Gales Ferry

Gales Ferry refers both to a village within the town of Ledyard, Connecticut and to a complex of buildings within that village at the site of the ferry which gave the community its name. According to the 2000 census, the per capita income of Gales Ferry was $24,678. [http://www.trulia.com/real_estate/Gales_Ferry-Connecticut/]

Gales Ferry includes a notable historic district with several buildings from the late colonial and early national periods (late 18th and early 19th century). Originally its own community, Gales Ferry has been administratively absorbed by the larger town of Ledyard, but nonetheless retains its own US Post Office (ZIP code 06335) and operates a library within the greater Ledyard library system. It has many notable areas such as The Village, Birdland, Christy Hills, Sherwood Forest, Glenwoods, and Presidental Estates. The village is named for the ferry operated by Roger Gale at the current site of the Yale University crew training camp. The community also has its own volunteer fire department, a small marina, and Dow Chemical currently operates a plant located on Route 12. The old Gales Ferry School Located on Hurlbutt Road, which has been vacant since 2001, is due to be renovated into the Ledyard Medical Center, Also a Rite Aid Pharmacy is going to be constructed over the old baseball field located on the school property. Construction is due to begin in May 2008. Much of the economic activity in the town revolves around the US Naval Base just to the south of the town in Groton, Connecticut. The community has two schools: Juliet W. Long, which is Grades 3-6, and the newer Gales Ferry school, which is K-2. They are located off the Thames River next door to each other.

The Ferry

The Ferry at Gales Ferry (Coord|41|25|50.41|N|72|5|36.06|W) is the site of the training camp of the Yale Heavyweight Men's Crew for the Yale-Harvard Boat Race. The Yale complex, at 2 Riverside Place, occupies the site of the ferry across the Thames river that gave the surrounding community of Gales Ferry its name. The complex consists of the Varsity House, Manager's House and the Boathouse. The oldest structure on the site is the front portion of the varsity house which was originally constructed in the late eighteenth century as a private home and which has since been considerably expanded by multiple additions. The boathouse was designed by James Gamble Rogers who was also responsible for much of the gothic revival architecture at Yale's New Haven campus.

The boathouse adjoining the dock serves as the center of activity when the camp is occupied and provides storage and repair space for the boats. Freshman oarsmen are also quartered in the second floor of the boathouse. Upperclassmen, including all of the rowers in the varsity and junior varsity boats, are quartered in the top floor of the varsity house. Women on the team, if there are any serving as coxswains, are housed either in the front wing of the varsity quarters or in the manager's house. The varsity house also contains several common spaces including a game room, a central common room and the dining room as well as bathrooms and the kitchen.

The Ferry is of considerable historical interest since Yale's Crew is the oldest college athletic team in America. The space is filled with memorabilia and artifacts from the team's history but it is very much a living history given the continuous use and occupation that bring the camp to life every year for the race. As the center of Yale Crew's institutional memory and the annual home of the longest running rivalry in American college sports the Ferry serves as an important site in the history of sports.

See also

* Yale-Harvard Boat Race