The Call to Adventure
A new idea in Europe
In the late 1700s, educators began to treat physical exercise as a serious part of schooling. The German teacher Johann GutsMuths wrote one of the first modern books on gymnastics for the young, and the idea spread that the body should be trained with as much care as the mind.
Jahn and the Turnverein
Friedrich Ludwig Jahn opened an open-air exercise ground, a Turnplatz, near Berlin in 1811. He is credited with developing apparatus such as the parallel bars and the horizontal bar. His followers formed clubs called Turnvereine, which brought together exercise, community and national feeling.
Sweden's Ling
In Sweden, Per Henrik Ling took a different path. He founded the Royal Central Gymnastics Institute in Stockholm in 1813 and built a system of gymnastics focused on health, posture and education rather than apparatus feats. Swedish gymnastics spread across Europe.
The hero sets out
German gymnasts took their clubs abroad, and the Turner movement took root in the United States after the 1848 revolutions. In 1881 gymnastics clubs from several European countries formed an international federation, the body now known as FIG. The journey had begun.