Three Men in a Boat Boat" is how undated it appears to modern readers – the jokes have been praised as fresh and witty. The three men are based on Jerome himself (the narrator Jerome K. Jerome) and two real-life friends, George Wingrave (who would become a senior manager at Barclays Bank) and Carl Hentschel (the founder of a London printing business, called Harris in the book), with whom Jerome often took boating trips. The dog, Montmorency, is entirely fictional but, "as Jerome admits, developed out of that area of inner consciousness which, in all Englishmen, contains an element of the dog". The trip is
The Boat Race 1911 the 1884, 1885 and 1886 races. The race was watched from the Oxford launch by the Prince of Wales and his brother Prince Albert. It was also the first time the launches were accompanied by aeroplanes. The Oxford crew weighed an average of 12 st 7.5 lb (79.4 kg), per rower more than their opponents. Six of the Cambridge crew had previous Boat Race experience, including R. W. M. Arbuthnot and J. B. Rosher, who were taking part in their third event. Oxford's boat contained three rowers who had previously participated three times in the event, in Duncan Mackinnon, Robert