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Law & Oars
Created: 5/31/2005 10:45:18 AM
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By Jack DeGange
The year was 1975. With a bachelor’s degree from Harvard and a law degree from Boston University, Dick Grossman was launching a career in law.
Grossman had been a coxswain in Harvard shells in the late 1960s as Harry Parker created a rowing dynasty that is ongoing. In 1968, he was the spare cox when Harvard’s heavyweights became the last collegiate crew to represent the United States in the Olympic Games.
During law school, he drove the coaching launch (and learned about motivating oarsmen) while Steve Gladstone, now the crew coach at California, directed Harvard’s lightweights to undefeated seasons.
In 1973, with his law degree in hand, Grossman coxed the U.S. lightweights to a bronze medal in the world championships. But a bronze medal wasn’t good enough.
“I was working with a law firm in Boston and asked for a leave of absence in 1974,” he recalled. “It was denied.” The lightweights, without Grossman, won the gold medal in the world championships.
The law firm partners took a dim view whenever Grossman would leave 15 minutes early for rowing practice on the Charles River. Grossman quit the firm, in time to cox the U.S. lights to a silver medal in 1975.
That national team’s coach was Peter Gardner, Dartmouth’s crew coach. “The day we left for the world championships, Pete’s freshman coach quit,” said Grossman. Gardner hired Grossman.
After four years as Gardner’s freshman coach and 26 as coach of Dartmouth’s lightweights, Grossman is retiring after 30 years, a tenure that has included back-to-back championships in the Eastern Sprints (1993, 1994), a close second in the national championship (1990), and a coaching career that has left an indelible mark on the lives of innumerable Dartmouth rowers.
Thirty years: It’s not a record for longevity. Gardner coached for 31 years (he retired in 1988). “Pete has always symbolized everything good about Dartmouth crew to me,” said Grossman. “I’m happy to let him keep the record.”
While his crews have won at the Sprints, no race is more memorable to Grossman than the lightweight duel with Harvard for the Biglin Bowl in 1994. The varsity race was postponed for two weeks after Harvard’s jayvee boat sank in rough water.
Dartmouth had never beaten the Crimson lightweights as they took to the Charles River early on a Sunday morning in pea soup fog.
“The crews were virtually even for the whole distance,” Grossman recalled. “In the last 20 strokes, Dartmouth decided to win it and Harvard couldn’t stop them. It was one of the best races I’ve seen and definitely the most satisfying.”
He’s seen changes in Dartmouth rowing over the years, most conspicuously the spacious boathouse that was completed in 1986 (he’ll continue to work with the Friends of Rowing to rebuild and expand Fuller Boathouse into a two-story building with much-needed training facilities).
A source of constant change that has been Grossman’s motivation: Dartmouth’s students. “Some classes are more talented than others, some individuals were more motivated than others,” he said. “Over 30 years, I realize that each season challenged me in a different way and kept it interesting.”
While coaching brought Grossman to Dartmouth, he and his wife, Elaine Warshell (they met in law school) had bought vacation property near Hanover in the early 1970s, with a long-term eye toward retirement.
“Retirement” is only a word. Grossman plans to take a year to regroup before exploring coaching opportunities with the rowing clubs that have sprung up around Dartmouth in recent years.
A return to a role in rowing may take more than a year for Grossman: There are two other coxswains in the Grossman family. Robin is a sophomore in the women’s novice shell at Cal-Berkeley this year. And T. J., coxswain of the Hanover High varsity eight this spring, will vie for a place in one of Steve Gladstone’s shells at Berkeley during the next four years.
In the near term, Coach Grossman will be just a very interested father of a daughter and son following in his footsteps.
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Related Schools: Dartmouth
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Related Sports: Rowing
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*This Article has been archived.*
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