The dream began with Hart Perry, a legendary figure in American rowing — a longtime Kent School coach, National Rowing Foundation executive, and the first American elected a Henley Steward. After moving to the Stonington area, he saw the underused Mystic River as "a huge missed opportunity," founded the Battle Between the Bridges Regatta in 2002, and imagined a true boathouse there: a home for Stonington High School crew, a place for community rowing, and public access to the river. He never saw it built — he died in February 2011, and his widow, Gill Perry Millsom, would later tell the opening-day crowd that "it was Hart's dream that brought us here to today.”
Groups including the Friends of Stonington Crew and Mystic Seaport had spent some fifteen years trying to secure the 123 Greenmanville Avenue parcel, one of the last undeveloped spots on the river, when Stonington residents finally approved the town's purchase at a 2016 town meeting, creating Mystic River Boathouse Park on the former industrial brownfield. A serious fundraising campaign launched in 2017 and was later led by Stonington Community Rowing, Inc., but the road was slow: the first boathouse design drew criticism as too modern, the pandemic left everything in limbo, and the site needed environmental remediation. Momentum returned with state grant funding for cleanup and the 2022 announcement of the Jim Dietz Rowing Center name, honoring the six-time Olympian and legendary coach.
Groundbreaking finally came in July 2025 on the $5.3 million project, and on September 19, 2026 — ten years after the town's vote — a ribbon-cutting officially opened the park, with the Hart Perry Boathouse, the rowing center, public docks, a kayak launch, a living shoreline, and the historic Lovelace House being renovated for team use. As John Thornell, Stonington's director of rowing, put it: "we open more than a boathouse, more than a rowing center. We open a new gathering place for rowing, a new connection to the river, and a new chapter for our town".
Few things have captured Stonington’s collective imagination and support like the Boathouse Project, especially over a ten-year span. There is much more to this story than space allows here, but you can find the people, the passions and the pictures in the following links:
https://heartheboatsing.com/2022/05/20/jim-dietz-rowing-center-soon-a-reality-on-the-mystic-river/
https://southcountystar.org/photos-see-the-new-mystic-river-boathouse-park/
https://stoningtoncommunityrowing.org/boathouse
https://heartheboatsing.com/2025/11/12/mystic-river-boathouse-park-inside-the-red-buoys/
https://heartheboatsing.com/tag/hart-perry/
https://www.stonington-ct.gov/archived/news/update-saint-michael-school-mystic-river-boathouse-park
https://heartheboatsing.com/2026/01/29/a-jim-dietz-rowing-center-and-hart-perry-boathouse-tour/