Last week, we started reading this article from 1951, written by a body-builder in awe of the huge arms on display in the ring.
Part of the reason many guys become pro wrestlers in the first place (today and, apparently, in 1951 as well) is to show off their hard bodies. What is the point of working out and developing an impressive physique if you have to keep it draped under a shirt and jacket every day?
Far better to find a career where you can display your jaw-dropping physique without shame. Pro wrestling is one of the few jobs that offers a body-builder this opportunity.
One of my favorite fellow Bloggers is Bard, who writes the awesome Neverland blog. Recently he wrote an article called “Pythons” about the biceps on wrestlers that reminds me of this essay from the 1951 magazine. Similar to the enthusiastic body-builder who wrote the 1951 article, Bard manages to describe bicep muscles in the most inspiring and exciting ways:
- pointed peak of that monster
- that vascularity and shape makes me gasp
- that cocky I-dare-you-not-to-lick-them grin
- like surgically inserted softballs
- flexing his guns hypnotically
- top shelf quality beef of musclebound arms
Bard is a poet for sure! And he has an advantage over the magazine writer, because a Blog written in 2012 is allowed to be way more explicit and homo-erotic than a magazine article from 1951.
The magazine article goes on to encourage the reader to work out, to “get the arms and power of a wrestler.” After all, “It’s so easy!” The article implies that any guy can and should develop huge, bulging bicep muscles. It’s just a matter of finding something to curl, and then curling it (genetics notwithstanding.)
What is being sold here is the notion that you, too, can be a big pro wrestling hottie — or at least resemble one. You, too, can impress and intimidate other people with your brawn, it’s easy. This was the message in many pro wrestling magazines, which often featured those articles where the skinny kid gets sand kicked in his face, so then he works out, grows his muscles, punishes the bully, and gets the girl.
The appeal of pro wrestling for many guys is the promise that we, too, can be big, dominating studs just like the hunks in the ring.
The article implies that arm strength equates to real power — that an impressive physical appearance will get you somewhere in this world. The implication is that the most masculine will win in life and become the leader (which was a common belief in pre-feminist 1951.)
Is this belief still ingrained in our society today? Are big biceps still considered something to admire? Can you get a job, or get promoted at work, thanks to a giant set of guns? Will people obey you and do your bidding in the modern age if you’re larger than them?
I don’t know if people still find muscle impressive, but I know pro wrestling remains popular and the athletes look stronger and harder every year.
The body-builder who wrote the article shares several helpful exercises the reader could use to build his unbreakable strength — in order to “grasp another man with your hands and hold him helpless,” and who in the world wouldn’t want to do that?!?
Back then, a lot of guys must have had no idea how to work out and they needed these instructions, but now pumping iron has become so ingrained in our culture, performing these basic exercises is just common knowledge.
The article promises that other people will be impressed by our newly developed muscles. We will get “many glances of admiration.” This doesn’t specify if those admiring glances will be cast by men or by women, so it seems either is good.
If you want to read the original four-page spread from the magazine, without all my cutting and pasting of the text, you can check it out here:
