history

Early years[edit]

Stone-lifting traditions were practiced in ancient Greece and Egypt. Western weight lifting developed in Europe around 1880 to 1953, with strongmen displaying feats of strength for the public, and challenging each other. The focus was not on the make up of their physique, and these strongmen often had a large stomach and fatty limbs.^[2]

Eugen Sandow[edit]

Bodybuilding developed in the late 19th century, promoted in England by the 'Father of Modern Bodybuilding', German-born Eugen Sandow. He allowed audiences to enjoy viewing his physique in "muscle display performances". Although audiences were thrilled to see a well-developed physique, those men simply displayed their bodies as part of strength demonstrations or wrestling matches. Sandow had a stage show built around these displays through his manager, Florenz Ziegfeld. The Oscar-winning 1936 musical filmThe Great Ziegfeld, depicts this beginning of modern bodybuilding, when Sandow began to display his body for carnivals.

Sandow became so successful at flexing and posing his physique, that he later created several businesses around his fame and was among the first to market products branded with his name alone. He was credited with inventing and selling the first exercise equipment for the masses: machined dumbbells, spring pulleys and tension bands. Even his image was sold by the thousands in "cabinet cards" and other prints.

Sandow was a perfect "gracilian". This was a standard of ideal body proportions close to those of ancient Greek and Roman statues – see Golden Mean. Men were judged by how closely they matched these proportions.

First large-scale bodybuilding competition[edit]

Sandow organised the first bodybuilding contest on September 14, 1901 called the "Great Competition" which was held in the Royal Albert Hall, London, UK. Judged by himself, Sir Charles Lawes, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the contest was a great success and with a capacity crowd many bodybuilding enthusiasts were turned away.^[3] The trophy presented to the winner was a bronze statue of Sandow sculpted by Frederick Pomeroy. The winner was William L. Murray of Nottingham, England. The most prestigious bodybuilding contest today is the Mr. Olympia, and since 1968, the winner has been presented with the same bronze statue of Sandow that he himself presented to the winner at the first contest.

On 16 January 1904, the first large-scale bodybuilding competition in America took place at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The winner was Al Treloar and he was declared "The Most Perfectly Developed Man in the World".^[4] Treloar won a $1,000 cash prize, a substantial sum at that time. Two weeks later, Thomas Edison made a film of Al Treloar's posing routine. Edison also made two films of Sandow a few years before. Those were the first three motion pictures featuring a bodybuilder. In the early 20th century,Bernarr Macfadden and Charles Atlas, continued to promote bodybuilding across the world. Alois P. Swoboda was an early pioneer in America.

Notable early bodybuilders[edit]

Many other important bodybuilders in the early history of bodybuilding prior to 1930 include: Earle Liederman (writer of some of the earliest bodybuilding instruction books), Zishe Breitbart, Georg Hackenschmidt, Emy Nkemena, George F. Jowett, Finn Hateral (a pioneer in the art of posing), Frank Saldo, Monte Saldo, William Bankier, Launceston Elliot, Sig Klein, Sgt. Alfred Moss, Joe Nordquist, Lionel Strongfort (Strongfortism),^[5] Gustav Frištenský (the Czech champion), Ralph Parcaut, a champion wrestler who also authored an early book on "physical culture," and Alan P. Mead, who became an impressive muscle champion despite the fact that he lost a leg in World War I. Actor Francis X. Bushmanstarted his career as a bodybuilder and sculptor's model before beginning his famous silent movie career. Bushman was a disciple of Eugen Sandow.