World Rowing Championship volunteer helped bring the sport to Sarasota decades ago

Although he hasn’t rowed for 17 years, Sarasota’s Art Ferguson might have had an indirect impact on bringing the 2017 World Rowing Championships to Nathan Benderson Park in Sarasota.

A coxswain at both his Massachusetts high school and at Yale University in the 1940s and 1950s, Ferguson purchased a wooden scull at a Yale reunion in 1971 and then began rowing recreationally for the next three decades.

Rowing in his wooden scull attracted the attention of another man with a background in crew, Peter de Manio, who was inspired to buy his own boat. De Manio then launched several rowing programs in the area.

“It started because I had the first boat, doing recreational rowing, and that’s when I met Peter,” said Ferguson, now a Siesta Key resident who stopped rowing in 2000 because “I figured I was getting too old for that nonsense.”

De Manio was a former rower for the University of Pennsylvania. Once he saw Ferguson, he couldn’t wait to get back in the water.

“He said, ‘Hey that’s a great idea, I’ll get one and we’ll row together,’” Ferguson said.

For three decades, they did. In the 1990s, de Manio, who has been dubbed the “father of rowing in Sarasota,” decided to start programs in coordination with the local high schools, to get students involved.

Though there were some difficulties with that (Ferguson said coaches didn’t want their best athletes running to the water), de Manio eventually started the Sarasota Scullers in 1990, the Sarasota Scullers Rowing Youth Program in 1991 and the Osprey Oars in 2003. He died in 2008, leaving behind his mark on rowing in the area.

“Starting in 1971, there was no rowing here, nothing,” Ferguson said. “I never could have envisioned that by 2017 Sarasota would have the World Rowing Championships here — it just boggles the mind.”

Ferguson will volunteer as a boathouse assistant at the World Rowing Championship — even though he’s not sure exactly what he will be doing.

“I figured it was a rare opportunity to see what’s going on, to be in the thick of things.”

Ferguson said it will be fun to watch the races, because there will be several boats on the water at once. Comparatively, when Ferguson’s high school team went to the Henley Royal Regatta in England in 1947, only two boats could row at a time.

“I think it’ll be a very good time to be a spectator or a participant in some form or another,” he said.

Those attending the event may be able to catch Ferguson in one of the boat houses. While he was waiting to find out his exact assignment, he said it could definitely be a “policing” job, to keep areas clear for rowers carrying their boats to the water. As a former coxswain, this type of responsibility would be right up his alley.

“I like to steer and I like to tell big guys what to do,” he said with a laugh. “It gives me a feeling of power.”

According to Ferguson, novice spectators should know it’s not the boat that matters — it’s all about the teamwork.

“The boat doesn’t make much difference at all,” he said. “There are manufacturers who make faster boats, but it’s the people who make the difference.”