Judy Kitzman was born in 1952 and was raised in Springfield, Oregon. Coming to Oregon State University in 1972 to study physical education, Kitzman enrolled in a class taught by Crew Coach Karl Drlica during her freshman year. This initial exposure to collegiate rowing proved to be pivotal for Kitzman in setting the course for the rest of her experience at OSU. By the start of her second year in the fall term of 1973, Kitzman had signed up for the Women's Crew team and thus began her association with the sport.
When Kitzman joined the crew team, women's rowing had been an established activity at OSU for nearly two decades. There was a designated Women's Crew coach in place since 1964, with Astrid Hancock the first to serve in that position. However, with regard to the level of administrative and financial support by the university the playing field between women's and men's athletics at OSU was far from equal. Pressure to equalize athletic opportunity in higher education gained traction with the passage of congressional legislation in 1972 designed to address discrepancies. A key part of this legislation came to be known as Title IX. To comply with these new federal requirements to provide equal access, OSU formed a new program in 1974, the Women's Intercollegiate Association (WIA), to administer women's athletic activity at the university. Among the nine sports represented by the WIA, Women's Crew was notably not included in the new program and continued to be administered by the Department of Recreational Sports as a club, and not a varsity sport.
After two years of rowing as a member of the team, Kitzman wanted to expand into more of a coaching role. Much of this stemmed from Kitzman's research into rowing technique as a part of her academic studies and wanting to follow up on these ideas through practice and observation. Kitzman began to coach in 1975 and her position helping to manage the team was considered a student position under the direction of the head coach. During this time, if a substitute rower was needed, Kitzman would also fill in as the situation arose. In her coaching role, Kitzman was a strong advocate for elevating the status of the women's crew team. In 1977, Kitzman and three others involved in women's athletics wrote up and submitted a proposal to the OSU Department of Intercollegiate Athletics to transfer the management of Women's Crew to the WIA. This proposal was approved that same year and marked the beginning of Women's Crew being regarded by OSU as an official varsity team sport, on par with Men's Crew.
After two years of coaching and with her bachelor's degree completed a year earlier, Kitzman left Corvallis in 1977 to continue her involvement with the regional crew community in Portland. In addition to coaching women's rowing for Lewis and Clark College, Kitzman and fellow OSU Women's Crew alumna Diane Gribskov established the non-profit organization Portland Junior Crew (PJC). The mission of PJC was to provide competitive crew opportunities for young women in the Portland area, and it gave Kitzman more opportunties to coach.
In 1981, wanting to follow up on the research she began at OSU, Kitzman entered the graduate program in physical education at the University of Oregon. As a part of her graduate research, Kitzman developed an outline for a rowing program designed specifically for the visually impaired. When Kitzman shared this research with the crew community nationally, it attracted a lot of attention and a program based on her guidelines was nearly launched in Portland. But because of liability concerns, the project was never implemented.
After a year of graduate school, Kitzman switched gears completely and pursued a very different path from the one she had forged at OSU. Relocating to Seattle in 1982, where she would remain for the rest of her life, Kitzman pursued work in marketing and public relations, holding positions for several organizations. Three years after retiring from North Seattle Community College, Kitzman passed away in 2017.
To honor Kitzman's legacy in women's rowing, OSU Crew Coach Emily Ford dedicated a new racing shell in Kitzman's name in 2015.
Author: Karl McCreary
