Mosman Rowing Club

Mosman Rowing Club is an all-level competitive and recreational rowing club on the North Shore of Sydney, Australia. Since 2007 the club's facilities have been wholly located at The Spit in Sydney's Middle Harbour, the northern arm of Port Jackson.Mercantile club historyMosman's red and white hooped racing colours date back to 1873 when the Mercantile Rowing Club was founded on the west side of Sydney's Circular Quay at Dawes Point. A meeting of warehousemen and merchants' clerks had decided to form a second club the second in the colony (after Sydney Rowing Club). Henry Woolnough was the club's first Chairman, he had earlier been a committee member at Sydney. Mercantile's first patron was the Governor of the New South Wales, Sir Hercules Robinson. Mercantile enjoyed a strong patronage but began to struggle in the 1890s and sustained losses when it opened an unsuccessful branch shed at Parramatta.Mosman club historyIn 1911 due to poor water conditions in the busy port and the expiration of a lease, a decision was made to relocate the original boatshed and all rowing equipment to Mosman Bay on the northern side of the harbour and to re-establish the club as the “Mosman Rowing Club”. The Dawes Point boatshed was purchased from the disbanded Mercantile club and rebuilt at Mosman in time for new club's official opening on 1 April 1911. The club operated from this building until 1933 when a new clubhouse was built on the same site. Boating and ferry traffic made this location less than ideal and from the 1950s senior training was done from Pearl Bay at The Spit near Mosman. A boatshed facility was built there in 1967 at the cost of $74,000. The Club's rowing facilities were progressively re-housed to Pearl Bay with the Mosman Bay site being transformed to a licensed social club. That site was closed in 2007 and major upgrading and a complete relocation to Pearl Bay had occurred by 2010.