Until relatively recent times rowing was not just sport as recreation or recreation in the form of a sport, but was just simple work, and training for this rowing itself. With or without a coach nearby, the coxswain, stroke and the other rowers could only follow instructions remotely applied. But eventually under the pressure of doing better than best something more was needed than a boat and oars and forms of rowing simulators appeared to provide an extra push toward perfection. Thus was born the rowing machine and all the innovations down to the moving water tank, Ergometers and Digital Monitors that give visible indications of effectiveness and efficiency.
The first rowing by Tech students was in 1909 as guests of the Union Boat Club at their boathouse in the Boston side of the lower Charles River while the Institute campus was still on Boylston Street. There rowing was quite informal, conducted in a club atmosphere where one of the budgeted expenses was tea and sometimes for prestige or social acceptance, but it did attract college oarsmen which added luster and success to the sport. The M.I.T. association with Union was a golden opportunity for a start which carried over to the new Cambridge campus with its migration across the Charles River the nucleus of a rowing tradition.
The BAA Boathouse a mile upstream from the new campus, had been built in 1913 to expend their club activities but was not able to carry its weight due to its distance from their main clubhouse and lack of rowing supporters. Being a little used maintenance burden, rented by Cambridge for their high school crews, its transfer to M.I.T. ownership was fortunate for both. With the boathouse came a few shells of uncertain condition and assorted sizes, whose main use was for both. With the boathouse came a few shells of uncertain condition and assorted sizes, whose main use was for spare parts as other shells were acquired. Also there were two sets of vintage rowing machines which though little used were of little help. Basically a leather strap wrapped around a drum, connected by chains to a wooden handle in the position of an oar between rower and oarlock. They hardly simulated rowing and were very inconsistent in loading, noisy and unloved by all.
The strap machine, as they were called, did have the elements used in a shell,-- a conventional sliding seat, foot clogs and a club of wood representing an oar. On pull through a farm machinery type iron link chain attached to the loose end of the leather strap and no two half turns had the same effect, leaving the guess of the coach opposed by the symptoms of distress by the rower. Sometimes the push of recovery was greater then the pull of the pull through, but perhaps that was intended to represent the occasional blast of headwind of clipping the tops of waves and therefore training value.
The year after Tech moved into the BAA boathouse the open front porch was enclosed to make it a part of the interior of the building. On the porch two sets of "state of the art" hydraulic machines were installed, parallel to the river as though they were shells rowing upstream. There was space enough between the sets and on the outside for the coach to wander about viewing the rowers from any angle and also to be handy to the pressure adjustment stud on the top of each machine to govern the effort of each rower. Of course there was no way of equalizing them for an entire group and it was a compromise of the coaches judgment and the acting ability of each person. With a large movable mirror behind each row the rowers themselves could see if any one was leaning or out of timing to some extent. While the strap machines were noisy and interfered with anything said by a coach the hydraulics were silent except for the light squish of oil through an orifice, and there was no resistance offered on the recovery.
As with the strap machines, a cold machine with cold oil offered great resistance, which changed rapidly as absorbed energy warmed and thinned the oil so that almost continuous adjustment with the cursed wrench was necessary. But any of the machines provided a good workout, utilizing all the muscles and members of the body used in rowing a shell, which was and should be a built in concept to any rowing simulator. Perhaps this is another controversial item, which will be touched on in regard to the variety of weight lifts and Nautilus machines that can be over or under used with resulting over development of some muscles and the ignoring of others, thinking of the old adage of a chain being only as string as its weakest link.
In 1926-1927 when the Tech Boathouse was enlarged to provide two more bays for boats and corresponding increase in second floor space, two more sets of hydraulic machines were added and during peak hours of fall, winter and spring indoor practice the boathouse was an orchestration of motion akin to a spread-out Corliss engine (a comparison that can only be appreciated by a pre-WWII engineering student). Training and training equipment within a boathouse continued in this manner until the transfer of rowing activities to the Pierce Boathouse in 1966.
Along with improvement in the boathouse and facilities, in 1927 came along the first training barge, a new wrinkle in training equipment. This was a square ended shallow box of pine plank with only a rise of the bottom fore and aft to make it a boat. Long enough for two rows of sliding seats and riggers, eight starboard and eight port, with a walkway down the center for passage of coaches. A large rudder in the stern gave some control though not as fast as a shell, dead slow in fact, but it did give practice in blade control for both beginners and those with problems. Balance should have been no problem considering its width, but from the beginning and moreso as it soaked and swelled it warped in spiral so that positions in the bow and stern on opposite sides too high or low in spite of rigger adjustment and aggravated by inevitable concentration of coaches and passengers. Being too heavy for removal from the water except for winter storage, rain kept it ballasted except when prepared managers for use. But it served it purpose well as one training aid, but lost its novelty quickly. And it was an economical acquisition as the riggers newer those from the two English thole pin shells, modified to mount swivel locks.
For the duration of the occupancy of the BAA boathouse training was enhanced by walking, of value for any sport as well as sedentary individuals of no athletic ambition, to and from classes and dormitories on campus or to their lodgings in fraternities on the Boston shore or in Back Bay. Vehicles in the early years were not a normal possession of students, but those that did seldom drove without a full load of passengers. If may not have officially counted as training but a brisk mile or two before and after practice added some tone though it was costly in time.
The universal feature has always been running or jogging, traditionally out in the open air where ever there was open space or least freedom congestion or traffic. There have always been suitable routes along Memorial Drive either on the walkways or grassed stretches. With the coming of tall buildings to the campus, such as the "Green Building" and running up and down the stairs became a something less than an enjoyable chore and a disturbance to the tenants, varied at times by trips to the cement stairs of the Harvard Stadium.