held the title for 22 of the following 32 years.
  
• There was constant controversity surrounding the distinction between professionals, amateurs and manual labour amateurs.  As colony/state associations were established to control amateur rowing, strict rules applied to differentiate between these groups that created problems for both rowers in regard to their status and between the colonies/states (particularly NSW and Victoria) over the definition of 'amateur'.  It was a dispute that lasted for decades.
• Another feature of early rowing was betting.  Widespread amongst both contestants and the public, it was a practise that added to public interest yet paradoxically contributed, in part, to the demise of prefessional rowing.
  

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