Los Gatos Rowing Club Fire
Arthur E Monk
At approximately 3:00 A.M. the morning of May 30th (Memorial Day) someone
deliberately set fire to the Los Gatos Rowing Club boathouse which was
located on top of the earthen dam at Lexington Reservoir above Los Gatos, CA.
The fire department received a call at approximately 3:15 A.M. from a passing
motorist who was beleived to be on highway 17. By the time the fire trucks
reached the site at approximately 3:30 A.M. the west end of the building was
completely in flames and the fire was moving rapidly toward the east end of
the building. In spite of heroic efforts by the fire department the building
and its contents could not be saved.
The boathouse contained roughly 40 rowing shells that were owned by the Los
Gatos Rowing Club, Santa Clara University, and private individuals who
stored their single sculling craft at the boathouse. The replacement value
of the rowing equipment lost by LGRC is over $220,000 and Santa Clara's loss
is similar in value. LGRC had 5 eights, 4 fours, 2 doubles, 8 singles,
4 rowing machines and three caoch boats with motors.
Santa Clara University had easily as much equipment. Sadly, Santa Clara
had just purchased a new Vespoli eight for $17,500 which had only been in the
boat house for a week and had never been on the water.
Yes, insurance was carried on the equipment. In the case of LGRC the club was
only able to afford insurance based on the historical cost rather than the
more expensive replacement value type of insurance. To make matters a little
worse, the club had over its history made a practice of buying used equipment
that was in good condition rather than new equipment so the values reported
to the insurance carrier were in fact the purchase values for used equipment
which are substantially less than the replacement values.
LGRC serves a diverse community of rowers in the South San Francisco Bay area.
This season we have had a junior program for high school students with
30 women and 19 men involved in sculling and sweep-oar rowing. The Juniors
worked hard and performed well at the recent Regional Championships wining
numerous medals. One of the highlights of the regatta was when our novice
women's high school crew beat Stanford University and Sacramento State in the
Open Women's Novice 8+.
The club also has a very active masters sculling program and many of the
individuals involved lost their rowing shells in the conflagration.
Among the masters rowers who were struck by this disaster is one 32-year
old gentleman who won the gold medal in the class "A" lightweight singles
at the USRA Masters Nationals. He recently defended his title winning
the gold in the Open Men's Lightweight Singles at the Regional Championships
in Sacramento, CA. He lost his boat and his insurance doesn't cover it.
We are asking for help from the rowing community and anyone else who has
an interest in seeing athletic youth programs of this kind maintained. To
be specific, we need boats, construction materials for a new building, and
money to help us get past this disaster. For those of you who would like
to make a donation to our rebuilding fund drive please note the following:
1) Donations are tax deductable in the U.S. since LGRC is registered as a
501-C3 non-profit entity with the IRS. Our Tax ID is 94-2711944.
2) Checks should be made out to the Los Gatos Rowing Club and marked "Donation
to Building Fund."
3) Mail donations to Bill Feulner, Treasurer, Los Gatos Rowing Club,
2801 Moorpark Avenue, Suite #2, San Jose, CA 95128.
This posting has been a little long and we appreciate your patience in
reviewing this information to this point. Should any of you wish to
talk with me about this situation or have fund-raising suggestions please
contact me as noted below:
Art Monk
President
Los Gatos Rowing Club
c/o 19782 Solana Drive
Saratoga, CA 95070
Phone: 800-278-6665
Email: mo...@cup.portal.com
Thanks for any help you can provide.
Art Monk
P.S. It has taken this long to get this note out because we first had to
push our Internet connectivity provider to subscribe to the rec.sport.rowing
newsfeed on Usenet before we could post this in the right place. A.M.
Bowman 2x
about the destruction by fire of the Los Gatos Rowing Club boathouse. We
are particularly moved by the loss of the shells. We are a small club
with a limited budget, but we did manage to build a boathouse some 4 years
ago. Consequently, we are still not completely out of debt because of its
construction. Nevertheless, at our board of directors meeting in Fort
Lauderdale tonight, we voted to send $100 to your club as a gift. Alan
Sheinfeld, our club treasurer, has your address and other info and should
be sending the check soon. We realize it is not a lot of money, but when
building our boathouse, we learned that every little bit helps. Greetings
from the Hollywood Rowing Club. Take heart! Bob Hone.