Cool. Thanks for posting, Robert. Btw, what was the address of the original gym? I know that it's long gone, but IIRC it was on Hamilton Ave...I'm only a few miles away so I'd be curious to see what sort of slum dwelling has gone up in its wake.[/quote443 Hamilton St. Costa Mesa Ca.Nothing left there now of the old gym.
shirley used to use um. gleaned off'n ironhistory.com.
Is this her?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shirley_Patterson
Nope not her. Shirley is alive and still training with the boys at The North Hollywood Health Club where she is the Manager. She was the first woman to compeat in a AAU Powerlifting meet. Back in the day they didn't have a lady's division so she entered the men's division. Not to try to beat the guys but to see if she could push herself to be stronger. Guess what, she exceeded the amount of weight she could lift because of that contest. Sadly she was baned from entering the Olympics as a lifter because compeating in that contest made her no longer a amateur but a pro. Hope this info helps to give her the respect she deserves. She is a piece of iron history.ThanksRZ
Any more pics of her? I can hardly find anything online.
Those are cool - are there different types of plates like that besides the mainstream ones we see now out there at various gyms?
Zuver was involved with some of the early WSM television, designing equiptment, etc...., in the 1977 or 78 show you can see Zuver's plates being loaded on to things. Dr. Ken Leistner mentioned that after Franco Columbu broke his leg in the refridgerator carry, he sued everyone including Zuver. This soured Zuver on the whole scene, so he just dumped everything and retired to Idaho.Zuver plates do show up once and a while, a pair was sold to Richard Sorin (Sorinex Equiptment and a big time collector of weights) by a member of Ironhistory, a few months back. Price was undisclosed, but I bet it was hefty.Did you know???.
I worked out at Zuver's a couple of times while stationed at Camp Pendleton.Here's how I recall it.We'd drive the 80 or so miles up to Costa Mesa and find Zuver's in a residential neighborhood which was somewhat strange back in those days.I kind of recall that it was a huge structure built on the north side of his property with his home on the south side. You'd park in any vacant spot on this residential street and then walk down a short dirveway towards the back of his property and see a huge structure guarded by a huge ape and a huge 'iron' door with a sign "If you cannot open this door, you are too weak to enter" or something like that.Once inside it was like entering an iron museum. Everything was "the biggest this and the biggest that" and "the heaviest this and the heaviest that" and some parts of the floor were actual 45 pound olympic plates.Most new-comers would spend about 30 minutes looking at all the equipment until Rev Zuver would walk over and introduce himself. No high pressure sales .... Just a hearty welcome and an invite to "Go ahead and use the equipment. Have a good workout!"Back in those good old days you were always welcome to work in with anyone who happened to be using the same equipment you were planning to use, so I ended up benching with some UCLA shot-putters who were pretty famous back them.Not sure about this but I think that the local community got a bit upset about Zuver's Gym being located in a residential neighborhood and all the resulting traffic. That may be the main reason why it closed down.And I don't recall if Rev Zuver reopened in another location.PS That's Zuver's son "Rhino" in that bench press shot.
Who wrote this???
