Battle Of The Bulges! (1941)
Need to work off those holiday pounds?
The 1941 reel shows six scantily-clad girls grinning and bearing it while their lumps and bumps were pounded by vicious contraptions called Hoops and Tombolas - toning machines from America.
Surprise: this video was made three years before the famous Battle of the Bulge - the German military offensive of December 1944.
A male voiceover then informs us 'gals' that after 'we've helped to win the war, we'll have another battle on our hands...and legs and things. The battle of the bulges'.
He goes on to say how women will board the 'streamliner' machine' 'and away you'll go to health and happiness.'
Perhaps most bizarre though is the preferred gym kit. Although the girls' hairstyles and swimsuits are very typical of the era, they are all working out in high heels.
According to a spokesman at Pathé, this was common on reels at this time and had begun a decade earlier in 1931 with fitness video Easy Steps to Slim. ~ Daily Mail
Video Source: British Pathé Film ID:1212.11
For more on the history of exercise see …
Thanks for the nudge!
Not without a grand jury subpoena.