SANDOW: THE MAN WHO MADE THE WORLD MAD FOR MUSCLES

by DAVID L. CHAPMAN

Every year at the Mr. Olympia bodybuilding contest the world's most massively built men pose and flex their muscles, each attempting to show that his bronzed, oiled sinews are bigger than the other guy's. As the audience screams its approval, the athletes contort their bodies in a carefully choreographed ballet of beefy pectorals, corrugated abdominals, and cantaloupe-sized biceps. The winner is awarded a large cash prize, but the check is accompanied by a rather unusual trophy. It is a statue of a modestly muscled Victorian strongman who supports an old-fashioned globe barbell in one hand while extending the other gracefully The mustachioed, fig-leafed statue is as unlike its modern counterparts as it is possible to imagine, and it represents a far older tradition than perhaps any of the men in the contest lineup realize This trophy depicts Eugen Sandow (sometimes spelled "Eugen"), a vaudeville strongman who encouraged bodybuilding a century ago and who transformed physical culture from the recreation of a few cranks to a sport and business that have exploded in popularity...

The crowning glory of Sandow's work in bodybuilding came in 1901 when he organized the world's first major physique competition. Weightlifting contests had been common, but Sandow was the first to give precedence to the contestants' musculature. This magnificent affair took place in London's cavernous Royal Albert Hall. Such was the interest generated by the event that there was standing room only in the enormous auditorium, and many people were turned away at the door. Sixty competitors had been chosen from all over the British Isles, and they all marched in wearing black tights and leopard skins (like the one Sandow wears in the picture shown at the right) and, incidentally, looking rather silly. The three men doing the judging were Sir Charles Lawes, a noted sculptor; Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author and originator of Sherlock Holmes; and Sandow himself. The contestants were instructed to go through a series of compulsory poses and then they were examined at close range. "Mr. Sandow," wrote one eye witness, "fairly went on his hands and knees to examine the nether limbs of the men, and not a point seemed to escape the judges, the audience watching with breathless interest." In the end, a Birmingham man named W.L. Murray was declared the winner, and he became the first bodybuilder in history to receive the famous Sandow statuette.

Who was Sandow?

The man who engineered that transition was born with the name Friedrich Wilhelm Mueller in Konigsberg, capital of East Prussia on April 25, 1867. Apparently, his father was a greengrocer and his mother was a Russian emigrant, but the strongman never offered much reliable information about his early life probably to camouflage his humble beginnings. At some point in his teens, the man ran off and joined a circus, where as a naturally athletic youth with a well-developed sense of balance he took to acrobatics. Although a competent performer, Mueller lacked the dash and polish required of a true star, but in Brussels around 1887 one Louis Durlacher with the stage name "Attila" recognized the young man's potential and decided to turn his young pupil into the star Attila himself had never become. At this point, Mueller changed his name to "Eugen Sandow" and under Attila's tutelege began progressive weight training. Developing muscles and lifting weights had been a human recreation from at least the time of the ancient Greeks, but until the late nineteenth century, this had always been done in a haphazard way. ÊThrough a long process of trial and error, Durlacher and a few German colleagues had finally discovered that it was possible to build muscles by lifting increasingly heavier weights in a regular and systematic way. After a few months of this, the two men began to travel around northern Europe performing wherever they could. ÊSandow had learned his craft well, and in London in 1889, he challenged and won a contest with the well-known stage strongman "Sampson". This established Sandow.

Despite Sandow's example, it has always been a hard road to physical perfection. ÊExercise, fitness, and especially weight training were mysterious activities to most people at the turn of the century; there was considerable confusion even in the medical community about the benefits or dangers of exercise. ÊMany distinguished physicians were actively opposed to exertion of any sort. "Bending over to tie or untie your shoes," counseled Dr. Peter Steinchron, "bringing the fork to your mouth; the rubdown after a shower; laughing; talking and reading, all these furnish your daily exercise requirements." Added to this attitude was the irrational fear of "muscle binding," a condition supposedly caused by over development of the sinews and resulting in the inability to bend or flex the muscles normally. The fact that this syndrome had never been witnessed before seemed to allay few fears among the uninitiated. While the medical community issued conflicting advice, there was still great interest in becoming strong and healthy.

One of the few places where nineteenth century audiences could actually see a few of the superb specimens of masculinity was in the vaudeville theater. It was here that spectators could witness professional strongmen lifting weights, juggling cannon balls, and showing off their manly physiques. Sandow emerged from this tradition, but he eventually learned to transcend its bounds, and in the process he brought the rest of us along with him. His fame was destined to grow even faster when in the summer of 1893 Sandow was discovered by a 26 year-old Chicagoan named Florenz Ziegfeld who persuaded him to perform at the World's Columbian Exposition in 1894. Ziegfeld recognized that Sandow's calling was not as a weightlifter, but as a physique artist whose musculature suggested the grace and form of ancient Greek statuary. But Sandow was of flesh and blood, and the Midwestern manager was not blind to the man's appeal as a muscle sex symbol. One of Ziegfeld's first decisions was to get Sandow to doff his pink tights and show a bit more skin; he also encouraged his subject to pose for a masterful series of photographs clad only in a fig leaf. Soon these innovations had made Sandow a prime attraction at the Fair, and Chicago's richest and fairest all clamored to see the perfect man perform.

After the Columbian Exposition, they went to San Francisco in 1894 for an extended stay. ÊHere Sandow had a famous fight with a lion. ÊThanks to a muzzle, paw mittens, and (according to some) a powerful drug in the beast's pre-fight snack, the lion lost. ÊBy 1896 there was hardly a theater in the land that Sandow had not played in at least once; he had managed to become an international star Êin a remarkably short period.

Business Ventures

By 1897 Sandow was ready to return to England. He was bursting with new ideas and ready to start what he considered his "real work." While traveling with his vaudeville company, the strongman had learned that many members of his audiences also wanted to become strong and shapely, and between tours he had experimented with mail-order instruction and original exercise equipment.

It was not until he returned to Europe, however, that he took full advantage of this trend by opening his "Physical Culture Studio" in London. There had, of course, been gymnasiums before, but Sandow's great innovation was to remove the stink and the Spartan decor and make the establishments more palatable to the middle classes. He did this by installing posh wood panelling, potted palms, gilt-framed mirrors, and oriental carpets. It is also significant that he chose to call his business a "studio" rather than a gymnasium. ÊThis was to be a place where customers came to resculpt their bodies and reform their health not to build muscles. Actually, there was very little of what we would recognize as modern bodybuilding at Sandow's studio; most of the exercise was done with light dumbbells or pulley apparatuses. The goal was heart-pumping, not iron-pumping. Only after men had finished a preliminary course would they graduate to heavier weights, but very few chose to go that far.

By 1905 Sandow's Physical Culture enterprise had grown into a successful chain of studios all over the British Isles. ÊPart of the reason for his prosperity was that Sandow recognized the importance of including women and children in his exercise plans. The Prussian muscleman was not blind to the business opportunities that were obvious in his chosen field. He became an aggressive marketer of equipment, gym memberships, and such unusual products as a Sandow's Patented Embrocation, Sandow's Health and Strength Cocoa, and even Sandow's Patented Health Corset. His interest in pursuing business opportunities anticipated by many decades the techniques of gym chain owners and health food fanatics of our own time. Sandow continually stressed the benefits and methods of bodybuilding, and he pioneered many devices for muscle development. ÊOne such invention was the "spring-grip dumbbell." This was simply a regular dumbbell that had been sawed in two laterally and then had heavy springs inserted between the two sides, thus enabling the user to work his grip strength as well as his biceps. Another brainstorm resulted in "Sandow's Own Combined Developer" which was really just an India rubber chest expander with light dumbbells attached to the handles.

Sandow realized before anyone else that in order for physical culture to become popular on a massive level, he had to interest the middle class. It was for this reason that he called his gymnasiums "Institutes of Physical Culture," and situated them in upscale neighborhoods. Before Sandow came along, working out with weights was a decidedly proletarian occupation; the middle and upper crust considered it too much like manual labor. It was thanks to Sandow's marketing genius that he discovered how to make weight training palatable to the gentry and the Êbourgeoisie. Part of his secret involved his posh, salons with their wood paneling, potted palms, and Persian carpets. ÊSandow's genius for self promotion and saturation advertising were also assets in this campaign, but he never lost sight of his goal of making the world's citizens healthier and shapelier. The former Prussian circus acrobat had learned how to make himself respectable in the world's snobbiest society.

After conquering Europe, Sandow decided it was time to attack the rest of the world, and he launched a series of tours that took him all over the globe. South Africa, India, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand all received visits from the perfect man. ÊIn 1911 he was made special instructor in physical culture to the King of England, indicating that his ideas were gaining even royal favor. Part of the reason for his phenomenal success was that Sandow came along at precisely the right time to cash in on a growing fitness movement that was sweeping the Anglo-Saxon world. Although it was partly motivated by the Victorian spirit of self-improvement, this time it was the body that came in for attention rather than the soul. It suddenly became fashionable to engage in athletics, and both sexes were eager to participate in a little friendly sport. ÊEveryone seemed to be bicycling, lifting weights, swinging Indian clubs, or playing any number of ball games. At the height of the craze, a certain reverend gentleman observed that the people of England were beginning to renounce St. George for St. Sandow.

Sandow died in 1925 of complications, probably from syphilis, and his wife never allowed a marker to be placed over her husband's grave. To this day Eugen lies in an overgrown plot in a forgotten corner of Putney Vale Cemetery near London. Ê

Sandow's Legacy

If he did not always measure up in terms of moral perfection, Sandow's physical perfection had never been in doubt. ÊHe had come to represent all that was best in terms of muscularity and manly beauty. He had become a model for others to emulate, and it was believed at the time that he was the most perfectly developed human male ever to grace the earth. To commemorate that fact, in 1901 Professor Ray Lankester, director of the Natural History branch of the British Museum asked Sandow to "pose" for a complete body cast that would then be used in an exhibit. The idea was to mount an exhibit displaying examples of all the major races of the world; the first was to be the Caucasian race, and Sandow was to be its consummate representative. Thus, Sandow's cast was to be a fitting monument to man's ability to mold his own body and marked with a small plaque announced that this was a "Xanthochroic-Caucasian type-E. Sandow." Ê Alas, critics were not kind to the cast after it had gone on view. ÊIt was as graceless and ugly, unlike the original, which was lithe and shapely. After a time, the plaster cast was removed, and it languished in a forgotten storage room until just last year. ÊSomeone uncovered the relic and offered it for sale, and it was purchased by a Teutonic muscleman from our own time, Arnold Schwarzenegger, an athlete who managed to collect eight of the little bronze "Eugen's" when he was competing for the Mr. Olympia title. Ê

© 2001 David L. Chapman
All Rights Reserved

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