Biography of
Joseph Hubertus Pilates (1883 - 1967)
Index:-
Bullied Child
Anatomic Model of Excellence
Early Adulthood: Boxer, Gymnast, Skier, Diver
The Pilates House in Moenchengladbach
First marriage - to Maria, one daughter
Roman Gladiator Act
War Years Internment: Pilates the Hospital "Nurse-Physiotherapist"
Training the Hamburg Military Police
Second marriage - to Elfriede
Moved to America at age 45(and met and married Clara)
The first Pilates Studio was surrounded by Dance Studios
40 Golden years of the Pilates Bio
The Pilates Workout Philosophy
Pilates Biography, Publications, Philosophy
Joseph's Death - Flamboyant Ending?
I.C. Rapoport: Photographic Interview
Joseph Pilates Legacy
Joseph Pilates Biography Quotes
Biography of Joseph Pilates Resources
Summary:-
Pilates was enamored of the classical Greek ideal of a man who is balanced
equally in body, mind, and spirit. His experiences taught him to believe that the (1950's!) modern life-style,
bad posture, and inefficient breathing were the roots of poor health. His answer
to these problems was to design a unique series of life enhancing physical exercises
that help to correct muscular imbalances and improve posture, coordination,
balance, strength, and flexibility, as well as to increase
breathing capacity and organ function.
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
A Bullied Child:-
Joe was born in Mönchengladbach (small town near Düsseldorf, Germany), on December 9th 1883
(see Official Birth Records).
At five years of age, Joseph lost the sight of his left eye(1).
Careful assessment of Joseph Pilates photographs show the left eye not being in need of correction
for long sightedness, and occasionally also a drooping eyelid. Family members alive today state that this was due
to a stone wielded by one or more bullies. The loss of the left eye suggests that the attack may have been due to
the young Joseph lying on his back while a (right handed) bully straddled over his midriff with stone in hand ready to strike.
Stories of bullying are not nice...
I take time to tell this story because I believe it throws light upon
the special character of Joseph. It explains for example why Joseph and his brother Frederick (and possibly other family members)
took up a strong interest in self defence. During his early teen years, Joseph worked as an assistant in the
brewery at Mönchengladbach-Neuwerk. On November 22nd 1900 (just before his 18th birthday), he moved to Heinsberg-Dremmen.
Joseph's father has been described as a prize-winning gymnast (according to official Prussion records, he was a mechanic, or a fitter
by profession. What is certainly true is that at some stage, he ran a
gym with the help of his wife and family(1). The story that the family name Pilates is "of Greek origin" is not
confirmed by family members alive today. They state that he was thoroughly German, and that the family was devout catholic.
His mother, it is stated, "was a naturopath". Family members state that this is not strictly true, that it was
more likely that as a resourceful and caring mother of nine, she studied and applied the
naturopathic skills as best she could. So... The reality was that she helped out in the family gym.
Naturopaths believe in stimulating the body
to heal itself, and it is likely that his mother's healing philosophy coloured his
own approach to therapeutic exercises.
Pilates was said to be a skinny, sickly child. He suffered from asthma, rickets and rheumatic fever.
The older bullies taunted him with "Pontius Pilate, killer of Christ". He was
too sickly to fight back or get away, and it was this situation that caused him
to begin his life journey to fitness and health, and a desire to help people in similar need.
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
...turned into an Anatomic Model of Excellence:-
A family physician gave him a discarded anatomy book: "I learned every page, every
part of the body; I would move each part as I memorized it. As a child, I would lie
in the woods for hours, hiding and watching the animals move, how the mother taught
the young." He studied both Eastern and Western forms of exercise including yoga, Zen,
and ancient Greek and Roman regimens. By the time he was 14 he had developed his body
to the point that he was modelling for anatomy charts!
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
The Pilates House at 79 Dahlenerstrasse
Below is the house where Joseph spent his earliest years.
You can read more about this in
Joseph Pilates - Official Birth Records & house in Moenchengladbach
Early Adulthood: a boxer, gymnast, skier and diver.
Growing up in Germany, and working at the local brewery, he achieved some success as a boxer and gymnast in addition
to being a skilled skier and diver.
First marriage, one daughter
According to Joseph's official affidavit for application for US citizenship,
he married one "Maria" about 1905 and they had a daughter on November 30th 1906.
Maria died in Germany in 1913 while the daughter (Helene, or "Leni") came to visit Joe in
New York in 1939. At that time she was (probably), married with the married name of Friedrich and she lived near Cologne(8).
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
In late 20's he moved to England, performed a Roman Gladiator Act:-
In 1912 he went to England for further training
as a boxer. He found employment there as a circus performer. By 1914 he had become a
star and was on tour - he and his brother (Frederick Pilates: read about
Fred's daughter Mary
), performed as Roman Gladiators!
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
During the War Years, his life was spent as a Hospital "Nurse-Physiotherapist":-
In 1914 after WWI broke out he was interned along with other German nationals in a
"camp" for enemy aliens in Lancaster. There he taught wrestling and self-defence,
boasting that his students would emerge stronger than they were before their internment.
It was here that he began refining and teaching his minimal equipment system of mat
exercises that later became "Contrology".
He was subsequently transferred to another camp on The Isle of Man where his interests in
health led him to help out in the sick bay. He became something of a
nurse and worked with many internees suffering from illness and incarceration.
His caring disposition lead him to request that he help the patients in the infirmary with exercise. Bed rest
was the norm in those days, so he was told, "you can do anything you like with them, as long as they stay in bed".
So Joseph took the springs from the beds and rigged them up to the bed posts as exercise apparatus for the bedridden!
Thus was born the Trapezium table ("Trap Table"). Joseph was both inventive and resourceful in solving the health and exercise
needs of his friends and neighbours!
When the 1918 'flu epidemic swept
the world, (it killed millions, and an internment camp is an ideal breeding ground for such epidemics to hit hard),
none of Joe's followers succumbed!
Joseph said (more or less!),
"I invented all zeez machines. Began back in Germany. Was there until 1925.
I used to exercise rheumatic patients. I thought, why use my strength? So I made a machine
to do it for me. Look, you see?.. It resists your movements, in just ze right way, so zose
inner muscles really have to work against it. Zat way you can concentrate on ze movement!
You must always do it slowly and smoothly... Zen your whole body is in it."
This part of Joseph's
biography re-inforces how adversity develops the common man. Previous to his internment camp life,
Joe was an ex-brewery hand, circus performer and part time fitness and defence instructor. Subsequently, it could be said that
Joseph Pilates had become a "Nurse-Physiotherapist", with a powerful and revolutionary approach to life enhancing
therapeutic exercise. Joseph called this approach "Contrology", and explained it in his book
"Return to Life through Controlology".
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
Training the Hamburg Military Police:-
After the war Joe returned to Germany and began training the Hamburg Military Police
in self-defence and physical training as well as taking on personal clients.
It was at this time that he met Rudolf von Laban, a famous movement analyst, who is said
to have incorporated some of Joe's theories and exercises into his own work.
In 1923 Pilates was invited to train the New German Army but because he was not happy with the
political direction of Germany he decided to leave. The urgings of his American based relatives - his uncle
(an influential catholic priest), his brother
Frederick, and his sister Helen, would have played a part in his decision to move.
The Last Half of the "Life of Pilates Bio" was spent in America...
Return to Weimar Germany, married a second time
According to Joe's affidavit for citizenship, Joe had a second wife (Elfriede).
They married on October 10th, 1919 in Westphalia, Germany. Since this was just 11 months after
the end of World War II, one gets the impression that that this was a speedy romance.
Elfriede died in 1931(8).
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
Moved to America at age 42
Joseph traveled a first time to New York on the ship the Albert Ballin on October 6, 1925 and stayed there
for two months. His stated reason for the trip was "on vacation", but he would also have visited
the American offices of patent and trademark attorneys Marks and Clerk of 22 Broadway.
These same attornies had recently helped Joe file patents for his Universal Reformer.
Joseph's second trip to new York was on the ship Westphalia which made port on April 14th
1926. This time he stayed for good. And Clara his future long term partner was on board too.
She was a kindergarten teacher
who was suffering from arthritic pain and Joe worked with her on the boat to heal
her and give her a new lease of life.
According to pilates biographer Stacey Redfield-Dreisbach, there is no reason to believe that
Joseph Pilates "came to America upon the urging of boxing promoter Nat Fleischer". Nevertheless
it seems likely that Joseph had fleetingly met with Nathaniel during October 1925
and that the well known boxing publicist did inspire him to stay.
Farfetched however, sounds the story that german boxing legend Max Schmeling
aided Joseph to move to America - there is not public record of their having met.
Far more likely that Joseph, like many immigrants before him, saw America as the golden land of opportunity.
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
Joseph Pilates and Anna Clara Zuener
Again according to Stacey Redfield-Dreisbach, Joseph never did marry Clara. What is certain is that by the time of Clara's
naturalization in January 1937 she and Joseph shared the same address and probably had done so for a number of years -
going by Joeseph's previous probably speedy marriages (or partnerships) - he was not slow at courtship!
What is also clear historical fact: when Joseph took a boat trip to Cuba in June 1938 he declared himself "single".
Be that as it may Joseph and Clara lived and worked closely together until the time of Joseph's death in 1967.
The first Pilates Studio was surrounded by Dance Studios:-
Upon arriving in New York City Joseph "took over a boxing gym at 939 Eighth Ave" (the Van Dyck Building), alongside
several dance studios and rehearsal spaces. It was this proximity
that made "Controlology" such an intrinsic part of the life, rehab and training of many dancers:
They were sent to Joe to be "fixed".
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
The Golden Years of the Pilates Biography
In the Pilates biography, 1926 until 1966 were the golden years -
From 1939 to 1951 Joe and
Clara went every summer to Jacob's Pillow, a well known dance camp in the
Berkshire Mountains. He was a friend and teacher to many renowned dancer/choreographers,
and many required their dancers to go to Joseph. One - Hanya Holm - even incorporated Joe's
exercises into her students' lessons. Joseph counted many socialites, plumbers and doctors,
(just to list a few), as his clients as well.
Philosophy behind the Joseph Pilates Workout
Joseph had a rough but kindly manner with his clients. Even the New York city slicker
of those days could tolerate his "boot camp" exercise approach (unlike today,
people back then still knew how to walk the sidewalk and climb the stairs). Exercise sessions
with Joe were not meant to tire, but rather to invigorate. He would say at
the end of the session, "One hour! Hit ze shower!".
(If he felt the client was in need of a lesson in personal hygiene or skin care,
he was not averse to joining them in the shower,
so as to demonstrate how to use the hard bristled scrubbing brush!)
Modern exercise physiology confirms the wisdom of the Joseph Pilates approach:
you cannot efficiently build muscle bulk/flexbility, while at the same time
performing a hard aerobic workout - doesn't work; just leads to unecessary extra
stress loading. Such sessions should always be performed separately.
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
Pilates Biography, Publications, Philosophy:-
In order to learn more of Joseph Pilates' philosophy and biography, you need to read his books.
They are still in print, and make good reading:-
- Your Health: A Corrective System of Exercising That Revolutionizes the Entire Field of Physical Education
(1934) by Joseph H. Pilates and Judd Robbins (Editor)
- Pilates' Return to Life through Controlology.
(1945) Joseph H. Pilates, William J. Miller, Judd Robbins (Editor)
(contains a set of 34 classic Pilates mat Exercises).
Joseph Pilates was something of a health guru. - Nevertheless,
he was renowned for liking cigars, whiskey (or was that vodka?), and women. He was the life of many parties, and was
to be seen running on Manhattan streets, in the dead of winter, in his habitual "bikini bottom"
training attire! -
He believed in fitness supporting life's rich goals.
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
Death of Joseph Pilates
Was it a Flamboyant Ending?
No! - As always, the truth is never so exciting as the myth. The 82 year old Joseph Pilates
did not charge into a burning smoke filled studio to rescue valuables, and firemen did
not find him hanging from burning floor joists! The following is a
quote by Pilates "Elder"
Mary Bowen :-
"The Fire" - People often ask me "Did Joe Pilates die in a fire?" One woman in
London where I was giving a workshop at the Pilates Foundation of UK last May
said she had read that it was so in The New York Times. To set the record
straight - no, Joe did not die in a fire. He died two years later, in 1967,
of advanced emphysema from smoking cigars for too many years (which he took
up out of disappointment that he wasn't taken more seriously by the powers
that be, especially physicians, during his lifetime). His personal friend,
Evelyn de la Tour, shared that with me.
There was a fire in 1965 in the storage room at the back of his floor. The
studio and his and Clara's apartment were in the front of the building and
were undamaged. Bruce King had an apartment near the storage room. He had to
move out due to severe smoke damage. The day after the fire Joe went to inspect
the extent of loss to his possessions in the storage room and one of his feet
fell through a hole in the floor scrapping his leg. That was the extent of his
injury from the fire.
The fire was in January 1966. Joseph's actual death was in October 1967
Pilates Obituary New York Times
Joseph's New York Times obituary records that he died at Lenox Hill Hospital.
He would have been (born December 9th 1883) 83 years old at his death.
The obituray reads like an advertisement for Contrology - very fitting indeed! He is described thus:
a white-maned lion with steel blue eyes (one was glass from a boxing
mishap), and mahagony skin, and as limber in his 80's as a teenager
I.C. Rapoport's Photographic Interview
That Joe Pilates had asthma is confirmed by this story:
"[In October, 1961,] Sports Illustrated arranged for me to meet with Joe Pilates in his second floor studio. I was 24 and
weighed 145 pounds. He was thirty pounds heavier, several inches shorter and 56 years older. I can still
recall his handshake - I sensed he could bend me like a pretzel if he cared to. Within a few minutes I was
photographing Joe bending himself into one. His gymnasium attracted beautiful people: ballerinas, modern dancers
and actors who would subject themselves to his authoritarian control. Though he personally demonstrated and
explained the mechanical contraptions designed to strengthen and stretch the body, the clouds of forty years
dimmed his voice. Yet, I can remember him telling stories about Germany and how he outwitted the Brown Shirts
on several occasions. Before we parted he encouraged me, for everlasting youth, to practice Contrology. It took
me 39 years to follow his advice."
-
Joseph Pilates died in October 1967, at the age of 83.
Rapoport's Pilates Photos -
View them here!
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
The Joseph Pilates Fitness Craze
Clara Pilates, regarded by many as the more superb
teacher, continued to teach and run the studio until the end of her life 10 years later, in 1977.
Initially, Hollywood celebrities discovered Pilates via
Ron Fletcher's studio in Beverly Hills.
The Pilates fitness craze presumably blossomed from there.
Joseph called his style of fitness "Controlology", but the public call it simply "Pilates".
Where the stars go, the media follow, and when the media follow, fashion follows!.
It was the late 1980s, and the Pilates fitness boom started. "I'm fifty years ahead of my
time," Joe claimed - and he was right. No longer the workout of the elite, Pilates has
truly returned to life and entered the mainstream of fitness, and has even
established itself as a physiotherapeutic
modality in its own right:
(Pilates Article by Lynne Robinson).
Today, perhaps ten million people world wide regularly practice
"Pilates", and the numbers are growing! Its a great tribute to the Pilates Life and Biographical Life Story!
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
The Real Joseph Pilates Legacy:-
Joe Pilates' greatest legacy remains his 34 Contrology Exercises.
Many modern Pilates schools teach them differently.
Very often, the exercises lose something in the translation. For example: the editor (Bruce Thomson) has
considerable
problems with tight muscles and trigger points. Many supposedly sound physiotherapeutic interpretations
of Joe's work do not fully cater for the problem of tight muscles. But the Joe Pilates 34 exercises do.
They do this by working the muscles over their longer range, and by "finding the stretch".
Modern interpretors say that Joe's exercises are too difficult in their original form. But Joe had an
answer for this:-
"Uncle Joe said when you did the hundred, you started with your legs 2 inches off the floor.
If you could only do 10 repetitions, that's all you did that day....until you could do 11."
Quote: Mary Pilates, Joseph's niece.
Source: Personal Communication, from
(Fran Perel: Parkland Pilates, Coral Springs South Florida)
(Editor's note: some modern interpretations of the Pilates 34 exercises are in fact preferable to the originals.
Always keep an open mind - always talk to a variety of Pilates instructors.
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
Joseph Pilates Quotes:-
- The Pilates Method: "my work is 50 years ahead of its time".
- Joseph's definition of
physical fitness: "the attainment and maintenance of a uniformly developed body
with a sound mind fully capable of naturally, easily and satisfactorily performing
our many and varied daily tasks with spontaneous zest and pleasure -
Everything should be smooth, like a cat. [The exercises are
done lying, sitting, kneeling, etc]... to avoid excess strain on the heart and lungs... natural movements
... with the emphasis on doing and being".
- "A few well-designed movements, properly performed in a balanced sequence, are
worth hours of doing sloppy callisthenics or forced contortion."
- "Patience and persistence are vital qualities in the ultimate successful accomplishment
of any worthwhile endeavor."
- The goal of Controlology (Pilates Method) ..... "the attainment and maintenance
of a uniformly developed body with a sound mind and the ability to perform life's
daily activities with zest and ease."
- "I invented all these machines. Began back in Germany, was there
until 1925 [or was that 1923?], used to exercise rheumatic patients. I thought, why use My strength?
So I made a machine to do it for me. Look, you see it resists your movements in
just the right way so those inner muscles really have to work against it. That
way you can concentrate on movement. You must always do it slowly and smoothly.
Then your whole body is in it."
- In explaining Controlology's guiding principle, Pilates liked to quote Schiller:
'lt is the mind itself which builds the body'.
- "I must be right. Never an aspirin. Never injured a day in my life. The whole
country, the whole world, should be doing my exercises. They'd be happier."
- Joseph Hubertus Pilates, in 1965, age 86
Pilates Biography - Return to Top
Biography of Joseph Pilates Resources & References
- Personal Communication, American Relatives
- http://www.powerpilates.com/ - About Joseph Pilates
- Web archive copy - "Joseph Hubertus Pilates
The Man Behind The Method"
-
Web archive copy - PILATES HISTORY
- Web archive copy -
A History of Joseph Hubertus Pilates
-
News and thoughts by Mary Bowen - see bottom of page "Fire"
- Yahoo search - Biography of Joseph Pilates
- Stacey Redfield-Dreisbach (Bethlehem, Pennsylvania USA): "CHASING JOE PILATES"
- http://www.pilatesnun.com/index.php?/categories/88-Pilates-Manifesto-Project
Return to top...
Joseph Pilates Biography ©
© Bruce Thomson, EasyVigour Project
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The Pilates Biographical Picture Gallery
Joseph Pilates, age 59: demonstrating Classical Greek Perfection...
Pilates with his niece (daughter of Fred Pilates,
who lived in St. Louis Missouri). Or perhaps it is Irena? ...
Pilates' picture, sent to his niece, Mary
Picture source:
Parkland Pilates Museum, Coral Springs, South Florida
Pilates the Showman explaining another piece of apparatus...
Pilates out Skiing, complete with one of the Cuban Cigars that eventually took his life.
Pilates in his late seventies. Able to squat and still full of Life...
Pilates, age 82. This picture epitomises the Pilates life and bio!
Purchase the Pilates Classics...
The Pilates Classics...
Joseph Pilates describes and performs the classic 34 matwork exercises...
Joseph's philosophies of Life, posture diagrams, pictures of his patented "V" bed...
Brooke Siler's "The Pilates Body" -
Thorough, understandable, true to the original exercises.
The most reliable information resource that the serious Pilates Mat student can buy.
Available from this website...
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