The New York Times:

The Peter Jay Sharp Boathouse, soon to set sail from a marina in Norwalk, Conn., is not the type of vessel normally seen in those waters. Neither is Bette Midler the usual sort of captain. But when the green and yellow boathouse, flying three colorful pennants from its hipped roof and looking like a modest but proud Victorian train station, is ceremonially towed around the Battery late next month en route to its Harlem River home at Dyckman Street, Ms. Midler will be very much in command, if only symbolically.

It would be too much to give Ms. Midler, 57, sole credit for the boathouse, or for the new city park where it will be moored, or for the sculling programs designed to awaken the Harlem River's dormant reputation as a center of competitive rowing. Nonetheless, her star power drove the seven-year process, harnessing bureaucracies and big donors alike.

"I saw pictures of the number of people engaged in sport on the Harlem River in its former incarnation," she said, "and then I saw the ghost town it had become. If it existed once, why not again?"

Last night her annual Hulaween Ball at the Marriott Marquis raised more than $1 million for the New York Restoration Project, the group she founded in 1995 to restore neglected parks.

After its overnight trip through Long Island Sound and Hell Gate, the boathouse will be moored at the new five-acre Swindler Cove Park, on the Harlem River's west shore in northern Manhattan.

As an x-crew jock, having rowed on the Charles River and all over the East Coast while in college, I appreciate Bette Midler's efforts in more ways than one.

There is no question that she is helping to bring new life and beauty to this part of Harlem, as a result of her initiative to restore neglected parks. However, until she gets on the water, in a shell, rowing "effortlessly" in sync with her crew mates, she will never know what her gracious act is going to do for the souls of so many youth.

Good on ya, mate, Bette! The music you have brought to the world is so very soulful, and now, here again, so are your acts of giving back to the world. Absolutely devine. Thank you!

~Jennifer