“Rowing will become a University-sanctioned sport over my dead body,” Brown president Henry M. Wriston famously said. Then in 1960, the scrappy club crew pulled together so well that they almost won the most important race in college crew, landing themselves in the pages of Sports Illustrated, which called Brown’s performance “the biggest upset since David skulled Goliath.” The New York Herald Tribune noted that “if the race had been rowed in orthodox fashion, the boys from Providence might have taken it all.” But the eight “boys from Providence” that were in that shell were just happy to have placed. Here’s their incredible story told by oarsman John Escher ’61, who was in the four seat—and a surprise ending the teammates discovered 60 years later.