page_title: Wellington Rowing Club
section_title: Famous Members
hierarchical_section_title: Wellington Rowing Club / Famous Members
caption_attribution_description: English: Tom Sullivan, champion sculler
context_page_description: The Wellington Rowing Club is a rowing club situated on Wellington Harbour, New Zealand. The current building, is classified as a "Category I" historic place by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust.
context_section_description: The Wellington Rowing Club boasts numerous international representatives and Olympic medalists.
  New Zealand's first international sculling representative was William Bridson. Bridson won the Amateur Sculling Championship of Victoria in 1891.
  Tom Sullivan, along with Bridson, was a member of the famous WRC crew who won all eight Rowing New Zealand (then New Zealand Amateur Rowing Association) championship titles between 1889 and 1890. Sullivan has been recognised as “New Zealand's first sculler of international note”. Sullivan left the club in 1890 to become a professional sculler. He was the first New Zealander to challenge for the World Sculling Championship. In 1893 he won the English Sculling Championship.
  George Lauchlan was the manager of the famous 1925 New Zealand eight that travelled to Australia and won the New South Wales Championship.
  Tris Hegglun and Owen Wares were members of the club before World War II. During the war they represented the 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) which beat the Cairo River Club and an all-Egyptian representative crew to win the Freyberg Cup. Today the Sir Bernard Freyberg Cup is allocated to the champion single sculls at the New Zealand National Club Championships.
  WRC's 'golden era' was without doubt the 1960s and 1970s. The club won the Champion Eight event in 1967 and 1969. The club later won the Boss Rooster in 1972.
  Pete Delaney was the club's first Olympian, representing New Zealand at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics.
  In 1967 the New Zealand "All Blacks" crew, including WRC members Pete Delaney (Bow), Graeme Shaw (2), Tom Just (3), John Hunter (5) and Alan Boykett (cox), won the first FISA North American Championships, St. Catharines, Canada, and the USRowing National Championships, Philadelphia.
  In 1968 John Hunter (5) and Tom Just (2) represented New Zealand in the eight at the 1968 Summer Olympics which finished fourth.
  John Hunter (5) and Simon Dickie (cox) were members of the New Zealand eight that won gold at the USRowing National Championships in 1970, the FISA European Championships, Copenhagen, Denmark, the International German Championships, Duisburg, West Germany and the International Austrian Championships, Klagenfurt, Austria in 1971.
  At the 1972 Summer Olympics Dick Joyce (6), John Hunter (5) and Simon Dickie (cox) won the eight-oar event with Ross Collinge (2) winning a silver in the coxless four event.
caption: Tom Sullivan, Professional Sculling Champion of England, 1893
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