The young artist—yet to be America’s greatest realist painter—turns to Boathouse Row, the world he knows, for his first subject. Eakins lives just blocks from the river and is a rower himself; his best friend from Central High School is winning championship races; and his chemistry teacher is president of a boat club. Besides, rowing is where it’s at in the 1870s—the nation’s hottest spectator sport.

The budding architect comes home from the Civil War a hero, ambitious and daring. He’s a risk taker, a radical, ready to make an imprint on his staid Colonial city. He quickly stuns his hometown with his eclectic design for the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. Few people know of the dynamic and lasting impact he will make on another part of town: Boathouse Row.

The child of poor Irish immigrants, Jack Kelly, is determined to make it. His story is one of passion and perseverance as he builds a business, a Democratic political powerhouse, and a competitive record so unrivaled that he remains the only rower in the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame. Much as he built his company, brick by brick, so on Boathouse Row he lays the foundation for its future.

Son of a two-time Olympian and brother to a Princess (Grace Kelly, of course), Kell manages to reach extraordinary heights of his own, even though—or maybe because—he is pushed to fill the hole in his father’s resumé. Women love him, not just his many flames, but the athletes determined to break into a males-only Boathouse Row, where he opens the door.

The tall, muscled football player from Moorestown, N.J. high school who labored on his family fruit farm seems an ideal candidate for crew when he lands at the University of Pennsylvania. Little does his coach realize that this quiet, modest business major will rise to become a one of the greatest rowers and coaches America has seen.

They call him “the Bear.” And for good reason. He is a character, big in every way— the kind of guy who will chase down an armed burglar, break world records with other Philadelphians in the “Big Eight,” and be remembered with affection and gratitude by generations of champions, for both his cutting quips and his coaching acumen.

She grows up a tomboy in an era when it isn’t seemly for women to exert themselves. She and her boyfriend secretly elope so he can compete in the Olympics in an era when sex is believed to sap a man’s strength. And, in an era when only men row, the “mother of women’s rowing” conjures up a way to start the first competitive women’s rowing club in the United States.

A generation younger than Ernestine Bayer, Joanne discovers that she’s damn good at rowing. So good that she decides to train for the Olympics. Only there are no Olympics for women like herself. Six decades after men’s rowing became an Olympic sport, women’s rowing is still not on the roster. Joanne commits to changing all that, and what a battle it is.

They are eight characters—ten, if you count their coaches. “Old men,” a “motley crew,” the press call them. One is 46; one is a father of six; a couple are Ivy Leaguers who spar with the military guys. They call each other “pussies.” And they have a Jew and a German as their coaches. They are the surprising story of the most unlikely crew ever to pull a boat, and I won’t give away the ending.

“Stotesbury”—that’s the event where thousands of kids compete in the world’s largest high school regatta. But who is Stotesbury, the man? And how did his name get on a rowing race? In his time, banker and billionaire Edward T. Stotesbury is one of Philadelphia’s best known citizens, but few know of his role on the river where he is called “Gum”.

The last demographic wave to reach the shores of Boathouse Row are the children of Philadelphia’s public and charter schools. Curiously, city public school students were among the first high school rowers on the Schuylkill, back in the 1800s. So why did they go away for so long? And how, through the non-profit Philadelphia City Rowing, are they making a comeback?