HARRY S TRUMAN

This race was started in 1976 by Peter and Mary Lou Van Kampen. It was their first year in the Club and back then the last race of the year was on Labor Day weekend. They wanted just one more race in the season and took it upon themselves to promote this race the Sunday after Labor Day. The fact that after Labor Day there are far fewer boats on the lakes prompted them to sail through the Channel from Green Lake into the other Lakes. Peter and Mary went around the lakes a few weekends in advance and put fliers on every sailboat on the lake. Everyone was welcome to join and we got a pretty good turnout. We once had a sailing Canoe race with us and several times Wind Surfers joined in.  There was a prize for the top three M-16’s (the most common boat in the Club then) and another three prizes for the top three handicap boats. Skip would calculate the time the race took, the speed of the wind and from one of his books came up with a handicap for every kind of boat that entered the race. There original trophy was one that Peter made up using parts of an old baseball trophy from his brother in law Buzz, with a sailboat on top that he got from Cal Bieswanger another sailor in the club. That trophy was replaced with a much nicer one by Dave Asbach ( a multiple winner of this cup). The current cup still has a copper medallion of Harry that was part of the original Cup. For several years everyone participating in the race received a bumper sticker stating that “I sailed the Harry S Truman Regatta. The stickers were donated by Peter’s brother Phil who owned a print shop in Madison.