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This week in Duke history: A club rowing team with no boat

<p>An old&nbsp;article in The Chronicle&nbsp;described&nbsp;the women's club&nbsp;rowing team's struggles without a boat, though one photo captioned "crew in action"&nbsp;mistakenly depicted&nbsp;field hockey.</p>

An old article in The Chronicle described the women's club rowing team's struggles without a boat, though one photo captioned "crew in action" mistakenly depicted field hockey.

This week in Duke history will commemorate the anniversary of a noteworthy Duke sporting event or story every week. From the funny to the unexpected, the blog will inform even the most dedicated Blue Devil fans about what you didn’t know about Duke athletics.

On Aug. 29, 1975, The Chronicle wrote that there was a significant obstacle facing the women’s club crew team entering the program's second year.

“The biggest problem facing the team was the lack of a boat.”

The article says the team had to practice in a simulation tank for most of its first season and was still raising enough money for a boat with the help of a "spaghetti supper" and a "bake sale" at the time of publication.

The team even did the unthinkable and eventually borrowed a boat from North Carolina. And to avoid interfering with the Tar Heels’ practice schedule, the Blue Devils practiced on the water as early as 4:30 a.m. The desire to compete was so strong that the women were willing to do whatever it took.

It would be more than 20 years before women's rowing became a varsity sport at Duke in 1998. By then, hopefully the editors of The Chronicle did not put a field hockey photo with a rowing caption, as they did in the original story in 1975.

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