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 the American Continental Weight Lifters Association (ACWLA).  Five years previously, Coulter wrote an article in Strength magazine calling for a way to standardize weightlifting in the United States. It was incredibly important to have a sanctioning body for American strongmen and weightlifters so that the...

Manufactured by Narragansett Machine Company of Providence, R.I. around the turn of the twentieth century, this pair of stationary exercise bikes are relics of the “bike boom” that swept the country in the 1890s. Each bike connects to a color-coordinated hand on the nearly 4-foot diameter dial measuring distance; the first rider to cover the four laps equaling one mile was the winner of bragging rights and, it is easy to imagine, a friendly wager or two. Retailing for $200 at a time when the average wage in the United States was 22 cents per hour, these trainers were most...

Born in 1952 in Long Beach, California, Cathy Rigby was a popular American gymnast whose fame extended beyond the sport. The highest scoring American gymnast at the Mexico City Olympic Games of 1968, Rigby’s sporting prowess was beyond reproach.  She followed her ’68 Olympic performance with United States National Championships in 1970 and 1972. Fun fact? In 1974, Rigby moved from sport to the theatre, when she headlined a tour of Peter Pan! Thanks to the Steve Wennerstrom Papers, we have a series of clippings and photographs on Rigby’s career. When Steve became a women’s track and field coach in...

To wish you all a Happy Valentine’s Day, we thought we’d share this 1950s children’s Valentine depicting a strongman and his weightlifting pooch. The card, collected by Jan and Terry Todd, is one of several dozen twentieth-century greeting cards in their collection depicting children as weightlifters. Measuring only 2.5 x 4 inches, the card was in all likelihood part of a set of “classroom Valentines” that were exchanged by children at school. These kinds of cards were sold in boxes containing 15 to 20 (or more) different scenes and messages, and for those who remember them (as I do), part...

Painting, oil on canvas. At first glance, there is something curious in Bill Wiman’s “Portrait of a Powerlifter,” a familiarity in the subject’s muted facial expression, which grasps a viewer’s attention like the apparition of celebrity in a crowd. I wrongly assumed the powerlifter was someone famous, someone I’d seen in the movies. As it turns out, my assumption was arguably close, but I wasn’t at the right theatre. In truth, Wiman painted his titular powerlifter, posed in a quarter turn, with such an expression, as inspired by da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa,” which long ago surpassed familiarity and became ubiquitous....

Teresa Lozano Long gifted this crystal sculpture to the Stark Center in the spring of 2017. Jan and Terry were visiting Teresa at her home in Austin when she decided that the piece should decorate the center’s reading room. In the piece, two glass figures pose together in a balletic lift. The sculpture focuses on the bodies and musculature required for such a feat, highlighting grace and strength in each dancer. The sculpture comes from Daum, a commercial crystal studio based in Nancy, France. At Daum, artists create crystal sculptures using the pâte de verre process where crushed glass is...