Gyms, as most of your guys know them, are a relatively new concept.
Maybe someone can fill in the "blanks" but as far as my memory goes, the first "real" gyms were the local town YMCA's where anything resembling weight lifting equipment or some odd piece of gear that had no place else to go was usually stashed off in one of the corners' of the full sized YMCA basketball court.
There was usually a make-shift bench for doing any kind of laying down exercise. This piece of equipment was usually less than completely erect and would wobble a bit when anyone over 135 pounds sat on it. But it was usually the only bench in the "gym" so the guys who used it would make -do the best they could. This piece of gym equipment never had an upright to place the bar while doing bench presses, so you'd have to get any weight you used to your chest while sitting on that bench and then lean back into a reclining position before commencing with your first rep. By then most guys were too damn tired to get that weight off their chest.
But in most cases anyone who benched over 135 with the olympic bar could expect anyone standing by to lend a helping hand getting that loaded bar into position and hence "spotters" were conceived. ("Spot" someone and lean back and that "spotter" would be there to lend a hand.) Today you'd call that person a "personal trainer" who collects a $50 fee for offering that self-same service plus a bit of uncomplicated advice such as "breath in - breath out". (The second biggest scam in the weight training world.)
In many cases someone else would be there to do his best to keep that bench stationary so that the lifter could complete his set without the need to "balance and/or readjust the bench". These old time benches were not built to support a heavy lift or even a heavy lifter without those weights over his chest.
If you were fortunate, your "Y" had an olympic set with plates that actually fit the bar. But in the majority of cases olympic sets were non-existent so you'd have to build-up your equipment from the standard and rusty bars and plates that were scattered all over the floor. And you were never allowed to use those plates whose sole purpose was to hold those damn self-closing doors open because that was the extent of air-conditioning back then.
Then you'd have to find that "damn key" that was used to keep the plates on tight. A key so small that it was constantly "losted". In many cases that "damn key" was a monkey wrench that was always hiding someplace even though it was easier to find.
And the same procedures had to be followed if you wanted to do some dumbbell exercises. Gather the equipment, fin the key, lock the weights in place, and do the set. If your weight increased each set, you had quite a workout just putting the equipment together.
And there were no such things as "racks" back then. Squat racks had yet to be invented so you'd have to depend on two upright pieces of metal attached to a couple of heavy plates that attempted to keep it immobile. These primitive racks would be leaning at various angles and placed apart so that you'd have to look for one or the other in order to get the pair together. Why they were separated was always the big mystery.
And then you had that noisey piece of belted mechanical equipment that claimed to vibrate the fat off your waist. It was always busy. Full of fat
guys attempting to make sense while carrying on a conversation while vibrating at 2,000 cycles a minute. I don't think that they ever worked as claimed and they soon became non-existent until recently when someone made something similar to stand on and get "vibrated" at 2,000 cycles a minute. History always seems to repeat itself.
And then you had that medicine ball and those "bowling" pins which no one usually bothered picking up. The ladies might have found them useful but ladies were never allowed in any "gym" back then. And that was fine with them.
Add a pull-up bar and some wooden type bars along the wall and there you had it - a typical gym of the 40's and the 50's.
Primitive to say the least. But someone saw a need for a change.
Usually it was the group of guys who took lifting seriously. Guys who liked to show off with a number of heavy lifts. There were always a couple of olympic lifters in the "Y', but there were also a group of guys who didn't have the olympic lifting skills who simply preferred to test their strength on the bench, or under one of those wobbily squat racks, or simply by picking up heavy things from a standing position.
It only took a bit of organization and these "odd lifters" came up with the Odd Lifts - bench pressing, squatting, and deadlifting - three feats of strength that anyone (odd or otherwise) could do.
So odd lifting was born and guys came together to prove who was stronger in just about every YMCA across the country.
So odd lift records were set and established and talked about among small groups everywhere.
If you held a "record", you were a small town YMCA hero and lifters would often show up unexpectedly to offer a challenge.
These were the days when there were NO rules. You simply had to complete the lift.
These were the days when someone discovered that he could squat heavier than normal while wearing tight Levis. So tight Levis became the standard uniform. Then someone else discovered the practice of tapeing tennis balls behind his knees. And tennis ball stock more than likely rose. (Probably not a fact.)
Then there were the day of the "lifting mummies". The guys would wrap ace bandages on every part of his body that had a joint - ever part of his body that was capable of bending. He would so wrapped up that he had to walk like a mummy would walk if mummies ever could really walk. So the days of Tut arrived on the odd lifting scene for as long as there were no rules to say otherwise.
SO various odd lifting discoveries were made and new personal and local and countrywide records were established.
And enterprising individuals saw the big picture and realized that this was a new and undiscovered 'market' which was just ripe for piken.
And that led to many new things on the lifting market - Super-suits, super-belts, super-sox, super-jox! Just about everything imaginable that could have the title "Super" before claiming what it actually and honestly was. And Super-supplements were soon to follow!
And then the Super-drugs!
And over a short period of time, everything began to change. Changes - good and changes - bad.
(To be continued if there is any interest.)
