The History of Pilates
Have you ever wondered where the Pilates Method came from and how it became the well-known practice it is today? Today Pilates is practiced around the world and is a familiar name to many, but it originated with one extraordinary individual: Joseph H Pilates.
We are going to take a look at the life and legacy of Joseph Pilates, exploring how his personal struggles, time interned in WWI, and love of improving the human body led to the method we practice today. However, this history is not a straightforward one to recount, and there are several versions of some of the key moments in his life and the development of Pilates. Based on my research and the stories I have heard over the years in the industry, I have tried to stick as closely to the facts as possible. However, there is bound to be some myth left in here because the man was already a bit of a mystery to those around him in his own time.
Taking the time to understand the fascinating history behind the movement can both deepen our appreciation for the exercises and help us connect more fully to our practice in each class. It is amazing to think that the exercises you do each time you come to the studio are part of a method that is over 100 years old and has stood the test of time as each new generation discovers it.
Joe and Clara Pilates
Who Was Joseph Pilates?
Joseph Pilates was born on December, 9th 1883, in Mönchengladbach, Germany. He had a difficult childhood marred by health problems, including rickets and asthma, and by his family’s unstable living conditions. His personal health struggles motivated him to explore physical fitness as a road to better health. As a teenager he pursued boxing, gymnastics, and diving laying the foundation for his future thoughts on exercise.
After a tumultuous early adulthood in Germany, we know that Joseph went to England looking for work. There are several versions of why he went, most possibly to work in a circus, but we do know that he was taken into custody as an enemy alien and interned for the duration of WWI.
While on the Isle of Man, it is believed he began to take the ideas he had already been developing in Germany and put them into a more solidified routine. It seems that Pilates was one of several who led daily exercise routines for the more than 24,000 internees housed there. This would have given Pilates the opportunity to see his exercises on many bodies and to hone his teaching skills. It is also believed that he may have begun to think about the design of his equipment and the role resistance would play while in the camp.
After the war, he was repatriated to Germany, where he was exposed to ideas and therapies for improving health. In the post-war era in Europe, there were many new therapies appearing including other breath-work methods, trigger point therapy, and hydrotherapy. All of these influenced Pilates along with aspects from Eastern philosophy inspiring the importance of the mind-body connection.
Developing the Pilates Method
Pilates immigrated to the United States in 1926 and opened a studio in New York City. He met his wife Clara (Anna Clara Zeuner) on the boat to America and they lived and worked together in New York. While Pilates always intended his method to be for all people, he gained a reputation for his ability to “fix” dancers’ injuries. His proximity and popularity within the dance community grew rapidly, as leaders such as George Balanchine and Martha Graham referred colleagues to him. This led to Pilates meeting Ted Shaw, who invited him to create an exercise program for his dance camp, Jacob’s Pillow. Pilates taught there between 1942 and 1947 and over that time his signature series of mat exercises was developed.
Because Pilates’ method of exercise, named Contrology by him, was a part of many dancers’ training and rehab, many of the first generation teachers were dancers from both the Ballet and Modern dance backgrounds. This has sometimes led to the misunderstanding that Pilates as a method was created as fitness for dancers. It absolutely was not, and Pilates had many non dancer students as well. However, proximity and then results led dancers to be early adopters of the method.
Contrology was focused on mental control as much as physical. Pilates believed that the mental clarity was key to harnessing the bodies full potential. Over time, he added to the philosophy behind his method, which built strength from the core out towards the periphery, and incorporated flexibility, strength, posture, and the movements of the spine. He saw the importance of the breath in activating the core and bringing the mind into connection with the body, always coaching his students on breathing.
At his studio in New York City, Pilates was continually tinkering and inventing. This lead to the creation of first the Universal Reformer, which is the basis of most modern Reformers. But also the Cadillac/Trapeze Table, Wunda Chair, Magic Circle, Foot Corrector, Ped-o-Pull, Ladder Barrel, Spine Corrector, Guillotin, and more. Pilates was an inventor as much as a fitness trainer, but he did not patent most of his inventions, leading to friction years later.
It is clear from his life’s work that he believed strongly in the importance of movement for our health. He thought that Pilates should be practiced by everyone in the world and hoped that it one day would be. While he did have famous clients during his lifetime, his method did not expand the way he hoped, nor did he have a lot of financial success from it. Over the years, Pilates developed very loyal clients, and at various time, some of them encouraged or even helped him to document some of the exercise routines on the apparatus. At one point, they even began to set up a trust to preserve his work and legacy after he was gone. Unfortunately, Pilates was suspicious of anyone trying to steal his method and never saw any of these attempts through.
How Pilates Has Evolved Over the Years
Joseph Pilates died in 1967 at age 83, leaving behind his gym, his wife Clara, and a group of loyal Pilates practitioners, but no plan for how the gym or his legacy would continue. While less is written about Clara, she was often the one to work with clients who needed the method modified for injury or chronic conditions. Her influence can be seen in several of the first-generation teachers who eventually spread Pilates around the U.S.
What followed Pilates’ death were some rocky years in which the Pilates method was preserved through the assistance of many of Joseph Pilates’ former students and a few teachers. Instrumental to this cause was John Steel, who had been a client of Pilates for years and became Clara’s lawyer to help her after his death. Steel worked hand in hand with Clara, a few teachers who worked under Pilates, and loyal clients to keep the gym going. He saw the need to create something more stable and looked for someone to step in and run the gym, eventually inviting Romana Kryzanowska to take the position.
In the 1990s, Pilates gained more attention, as physical fitness and wellness became parts of everyday life. With this popularity came more variations in the teaching, as more schools developed to train teachers, and group classes for just mat or just reformer became the norm. Pilates continued to evolve with the times and incorporated information from the field of physical therapy, biomechanics, and anatomy. While this has changed some of how we teach Pilates, particularly with respect to safety in some exercises and better knowledge for modifying for injuries, the core principals of precision, concentration, control, centering, breath and flow remain integral to the method.
Why Pilates Still Matters Today
Through his varied life experiences, Joseph Pilates was able to create a method that builds strength from the core out, prioritizes the connection of the breath to that strength, and focuses on the health of the spine to move and be supported. All of this is facilitated by balancing strength with flexibility, stability with range of motion, control with release, and effort with efficiency. It is a method that supports the body to move freely from a place of strength as much today as it did when it was created. But it is more than a way to be strong and mobile; it is a way to connect to your own body and build awareness. This awareness allows you to use your body to its fullest and know when you need to slow down and rest. The method is very much an approach to life that we need today more than ever, as we are bombarded with information, sold quick fixes, and numbed with noise. Pilates is an invitation to slow down, connect with yourself, and build a practice that can grow and change with you over the course of your life.
Sources
"Caged Lion: The Life and Legacy of Joseph Pilates" by John Howard Steel (2017)
"Return to Life Through Contrology" by Joseph Pilates (1945)
"About the Pilates Method: What Is Pilates?" Pilates Method Alliance, www.pilatesmethodalliance.org/about-the-pilates-method-what-is-pilates.
Photo Credit
Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library. "Joe and Clara Pilates outside" The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1950 - 1955. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/aa5b4460-8b5e-0130-0db1-58d385a7bbd0