If it’s an odd business meeting a stranger to interview them; it’s probably just as strange to be the person opening the door. Of course after two hours Frank Cunningham was no longer a stranger. Plus I had so many pages of notes and quotes I knew trying to reduce his 88 years to column length was going to be painful.

“I just interviewed a man who received the 2010 US Rowing Medal,” I said by way of hello to Jody at my next stop.

“Frank Cunningham?” she said. “I love him. Was he wearing that plaid, wool hat?”

At my next stop I met a fellow writer and die-hard outdoorsman. “I just met a man who has been rowing almost all of his life,” I said.

“You met Frank Cunningham.” Scott replied.

Am I the last person in Ballard to know about Frank Cunningham? Then again I wasn’t yet born when he rowed for Harvard in a 1947 post-season crew race in Seattle. I wasn’t one of his English or History students at Edmonds High School, or at Lakeside where he taught and coached until 1980. I’ve never sat in a single, a double, a four-man or an eight-man in my life. Not on the Charles, not on Greenlake, not on Lake Union where Frank was a founder and is still a regular at Lake Washington Rowing Club.

For two hours a blue album sat unmentioned on the ottoman next to Frank’s chair. His grandson and a friend rehearsed music in the basement. “It’s happy noise for me,” Frank said. His wife Jane died in 2004 and Frank accepted his son Chris’ invitation to live with him and children in Ballard.

Frank’s story begins in the former mill town of Lowell, Massachusetts. He didn’t choose to follow in his father’s footsteps as an engineer. Instead he became an oarsman, teacher, coach, husband, father, mentor; a man honored at 88 for his lifetime achievements on the water. Yet his father said of his son the Harvard graduate. “All that education, wasted.” Instead Frank chose educating others, maintaining the boats and training for races until he was 64.

Frank’s own words best describe his life and his lifelong passion. “I live in a sphere defined by the sport of rowing. The Seattle water scene has been the center of my life. I was a one-sport man, always was.”

On teaching: “You can’t say you teach for a living; it’s more like a pittance – a charity. But it was a hell of a good time.”

On coaching: “I established the standards of coaching. I still go out in the coach boat if they’ll have me and they’re willing to ask me questions.”

On hanging up his oars at 83: “I could still row very well. I’ve always been vain about that. Sometime I even coached someone who could row as well as me but I stopped when I could no longer demonstrate that. I like to row in a single – it’s only marginally dangerous, but getting back in the boat was getting too difficult.”

On aging and his children revoking his driving privileges: “I can look in the mirror and see what they see – an old man. Approaching 90 even I realize the idea of still driving is funny.”

On changes in rowing: “The real boats are wooden. Real boats preceded the ones they use now. Wooden boats take a lot of upkeep; there are very few people who can maintain them anymore.”

On living with his son and grandchildren: “This role reversal is a good thing. It’s taken me a long time to grow up. Maybe I’m still working on it.”

What he thinks while standing on the bank at the Montlake Cut on Boating Day: “I guess you could call that rowing. I could do better.”

Only when I asked about the blue album did Frank show me the testimonials and photos surrounding his receipt of the 2010 US Rowing Medal; their highest award. When I noticed a reference to a book he’d written in the clippings he showed me The Sculler at Ease, written with Leslie Stillwell Strom and illustrated by his daughter Laurie Cunningham. Self-published in 1992 the book still sells consistently well.

Frank Cunningham may be vain about his rowing skills but he seems too modest about his contributions in life. His choices disappointed his father but for others he has been the ultimate mentor and coach. He claims, “My whole career has been shaped by dumb luck and good friends.” But doesn’t explain what pushed him to train five days a week, either doing 1000 meter sprints or rowing continuously three miles out and three miles back. It wasn’t dumb luck that pushed him almost daily to dip his oars into the cold, dark Seattle water that has been the center of his life.

Peggy can be reached atlargeinballard@yahoo.com. She is co-author of Out of Nowhere, with Maria Federici’s mother Robin Abel.