Ocean rower, Katie Spotz

By Greg Spooner

Past, Present, and Future – events are set in motion that create lucky, and often times life-changing encounters that commemorate grand events, put you closer to grim history than you care to be, and let you cross paths with trend setters that were genius long before their time. Share your story below, after you read about ours:

Present: I drove to Seattle today to meet up with a friend I’ve never met in person. Katie Spotz is in town visiting friends, and we thought it a fine idea to finally put faces to the many phone calls and emails that preceded her own record row – solo at that – across the mid-Atlantic Ocean. Back in early 2009 I got a call out of the blue asking, for all intents and purposes, how to put together a successful ocean rowing expedition. I shared all I knew, she ran with it, and was so successful that she exceeded anything we had ever accomplished: over $70,000 for her charity, weekly awards, regular speaking gigs, AND appearances with CBS Evening News’ Katie Couric & with Anderson Cooper 360°. We’re all very proud of her accomplishment, and excited to see what’s in store for her next grand challenge (We’ll shout it out via Twitter when it goes public).

The iceberg suspected of having sunk the Titanic. It was found in the vicinity of the lifeboats with a "red smear" of anti-fouling paint.

Past: On 6/30/09, in the midst of the North Atlantic Rowing Race, we rowed within 100-miles of the final known location of the RMS Titanic. 88 years before our own “titanic” journey, The Titanic struck an iceberg and was gone within a mere 3-hours, losing over 1,500 of the 2,223 passengers – less than a 1/3 survived. We saw no such behemoths on our journey, and if my memory serves me, icebergs haven’t been seen that far south since the mid-1950′s. Nonetheless – and I don’t think we recognized it at the time – this brush with history was a chilling reminder of the fragility of life, and the respect and planning with which any ocean-going undertaking deserves.

Charles Darwin, circa 1880

Future: The impetus for this blog post is that today happens to be Charles Darwin’s birthday – the figure behind the theory of natural selection. Born February 12, 1809, Darwin is most famously known for his On the Origin of Species, a work almost 20-years in the making, spawned from 5 years of observations aboard and ashore from the HMS Beagle as it charted the South American coastline and circumnavigated the world. Leaving Liverpool, England in December 1831, the brig-sloop waylayed in the Canary Islands (customary departure for most trans-Atlantic ocean rows), and plied waters we will invariably cross as it made its way for eastern South America.

When did you cross paths with history? Or did you make your own? Please share in the comments section.