Mind and body

EDITORIAL COMMITTEE: KARL KROH, COOK CO. NORMAL SCHOOL, ENGLEWOOD, CHICAGO, ILL.
WM. STECHER, SECRETARY OF THE TECHNICAL COMMITTEE OF THE N. A. GYMNASTIC UNION, 1830 PAPIN ST., ST. LOUIS, MO.
HANS BALLIN, MANAGING EDITOR, NORMAL SCHOOL OF THE N. A. GYMNASTIC UNION, 470 E. WATER ST., MILWAUKEE, WI8.

HEALTHY MIND in healthy body

From oppression man doth free;

Beautiful, all grace and power,

Let the mind and body be.

Hale and hearty, men and women,

Kind and noble, true and strong;
Ever on the side of Freedom,
Never in the ranks of Wrong.

Let the blood of ancient Greekdom,
Joyous, through the body flow,
And the mind, in deep emotion,
For all great ideals glow.

With a courage never daunted,
And a firm, unswerving zeal,
Let the mind, in stalwart body,
Be a sword of truest steel.

SYSTEM OF GERMAN GYMNASTICS.

BY WM. FLECK.

Formerly Director of the Normal School of Gymnastics of the North-American Gymnastic Union.

AN

SYSTEM.

NY compilation of materials for gymnastis exercise, arranged after a certain principle, is called a system of gymnastics.

The materials for gymnastic exercises, have, ever since their existence more than a hundred years ago, been elaborated in every possible direction, by persons called upon to do so as well as by others, with varied results. For beside a lot of trash, this labor has brought forth such an abundance of precious exercises, as no other nation in the world has ever called or calls its own.

From the beginning, experience alone has passed judgement on the merit or immerit of an exercise, each and every addition and improvement was immediately looked upon as common property; and the same holds good to-day.

Since no field of human experience may be regarded as closed, so long as human beings are born, we must of course look upon gymnastics as incomplete. The German System of gymnastics is at all times ready to admit of improvement, but not until it has been clearly and in disputably shown, that the proposed improvements are really such, and not idle illusions, which, under high-sounding name and an apparently scientific garb, are calculated to impress and mislead the inexperienced.

To give those, unacquainted with the German system of gymnastics an insight into the extraordinary wealth and variety of its materials for gymnastic exercises, we will here give a short, precise synopsis of our system, as it is in general use to-day and is best adapted for practical purposes; the system arranged by Adolf Spiess, the father of the new tendency of German school-gymnastics, the founder of gymnastics for girls, in his work: The Doctrine of Gymnastic Art., Basel 1840, and improved and built out up to the present time, by his most prominent colleagues and pupils.

In accordance with this system the materials for gymnastic exercises are divided as follows: Free Excercises; Tactics; Exercises with Apparatus; Exercises on Apparatus; Companion Exercises (GesellschaftsUebungen).

I. FREE EXERCISES.

These are divided into two classes, namely Free Exercises of the first order, and Free Exercises of the second order.

A. FREE EXERCISES OF THE FIRST 6. Exercises in derived hops.

ORDER.

1. Exercises in the fundamental posi

tion.

2. Exercises in derived positions.

3. Exercises in common marching. 4. Exercises in derived steps.

5. Exercises in common hopping.

1. Exercises in the fundamental position.

a) Head exercises ;

b) Arm exercises ;
c) Trunk exercises;
d) Leg exercises;

e) Turning;

f) Compound exercises.