Telling You Today: March 17, 2025
I just read Casey Johnston's memoir about weightlifting, A Physical Education. The author journeys from cardio addiction and restrictive dieting to becoming strong with barbells. She also digs into the history of strength training in America - beginning with the Turners, a group I'd never heard of but now find fascinating. The Turner movement began in mid-19th century Germany, and overlaps with nationalist and liberal movements which culminated in the failed revolution of 1948. Many exiled German liberals and socialists, aka "48ers", ended up in the U.S., and Turnvereine ("gymnastic unions") were founded around the country. As Johnston writes:
In this new and developing country, they became strong advocates for public physical education but also for "controversial" causes, including abolition and socialism. The Turner Union's main enemy was oppression, and they resolved to fight any power that infringed on individual rights on the basis of skin color, gender, or place of birth. They opposed religious influence in government, including tax exemption for churches or using religious phrases on government currency or documents.
The Turners supported the Republican political party of Abraham Lincoln in the lead-up to and during the Civil War, and many joined up as Union soldiers. Turners repeatedly served as Lincoln's bodyguards, including during his inauguration.
In Johnston's reading of the Turners, there's a story of strength training that isn't bound up in right-wing or militaristic associations:
Today, weight-training sports still keep close associations with the military and law enforcement. These ties have given rise to the perception of lifting as a tool of fascism, elitism, or as service to a higher power, instead of where its real origins lie, as envisioned by the Turners: a public social good that ties us together and empowers the collective of civilians against imperialism, capitalism, and fascism.
(emphasis mine)
I've been on the fringes of this world long enough to be familiar with its often problematic ideological baggage; it's refreshing to know that there's a potential counternarrative.
An odd coincidence: I read these passages Friday night, and was poking around for information about the Turners the next morning. A few hours later my colleague sent image selects for our March newsletter, loosely focused on Women's History Month. They were all from the library's photo collection. One photo was of a group of gymnasts:
When I scanned the metadata, I realized that these were in fact gymnasts from Los Angeles' own Turnverein, shown here in 1888 in its headquarters at 321 S Main Street (since demolished for the Ronald Reagan State Building):
Recs
I liked this Basement Jaxx mix from 1999
Need some tugboat information?
Mickey 17 was very enjoyable!
Pics
That’s all! Have a great week!