History of Balmain Working Men's Rowing Club

Change of Name - 1892

At the half-yearly meeting of the Balmain Working Men’s Rowing club held in Dick’s Hotel Balmain on Wednesday evening 14th December 1892, the captain Mr H J Bourne, proposed and Mr C Berry seconded, that the name of the club be altered to the “Enterprise Rowing club.” A dispute arose and a ballot was taken, which resulted in a victory for the new name by one vote.

A great ﬁght was put up by the Enterprise club to widen the amateur deﬁnition. Eventually the club became afﬁliated with the NSW Rowing Association in February 1894 with the direct result that its members could race without hindrance at the amateur regattas.

The doors were now open for the working men to challenge all other rowing clubs on equal grounds. This was a great moment for the Enterprise Rowing club. Up until this time they had been restricted to competing within their own club regattas or in the Manual Labour entries at open regattas.

It wasn’t until 1912 that the E.R.C hosted their ﬁrst Association regatta which was reported to go down in history as an indicator of their successful status as a rowing club.

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Whilst every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the information provided, errors may exist. Please send advice of any errors or inaccuracies by email to:

Also your comments, suggestions and photos are sought to enhance this site.

The idea for this history originated from the Olympic Rowing and World Senior Rowing Championship histories written by Andrew Guerin and Margot Foster in 1991, 1992 & 1993 for the Australian team handbooks. Andrew Guerin developed and extended these histories to the current format in 2004 for publication in 2004 and then expanded the site.

Steve Roll has been an invaluable contributor to the website in locating errors and finding Christian names of rowers. His superb work is acknowledged.

© Andrew Guerin – 2004
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Disclaimer: Whilst extensive efforts have been made to ensure the accuracy of the information supplied, the editors take no responsibility for any loss or damage whatsoever arising from inaccuracies contained in this work.