Identifier: pioneersofmodern10leon (find matches)
Title: Pioneers of modern physical training
Year: 1910 (1910s)
Authors: Leonard, Fred Eugene, 1866-1922
Subjects: Physical education and training
Publisher: (New York) Physical Directors' Society of the Young Men's Christian Association of North America
Contributing Library: Mugar Memorial Library, Boston University
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston Library Consortium Member Libraries

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
y approved the plan. Ling was made director at afixed salary, and given a grant for the purchase of equip-ment and an annual allowance to cover the rent of neces-sary rooms. In 1814 the **Royal Gymnastic Central Insti-tute—so named by the King—was ready to begin opera-tions, and here for the remaining twenty-five years of hislife Ling was busily engaged in the elaboration of his ideas.He was the author of a long series of dramatic and otherpoetical works, which won for him the great prize of theSwedish Academy and membership in that distinguishedbody. He also received the title of Professor, and wasdecorated by the King with the Order of the North Star.His successors at the Institute have contributed much to thedevelopment of gymnastics in the three directions which heindicated. As one of them has said, His greatest serviceto gymnastics was the attempt to give it a scientific basis,and it must therefore change and develop with every ad-vance in the sciences upon which it rests. 10
Text Appearing After Image:
Friedrich Ludwig Jahn IV. Friedrich Ludwig Jahn.* The gymnastic societies (Turnvercine) in Germany,which have to-day a membership of more than 850,000, be-gan to appear in their present form in the fifth decade ofthe last century. Their real origin, however, lies fartherback, in the years immediately preceding and following theWar of Liberation (1813), and can be traced directly to theunique influence exerted by one man, Jahn (1778-1852),the hero of the German common people. His father wasthe Protestant clergyman at Lanz, a Prussian hamlet lyingmidway between Hamburg and Berlin and only a few milesdistant from the Elbe. The first thirteen years were spentat home, mostly out-of-doors and in the company of olderpersons. He roamed the neighboring fields and forests,learned to ride and swim and shoot, and explored every roadand footpath leading to the surrounding German states.Early lessons from his father created a lifelong interest inthe history, geography, and language of his native la

Note About Images