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Muscle Beach
St. James Encyclopedia of Pop Culture by Jan and Terry Todd
The burgeoning of the Beach was cut short, of course, by the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the entry of the United States into World War II, although Pudgy and a few others still gathered by the pier from time to time while Les and many of the others were doing their part in the war effort.
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But when hostilities ended, activity alongside the pier reached a higher level than ever before. In addition, the tumbling platforms were elevated by the city so that visitors to the increasingly famous Muscle Beach weekends had a better view. By that time the bodybuilders had arrived, and their extravagant physiques also drew crowds, like fully-fanned peacocks at a zoo. The city soon built a "weight pit" where the competitive lifters and bodybuilders could pump iron and work on their tan all at the same time, cooled by the prevailing Pacific "westerlies."
Even though the period from 1946 through the late 1950s lacked the sweetness and purity of the pre-war Muscle Beach, it featured ever-larger crowds and an ever-greater percentage of bodybuilders in the cultural mix. Some of these people made major contributions to the world of weights. One such was Jack LaLanne who, although he lived in San Francisco, would drive down to Santa Monica almost every weekend to lift and do stunts with his friends. In 1951, he began a pioneering fitness program on television that ran for 34 years and made his name a household word. Steve Reeves was also a regular at the weight pit, and those who were there say that no one ever drew crowds like the handsome, Greek God-like Mr. America of 1947. After a bit of earlier film, stage, and television work, Reeves was chosen for the lead role in Hercules (1959), and this film launched a 16-year career during which, for a time, Reeves was the number one male movie star in the world.
Other regulars at Muscle Beach were Vic Tanny and his younger brother Armand, an outstanding lifter. In the 1950s, Vic founded a nationwide chain of modern "health clubs" that bore his name. They were the first of their kind, and although the chain grew large and unwieldy and eventually failed, Tanny's influence was felt by millions of Americans who had their first taste of progressive resistance exercise in his glittering, chrome-filled clubs. Lesser known early on than Tanny but with more "legs," Joe Gold developed his muscles as well as his famous tan at Muscle Beach before opening what would eventually become the second West Coast bodybuilding Mecca--Gold's Gym--training headquarters of the leading bodybuilders in the world during the 1960s and 1970s. Eventually, Gold sold his legendary gym, and promised not to start another in which his name was used. However, once he opened his new place, called World Gym, it attracted so many of the top bodybuilders that he was able successfully to franchise the name around the United States.
