Shortly after dawn on a brisk April morning, steam rises from the cold, calm surface of Lake Michie. Except for the honking of Canada geese overhead, the lake is quiet. Two wakeless launches—quiet motorboats—shear through the water.“Make sure you’re rowing as straight as you can!” yells the woman piloting one of the boats. She has a megaphone.“Roll it hard!” barks the hoarse-sounding man, steering the other. “Legs! Legs! Harder, legs!”

One Saturday morning in the late 1980s, Marissa Young entered a bedroom where her father, Robert, was recovering from working the graveyard shift.Young jostled him until he awoke. She wanted to join a friend in signing up for the local softball league, and she needed a ride. “Softball? You want to play softball?” he replied, in disbelief since his daughter was in just the first grade. “Have your mom take you.”