Women's Crew History

1910-1919

1910
1912
1913
1917
1910
Washington Rowing Women's History

A July 17, 1910 article in the Seattle Daily Times describing the conflict Hiram Conibear was already having with upper campus over his women’s team. Miss Jessie Merrick, the phys-ed director for women at the UW, was adamantly opposed to the “rigorous exercise which Conibear prescribes for them”, and denied Conibear and his athletes the racing they wanted, adjusting practices to instead focus on a form contest. “Miss Merrick contended that the rigorous treatment “Conny” was giving his fair proteges was too violent and that his language was ungentlemanly,” the article stated. “She protested, particularly against the long race which “Conny” wanted the women to pull off on Junior Day. The result was that the women did not race, holding what was known as a ‘form-race’ instead”.

There is a lot packed into this article, but it is important to note that “the women petitioned the UW to allow them to take rowing and the board granted them permission. Miss Merrick has since declared that she will not allow the women to take the rigorous exercise that Conibear prescribes for them, so that present plans have been brought to an abrupt halt.”

This would not be the first – or last time – “Conny” would find himself defending the women’s program, and particularly these early women athletes who wanted to race.  Seattle Daily Times, July 17th, 1910

1912
Washington Rowing Women's History

Women’s athletics at Washington was not limited to rowing; in fact, basketball, baseball, hockey, and track became sponsored sports for women. But by 1912 women’s rowing was attracting as much as 10% of the entire coed population on campus, with a program growing so rapidly that everyone – including upper campus – were taking notice. Tyee photo

1913
Washington Rowing Women's History

Two of the more influential women whose coaching led to the growth in the sport at Washington: Gretchen O’Donnell (l) and Ethel Johnson (r).

O’Donnell is described in the history:  “In addition to her dedication to rowing, Miss O’Donnell was on the Hockey team (right halfback) and Basketball team (guard), as well as being assistant editor of the Tyee, member of the Women’s League, WAA, Spanish Club, Senior Class Secretary, Varsity Ball Committee, involved in drama, and Senior Class historian.  Add to that “coach” of the women’s rowing squad in 1911; invaluable to Conibear in these early years, it was her dedication that linked the program from it’s inception to the glory years mid-decade.”

Johnson took over the head coaching role in 1913, “hired by Jessie Merrick as coach/instructor for Hockey and Baseball, and quickly took to the sport of rowing.” Tyee photos

1917
Washington Rowing Women's History

Always the optimist, always the believer, and always – like Dick Erickson some 70 years later would say – an “opportunitiest”, Hiram Conibear was killed in a freak accident in his backyard picking plums in September of 1917. That same year the U.S. had entered World War I, and suddenly a perfect storm of circumstances was weighing on the program.  Washington Rowing – in a matter of months – was abruptly and irrevocably changed.  By the time the war was over a year later, rowing across the country was being redefined, but none more so than on the west coast. Cal’s men’s program was teetering on the edge of extinction, and Stanford’s men’s program was cancelled and would not return for 60 years (neither of these programs ever had women’s rowing to begin with). As Ed Leader took over at Washington, it was all he could do to keep any rowing alive against a backdrop of anti-athletic sentiment on upper campus, and a community reeling from the war.  In those years of turmoil one of the greatest casualties at Washington was women’s rowing.  Without their strongest advocate in Conibear, and without the funding or the facilities as the men’s team moved to the Navy Hanger on the new Montlake Cut, women’s rowing – and the unique opportunity it afforded the many young women who participated – would disappear from campus for decades.

“Miss Merrick (UW Physical Education Director for Women) has since declared that she will not allow the women to take the rigorous exercise which Conibear prescribes for them, so that present plans have been brought to an abrupt halt.”
Seattle Daily Times; July 17, 1910