Sigmund Klein was one of the most fascinating, and indeed, successful physical culturists of the 1920s and 1930s. Operating a gym in New York, the same gym run by his father in law, Professor Atilla, Klein’s unique position in the fitness industry made him the envy of many. Not only was he incredibly strong and...
On Monday, March 2, 2020, I met my graduate course, The History of the Sport Industry in America, at the Stark Center to talk about a series of readings they’d been assigned that dealt with the business of strength. They were asked to read an article Ben Pollack and I wrote about 1950s gym-chain magnate...
In June 1911, shortly after Joe Greenstein arrived in Houston, Texas, he resumed a wrestling career that had been interrupted in his native Poland when rising anti-Semitism drove him to join relatives in America. In 1914, however, a friend shot him between the eyes and set him on a different path. As the story goes,...
As an avid, but unsuccessful golfer, I have a deep appreciation for those skilled in the sport. In a career spanning several decades, Penick was involved with the game at every level. From 1913 to 1923 he caddied at the Austin Country Club. In 1923 he became the head professional right out of high school. ...
In 1989, Joe Weider commissioned Lorenzo Ghiglieri to produce this oil painting based on a famous print depicting a training session at the Hercules Club in Vienna. The original print was made over one hundred years ago. Close observers will see Joe’s likeness painted into one of the beer hoisting onlookers and, on the wall,...
PhD candidate Tanya Jones was recently awarded a prestigious research grant from the British Society of Sport History. This grant is for aiding graduate students undertaking original research in the field, and Tanya will use it to travel to Boston, MA. There, she will spend time in the archives of the Center for the Study...
When Mack Brown was named head football coach at the University of Texas in 1998, he was immediately tasked with returning Longhorn football to a place of national prominence and a culture of winning. Wisely, he sought out the insights and expertise of Darrell Royal, a man who coached the Longhorns for twenty years, won...
Tom Pevier is not an individual familiar to many weightlifters today. Nevertheless, his physical culture interest holds a great importance for scholars of the early twentieth century. An avid weightlifter, wrestler and all-round physical culturist, Pevier went on to referee several of the early British weightlifting competitions in the early twentieth century. Pevier’s scrapbook, a...
One of the most fascinating aspects of working in the Stark Center is the ability to work with personal letters from one physical culturist to another. This letter from George F. Jowett to Ottley R. Coulter represented a conversation between two prominent American physical culturists. In the letter, the two men discuss the foundation of...
