Strength and Health magazine mentions testosterone esters in 1938.
In two seperate articles, Strength and Health writes about George Eiferman and Jack Delinger, already national level bodybuilders, going out to Yarick's Gym in Oakland California for the summer (George 1948, Jack 1949) and coming back 30-40 pounds heavier.
Pics of Steve Reeves show him significantly larger, harder, fuller in 1953 than in previous years. Pics from a few years later, he's back to his "normal" size.
Tim, is this your opinion, or do you have evidence?
Bodybuilders especially are able to put on weight and take it off quickly. They spend hours in the gym daily and can eat unreal amounts of food. I remember when eating a dozen eggs with cheese was something I could do and not get full.
What gets me is that some guy will look at Park or Reeves, and say, surely they took drugs, and then someone else will look at some "Natural" Poster Boy, complete with glute striations, and say he is obviously natural because his waist is under 40 inches.
(Then there are people who believe that our own government blew up those WTC towers on 9/11... people believe in silly things).
What I'm saying is, whatever your opinion is, take a step back and examine whether or not you have any basis at all in taking that position.
How do we go from the Nazi experiments in the 40's, to Communist Russia's use in the mid-50's, to Dr. John Ziegler's medical & experimental (York) useage in the late-50's to early 60's & the introduction of Dianabol around 1961. How do we build a case that test tube (or laboratory) use of testosterone was available and used? And if we do, we have to realize that at best, this drug must be used on a constant basis and be in plentiful supply to be of real value. Why did Ziegler need to reinvent the wheel with Riecke, Garcy and March if Reeves, Park and Eiferman had already been there and back?
Park, Reeves and Eiferman were muscular their whole lives, unlike today's drug user, who must be "hooked up" to be big. But the same rules apply. Was there a more effective steroid before they were even sold as Dianabol?
In other words, you must build a case that (1) it existed (2) it was being used, (3) that someone had the knowledge that it COULD be used for bodybuilding (which Ziegler himself did not know) (4) that it was in plentiful supply (5) that no one seemed to know about it except a very select few and (6) they've somehow kept their mouths shut about it for all these decades.
To say "X" took steroids before they were even sold or before they were available takes alot of steps. At what particular point in time did we know that steroids built muscle? The Nazi experiments were done to create more aggressive dogs, and later Nazi soldiers. The Russians used them on their O/Lifters and they had major side-effects (prostate, urination/catheter problems), etc.
But yet, here we have Reeves, Eiferman and Park all sunning themselves at the poolside with pre-Dianabol steroids in their gym bags, without a care in the world, all the while remaining perfectly silent at all times even to this day - fooling all the people all of the time. Where were the labs? Who were the scientists? Who were the contacts (middlemen)? How did it completely escape the knowledge of everyone else? How do we get there?
