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A Pictorial History
of Muscular Women
DAVID L. CHAPMAN &
PATRICIA VERTINSKY
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Cover Illustration: The lovely lady
in the ostrich-plumed hat who flex-
es her impressive biceps is Laverie
Vallee, better known by her stage
name of Charmion. She was a suc-
cessful performer in circuses and
vaudeville theaters, and starred in
an early movie by Thomas Edison.
Few women in the first decade of
the twentieth century had such
impressive musculature, and even
fewer would dare to display it for
the camera for fear of appearing
too uppity and manly. As Charmion
clearly shows, a woman can have
muscles and still appear feminine.
This photo is dated 1904; the pho-
tographer was Frederick Whitman
Glasier. (From the collection of the
John and Mable Ringling Museum
of Art Archives.)
Venus
with Biceps
A Pictorial History of Muscular Women
DAVID L. CHAPMAN & PATRICIA VERTINSKY
Arsenal Pulp Press | Vancouver
VENUS WITH BICEPS
Copyright © 2010 by David L. Chapman; Introduction © 2010 by Patricia Vertinsky
Images © by the artists
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any form by any
means—graphic, electronic, or mechanical—without the prior written permission of the
publisher, except by a reviewer, who may use brief excerpts in a review, or in the case of
photocopying in Canada, a license from Access Copyright.
ARSENAL PULP PRESS
Suite 101, 211 East Georgia St.
Vancouver, BC
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The publisher gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts
and the British Columbia Arts Council for its publishing program, and the Government of
Canada through the Canada Book Fund and the Government of British Columbia through
the Book Publishing Tax Credit Program for its publishing activities.
Efforts have been made to locate copyright holders of source material wherever possible.
The publisher welcomes hearing from any copyright holders of material used in this book
who have not been contacted.
Front cover illustration, oritingally black & white (see page 2), is used courtesy of The John
and Mable Ringling Museum of Art. Colorized by David Berryman.
Book design by Shyla Seller
Editing by Susan Safyan
All images courtesy of David L. Chapman; image restoration by David Berryman
Printed and bound in Hong Kong
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Chapman, David L., 1948-
Venus with biceps [electronic resource] : a pictorial history
of muscular women / David L. Chapman with Patricia Vertinsky.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Type of computer file: Electronic document in PDF format.
Also available in print format.
ISBN 978-1-55152-385-9
1. Women bodybuilders--History. 2. Women
bodybuilders--Pictorial works. I. Vertinsky, Patricia
Anne, 1942- II. Title.
HQ1219.C53 2010a 306.4’613 C2010-902978-X
Contents
7 | Foreword
11 | Introduction
21 | Muscularity and the Female Body Patricia Vertinsky
47 | Foremothers
135 | Pumping Wood
195 | Pursuing the Healthy Life
233 | Wonder Women
293 | From Figure to Physique
347 | Conclusion: Let’s Get Physical
357 | Index
Acknowledgments
In writing and assembling this book, I have been helped by many people. Mi-
chael Murphy of Westerly, Rhode Island, supplied both moral and material sup-
port throughout the process. Larry Aumann of Manitowoc, Wisconsin, assisted
me continually with both photographs and encouragement. Laurie Fierstein
of New York City was always ready with wise advice, factual clarification, and
friendly support. One of the most important scholars of muscular women, Jan
Todd of the University of Texas at Austin, gave me generous help and advice.
The greatest assistance came from my patient and long-suffering partner,
David Berryman. He used his technological skills to turn many dim and tat-
tered photographs into the wonderful images that appear in this book. I often
handed him some scuffed and frayed illustration and asked, “Do you think you
can make this look good?” He invariably could.
FOREWORD
David L. Chapman
Contemporary female bodybuilders tend to elicit pretty strong reactions; some
of these responses are positive, but most range anywhere from disgust to in-
credulity. My own interest in female muscularity was inspired by two seminal
events, the first of which occurred in California in 1987 and the second a dozen
years later in New York City.
Muscle Beach was once one of the most important venues in Southern Cali-
fornia for bodybuilding. The little strip of sand between Santa Monica Pier and
Venice Beach was made famous in the 1940s and ’50s by the gymnasts, acrobats,
and high vaulting adagio dancers, who regularly put on free balancing and ath-
letic shows for the public. It was a place you could go to on summer afternoons
(and summer is a very long season in Los Angeles) and find superbly muscled
athletes in brief attire practicing their jumps, handstands, and human pyramids
there on the warm and forgiving sands. It was also one of the few places in
the world, outside of a circus, where you could find muscular women—girls
who had sculpted their physiques to a fare-thee-well by lifting weights or sup-
porting partners on their generous deltoids—female athletes like Relna Brewer,
Paula Unger, and (most wonderful of all, to me) Abbye Stockton, known to her
friends as “Pudgy.”
Unfortunately, the seaside idyll at Muscle Beach ended after sex scandals,
sleazy conduct, and a general distrust of athletes and the people they attracted
caused the area to be closed down starting late in 1958. Almost thirty years
after closing it down, the city of Santa Monica agreed to put up a sign marking
the site of the old Muscle Beach. Since expensive beachfront properties had
now sanitized the neighborhood, the city organized a commemoration of the
beach’s former glory, and invited a number of the old denizens back to celebrate
8 | VENUS WITH BICEPS
David L. Chapman and Abbye “Pudgy”
Stockton, Muscle Beach, California,
1988.
the erection of the historical marker. I got word that the celebration would take
place and was determined to go so that I could meet some of the old-time body-
builders whom I had long admired. At the time, I was a writer for a couple of
bodybuilding magazines, so it wasn’t hard to finagle an invitation.
At the event, I was not disappointed; there were many stars in attendance
whom I was happy to meet. The greatest thrill of the day came when I encoun-
tered a beautiful and elegantly muscular woman who had acquired the unde-
served nickname of “Pudgy.” I was particularly thrilled to meet her because of
the role that she had played in the history of bodybuilding, especially women’s.
Pudgy led the way. For many years, the diminutive lady with whom I was mer-
rily chatting at Muscle Beach had been one of the few brave enough to buck the
trend against strongly muscled women. Her photos in Strength and Health (the
premiere fitness magazine of the 1940s and ’50s) and other periodicals proved
conclusively that exercising with weights would not make a woman “overly”
muscular or mannish.
After talking with Pudgy, I happened to see another unmistakable and
highly original character who’d played a part in both the fitness revolution
and women’s exercise: Jack LaLanne. There he was, right in front of me, an
animated and obviously fit little man offering opinions, clowning around, and
generally having a great time at the center of a group of admirers. I had known
of him since the 1950s when my mother religiously watched his mid-morning
9 | Foreword
exercise program on television. It was largely thanks to LaLanne that women
all over North America learned the rudiments of fitness and good eating habits.
My mother was something of an exercise fanatic, and she would never dream
of missing his show. She had somewhat mixed opinions on Jack’s nutritional
advice, and she agreed with almost everyone that he was eccentric in his speech
and behavior, but she still loved him.
My interest in muscular women received another impetus in the year 2000
when the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York mounted an extraor-
dinary exhibition of modern and vintage art related to strongwomen called
“Picturing the Modern Amazon,” which was something of a turning point in
the study of female bodybuilders. Prior to the show, I met an extraordinary
woman named Laurie Fierstein, who was one of the curators of the exhibition.
She was both a physique athlete of magnificent proportions and an eloquent
and intelligent historian who helped me to understand the meaning and impor-
tance of female bodybuilders. Laurie looked at my collection of photographs
and chose several items for the show. Later, I was invited to give a lecture at the
Museum on the iconography of strong women in historical images.
Laurie Fierstein, photo courtesy www.
This was the first time that I had the opportunity to meet and talk with
WPWMagazineOnline.com
women who had honed their physiques to an unprecedented size and mass.
I found most of them to be pleasant company, confident (but aware of their
faults), and enthusiastic, but not aggressive. In short, they were pretty normal
for athletes at the upper end of their chosen field. I wanted to know why they
spent hours in the gym building bodies that most people (men and women)
found unattractive. The answer was almost always the same: they did it for
themselves. Building muscles made them feel better about themselves. Accord-
ing to Leslie Heywood in her excellent book Bodymakers, most contemporary
women bodybuilders don’t care if we like the way they look or not. They aren’t
building their bodies for us, anyway. The question is not whether they are sexu-
ally appealing for others but whether they excel at what they do for themselves.
In the end, it is an issue of self-fulfillment. It was a simple explanation, but it
made me wonder about the women who had tried to build their bodies in pre-
vious generations. Did they worry about gender-identity issues a hundred or
more years ago? Did these muscular females agonize over their mesomorphic
genes and their need to express themselves? Who can answer these questions?
All I know for sure is that, then as now, they were individuals who chose to
be themselves regardless of what others thought or said, and as such they ex-
panded and redefined femininity itself.
