The women's exercise movement in 19th-century Boston
![Women exercising in Boston](https://www.universalhub.com/files/styles/main_image/public/images/2016/womenexercise.jpg?itok=lbvdAKMv)
Boston high school students exercising in early 1890s (from BPL). See larger.
The Massachusetts Historical Society fills us in on the movement to get women moving, starting in the 1860s:
Bostonians such as Dr. Dio Lewis and Mary E. Allen, opened gymnasiums catering specifically to women and children. In 1860 Lewis opened the New Gymnasium, focused almost exclusively on promoting muscular development in children of both sexes, and his Family School for Young Ladies in Lexington, MA, which centered its curriculum around both intellectual and physical instruction.
Mary E. Allen continued this trend into the 1870s, opening the Ladies Gymnasium on Washington St. in 1877 and offering facilities for women and children to conduct slow, careful, and progressively more difficult physical exercise in the pursuit of 'symmetrical bodily development".
By 1899, girls at Charlestown High School were climbing the walls:
![Charlestown High School students exercising](http://www.universalhub.com/images/2016/2ctowngirls.jpg)
Photos from the Boston Public Library. Posted under this Creative Commons license.
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Dr. Diocletian Lewis
Fun fact: Besides his work on women's education, Dio Lewis (referenced above) was also a big-time temperance advocate. He used to advocate that women set up shop in saloons and pray for their closure. When his gym in Lexington burned, he relocated to a tavern on the shores of Spy Pond, in Arlington. That arrangement didn't last long.
warrier 1, not bad.
warrier 1, not bad.
Fit For Life
Fit For Life
http://www.cambridgepublichealth.org/lifestyle/mens-health/fitforlife.php
Derail forever
Oh, Don. You never change.
This revealing workout gear is distracting
Any moment, a glimpse of a woman's elbow could drive me into paroxysms of lust. LUST, I say!
It scarcely bears mentioning what would happen if we could see their ankles.
If they keep encouraging this libertine behavior ...
These women may move on to riding bicycles and demanding higher education and ... THE VOTE!
A more artsy one...
https://www.flickr.com/photos/boston_public_library/6198182940/in/photos...
It IS true!
Yoga was actually invented by suburban, white, Massachusetts yuppy women in the 1890's! No wonder they love it so much...I think I even see a starbucks cup in the background!
Mislabled - they were
Mislabled - they were actually singing gospel music. Praise Jeez-uss!