Dianabol Godfather
Sunday, February 20, 2005
The Man Behind the Juice
Fifty years ago, a doctor brought steroids to America.
The BALCO scandal and Jose Cansecos best-selling book Juiced have kept steroids on the front page of the sports section for months. Yet athletes have been pumping themselves up with anabolic steroids for nearly 50 years, long before the days of the cream and the clear. So, who is responsible for bringing steroids into the sports world?
The godfather of steroids was a rough-and-tumble Maryland physician named John Bosley Ziegler. Ziegler practiced medicine in Olney, Md. and conducted chemistry research at a company called Ciba Pharmaceuticals. A big, fleshy former Marine who answered to the nickname Montana Jack, Ziegler loved to pump iron. During his long sessions at the gym, he befriended several bodybuilders associated with the York (Pa.) Barbell Club. In the 1950s, York was at the center of American fitness training, and Bob Hoffman was the movement's spiritual leader. Hoffman, who competed with Joe Weider and Charles Atlas for the title of Americas main muscleman, also ran the York Barbell Co. I am proud that I am a builder of men, he wrote in the 1939 book Weight Lifting. The men he built included such famed old-time strongmen as John Grimek, John Davis, and Paul Anderson.
Read the whole article at Slate