Boys In The Boat Sparknotes

The book The book The Boys in The Boat, written by Daniel James Brown, tells a story about a boy, named Joe Rantz. Through his life he becomes an unlikely hero because of his bravery; cleverness and creativity; consideration towards others; admiration he receives from his family, friends, and the rest of the world; and the ability to survive against all odds.

Joe manages to overcome many obstacles in his life by being smart and resourceful. At nine years of age his stepmother decided that she did not want Joe living under the same roof as her simply because she didn't like him. He was moved to a small shed, on the grounds of his school. Brown narrates,
Every morning before school and every evening he trudged down the wagon road to the

cook house at the bottom of the mountain to work for the company cook, Mother Cleveland, in exchange for breakfast and dinner (...) in the evening he trudged back up the mountain to the schoolhouse to chop more wood, do his homework, and sleep as best he could. Brown, James. The Boys in the Boat. New York: New York, 2013 (36)
Though Joe was kicked out of his house he was smart.

He learned to fend for himself and found work. He was able to maintain his A average and eventually he was allowed to move back in. He was street smart and school smart.
When Joe was fifteen, his parents left him again, this time taking with them everything including his two younger siblings. They left him some food, money, a half built house, and little more. But just as he had when his stepmother had first kicked him out of the house he survived. Joe

recalls,
Over the next few weeks and months, Joe began to learn to fend entirely for himself. He drove iron stakes into the ground to fortify the chicken coop against future mink attacks (...) He foraged in the dripping woods for mushrooms (...) he hiked three miles into town with one or more enormous salmon slung over his shoulder (...) Joe delivered his catch (...) where he sold them for cash or bartered them for butter or meat or gas. (59-61)
Joe was alone, but he had ideas and plans to go along with them. He was not going to let something that had happened to him multiple times stop him, just because he was alone; because “Home, it was beginning to seem,was something you couldn’t necessarily count on. (31)”

Joe was admired and brave.

After school he was asked to join the University of Washington crew team. On the first day of practice his freshman year he found himself walking into a crowd of others who were also trying out for the team. Out of about a hundred who tried out, he remembers, “The first to drop out had been the boys with impeccably creased trousers and freshly polished oxfords. (51)” Joe is admired by other boys who were in a similar situations as him. He was able to beat those other boys who had more money and more time than he did.
He was brave for continuing to row, even though he had multiple issues with money. He wasn’t very social and he didn’t really have a family so he was alone a lot of the time. Though there were others like him who struggled to blend in,“ he still felt that he stuck out among the survivors (73).” “With the weather remaining cold, he still had to wear his ragged sweater to practice almost everyday, and the boys still teased him continuously for it (91).” Brown explains that Joe was bullied and teased. He shows that Joe was uncomfortable but that through Joe’s bravery he was able to conquer his self doubt as well as other people's negative

tone.
Joe was admired for his strength both mentally and physically. He rowed in an 8+ (eight boys, each with one oar, and a coxswain) through college and straight into the 1936 Berlin olympics. It wasn’t easy but in the end they made it, they won, and even their coach who had never been 100% sure about this particular boat said it was,"'the finest I ever saw seated in a shell. And I’ve seen some corking boat loads’ (354).” Throughout the book their coach, Ulbrickson, continuously changed his opinion on how well he thought the eight could do. He believed in them but was not expecting to make it to the 1936 Olympics. They must have been pretty astounding for them to have surprised their own coach.

Finally, Joe is respectful without showing it to much. His sophomore year of college he discovered that his family, the one that had left him five years before with no communication or attempt to communicate, was living fairly close to where he went to school. One day he and his girlfriend, Joyce, decided to pay them a visits. At the door they were answered by Thula, Joe’s stepmother. He recalls the visit,
She didn’t seem particularly surprised to see them. (...) Nobody knew quite what to say (...) Finally Joe broke the silence. ‘Hello Thula. We just came by to see how you are doing.’ (...) Joe asked if they could come in to say hello to his father and the kids. Thula said that Harry was at work and the kids were visiting friends. Joe asked if he and Joyce could come back and visit them another time. (...) ‘No’ she said, her voice colder now (133).
Joe remembers Thula as a pretty nasty person, but through about the book Brown indicates that Joe didn’t hate her. He didn’t like her either but he chose to honor her wishes until she died and showed no disrespect towards her, even though she was horrible to him.

Heros can be ordinary people. Often they are humble and polite, they are calm when things seem to fall apart, and they push their way through plights and problems. Joe is ordinary, but he is also a hero. He has worked through more obstacles in his first 21 years than most people go through in their entire lives, yet he has accomplished things that most people never accomplish.