Rare Cornell Rowing Photos

There are so many historical items that are of interest to Cornell Crew’s history, and many are safely preserved in Cornell’s own archives. Recently, Cornell's Archivist Evan Fay Earle, a longtime contact and friend of the crews, and coordinator of Cornell Crew materials in Kroch Library, found a very unique and interesting offer: an album for sale on eBay full of photos of the 1927 Cornell Crew. Neither he nor any of the coaches had ever seen these photos, which Evan described as very interesting and unique because of their candid nature.  Most photos of this era are posed and formal, while these photos casually showed much of the everyday life of student athletes.

For now, you can see the album here: http://private.betweenthecovers.com/Catalogs/416097_Fraternity.pdf

The Crew, along with Cornell's Archives, were able to purchase this album. The photos are now being loaded and catalogued into a digital database that will be accessible to us all! This partnership between the Cornell Library and Cornell Crew has helped bring a unique piece of our history back to the University.  It also serves as a strong reminder that if you have old pictures of Cornell rowing, they may be of great interest to the Crews and to the University. By sharing them with Cornell, they can be carefully stewarded into perpetuity by professional archivists. Gifts of this kind help preserve our history, and keep us from having to buy it back in the future on eBay!