Monday, January 25, 2010
The Mighty Atom ~ Nail DrivingAnother classic shot ofThe Mighty Atom performing The Nail Driving Feat - a feat he did until well into his 70s. For more information about The Mighty Atom and his nail driving prowess, you'll want to sit down with the Hammer Man.
Labels: Feats of Strength, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman Feat, The MIghty Atom
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Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Milo BarusThe great German Strongman Milo Barus, is shown here performing the Human Link feat with a pair of automobiles. Barus performed a tremendous variety of incredible strength feats in his act: Nail Driving, Steel Bending, Harness Lifting, The "Leg Press", Horse Lifting etc etc.
In 1983 a Movie was made about his life and today, a strength competition in his honor takes place in front of his old house at Mühltal Eisenberger. -- The winner receives the "Milo Barus Cup".
Labels: Classic Strongman Feats, German Strongman, Human Link, Leg Press, Milo Barus, Nail Driving, Steel Bending
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Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Galen GoughBilled as "The World's Miracle Strongman," Galen Gough from Howard''s Grove Kentucky certainly lived up to his title. Gough was terribly injured while serving in World War I, but built himself back to health and strength through physical training. His results were so dramatic that a career as a performing strongman soon followed.
Gough performed feats of strength in carnivals, fairs and vaudeville houses all over the country. In addition to "traditional" strongman feats such as The Human Link, Nail Driving, and bar bending, Gough came up with many of his own including dangling from a rope tied to an airplane by his teeth, with a 50 pound weight in each hand, biting keys in half, juggling a 300-pound anvil!
One of his many adventures was to perform feats of strength as publicity stunts for the Louisville, Kentucky- based Oertel Brewing Company which is the origin of the Barrel barbell pictured above.
Labels: Anvil, Anvil Lifting, Bar Bending, Barrel, Barrel Barbell, Barrel Lifting, Feats of Strength, Galen Gough, Human Link, Jaw Strength, Kentucky Strongman, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman, Teeth Lifting
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Tuesday, August 18, 2009
Stanless SteelStanley "Stanless Steel" Pleskun from South Brunswick, N.J has been quietly performing amazing feats of strength for years. He can lift over 600 pounds with one finger, break chains, drive nails, lever sledge hammers and, incredibly, bend a penny with his bare hands. Stanless attributes his great strength to the ability to harness the power of his own mind.
Labels: Chain Breaking, Coin Bending, finger lifting, Mental Strength, Mind Power, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman, Sledge Hammer Leverage, Stanless Steel, Steel Bending, Steel Bending Strongman
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Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Siegmund BreitbartSiegmund Breitbart was a master of many traditional strongman feats (horseshoe bending, Nail driving, steel scrolling etc) but he also came up with a number of his own unique feats. Here's a shot of Breitbart supporting a full-blown motorcycle race on his chest!
Labels: Feats of Strength, Horseshoe Bending, Nail Driving, Siegmund Breitbart, Steel Scrolling, Supporting Feat
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Monday, February 16, 2009
| You've probably never heard of Arthur Santell -- in fact likely nobody has, he was just a kid from Los Angeles with an interest in physical training who was featured in an old newspaper clipping. What we do know of Arthur Santell is that he could drive a 20 penny nail through two 1-inch boards with his fist and scroll a 1-1/2" x 1/4" steel band around his arm. This picture was taken on May 6th, 1930. Santell was 18 at the time. |  Arthur Santell |
Labels: Arthur Santell, Nail Driving, Steel Bending, Steel Scrolling, Strongman Feat
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Friday, February 13, 2009
Siegmund BreitbartHere's an interesting picture of famous oldtime strongman Siegmund Breitbart. It highlights his steel scrolls and hand-bent horseshoes. The structure behind him, however, is the real star, it was created with woodens boards Breitbart nailed together by hand.
Labels: Bending, Nail Driving, Siegmund Breitbart, Steel Bending, Steel Scrolling
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Monday, February 02, 2009
Saxon BrownAs a boy athlete, Saxon Brown was Britain's strongest youth. As a professional, he performed many traditional feats of strength such as Nail Driving, Nail Bending, Card Tearing, The Human Chain and Steel Scrolling. He could also lift a car from the side and would let a motorcycle drive over his neck as a part of his act. Saxon Brown was the first man to pull a bus with his teeth.
Labels: Card Tearing, Chest Expanders, Nail Driving, Saxon Brown, Steel Bending, Steel Scrolling, Teeth Lifting
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Thursday, January 29, 2009
Tommy Kono - Nail DrivingThe number of strength stars who also practiced Nail Driving is quite extensive. Among them famous weightlifter and sometimes bodybuilder Tommy Kono, shown here performing strength feats at the 1960 Jr. Nationals Weightlifting contest held in his home town of Sacramento, California.
Labels: Feats of Strength, Jr. Nationals, Nail Driving, Tommy Kono
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Monday, January 19, 2009
| Dennis Rogers can rip a deck of cards faster than anyone on the planet, he can also easily drive nails through wooden boards with his bare hands. One day he had an idea: why not combine these two elements into one amazing feat? The result was to drive a nail through a full deck of cards, a feat never before imagined, let alone completed, by any other strongman. Needless to say this feat goes over huge when performed in front of an audience. |  Naildriving Through a Deck of Cards |
Labels: Deck of Cards, Dennis Rogers, Dennis Rogers Nail Driving, Feat, Nail Driving, Strongman Dennis Rogers
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Wednesday, December 31, 2008
| Siegmund Breitbart was a strongman of many unusual talents... Like many of the oldtime strongmen, he performed feats such as bending steel bars, nail driving, supporting feats etc etc but one type of strength that he was simply in a class by himself was the strength of his jaw. He could pull cars or wagons with his teeth but even more amazing was that he could bite clean through steel chain links. Yes, real steel, real chains, one of which is pictured on the right. This feat is almost to incredible to be true. Amazingly enough, the Mighty Atom was able to accomplish this feat as well. |  The Actual Chain that Breitbart bit through |
Labels: Chain Biting, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman Feat, Siegmund Breitbart, Steel Bending, Supporting Feat
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Friday, December 12, 2008
The Mighty Atom - Nail DrivingThe Mighty Atom was a master of many unusual strength feats, one of which was driving a nail through thick wooden boards with his bare hand. He performed this feat for decades, even into his 70s. In fact, in his Dungeon Gym Slim The Hammer Man still has the last nail the Might Atom ever drove.
Labels: Nail Driving, Slim The Hammerman, Strength Feat, The Dungeon, The MIghty Atom
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Tuesday, February 05, 2008
The Mighty Samson's Nail DrivingAlexander Zass, aka "The Mighty Samson, was one of the greatest of the Nail Driving strongmen. He used the unorthodox style pictured above to drive the nail through a 3" wooden board -- and, like no other strongman I know of, also used to pull the nails out as well.
Labels: Alexander Zass, Mighty Samson, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman Feat
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All Contents, Including Images and Text, Copyright © 2010 by John Wood and Thunderdome Media Inc., Not to be reproduced without permission, All Rights Reserved
Monday, January 07, 2008
| Stanley Radwan was a catch wrestler and strongman who performed during the 40s and 50s in the Cleveland, Ohio area. He is not especially well known outside of the Cleveland area but very well known and well loved inside the Cleveland area especially among the Polish community. This event poster from 1949 advertises him pulling cars with his teeth, biting through steel, breaking chains, bending horseshoes, bend nails and spikes, nail driving by hand, tearing decks of cards, and performing the human link feat. It was said he could also bend coins with his hands. |  Stanley Radwan |
Labels: Bending Feat, Coin Bending, Nail Bending, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman, Oldtime Strongman Feat, Polish Strongman, Stanley Radwan, Steel Bending
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All Contents, Including Images and Text, Copyright © 2010 by John Wood and Thunderdome Media Inc., Not to be reproduced without permission, All Rights Reserved
Saturday, December 01, 2007
The Mighty Atom: Nail DrivingLike many of the Oldtime Strongmen, Joseph Greenstein aka The Mighty Atom was very adept at the nail driving feat... And like many Oldtime Strongman feats, this one must be accomplished in your mind before it can be accomplished in real life.
Here's the Atom driving a nail through several pieces of sheet metal and a thick wooden board.
Labels: Joseph Greenstein, Nail Driving, Strongman Feat, The MIghty Atom
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Thursday, November 08, 2007
Nail Driving With Paul AndersonPaul Anderson accomplished many things in his life including an Olympic Gold Medal and World Records in just about every lift he tried but I bet you didn't know he was also an expert nail driver too...
When he traveled around for speaking engagements the quickest way to get an audience's attention was to perform an unusual feat of strength -- and a man driving a nail through a wooden board with his bare hand sure fits the bill!
There have been many excellent nail drivers throughout strongman history but I will cover them at another time.
Labels: Nail Driving, Paul Anderson, Strongman Feat
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Monday, October 29, 2007
Joseph Greenstein aka "The Mighty Atom"Joseph Greenstein aka The Mighty Atom twisted horseshoes, drove nails through boards with his bare hand, broke chains, bent iron bars, BIT nails in half, he even held back an airplane with his hair...
Find out more about the Might Atom from his #1 student Slim The Hammer Man
Labels: Bent Horseshoes, Joseph Greenstein, Nail Bending, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman, Strongman Feat, The MIghty Atom
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Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Dennis Rogers: How to Drive a Nail Without a HammerDennis Rogers is keeping many of the Oldtime Strongman feats alive. Here is Dennis performing one of his specialties: nail driving without a hammer, a feat performed by many of the greatest oldtime strongmen and stretching back well over a hundred years.
Dennis regularly drives nails through several inches of wooden boards at once, even those set on fire shown here.
On the Discovery Channel show "More Than Human, Dennis Rogers drove a nail completely through a wooden board and Teflon coated frying griddle with one blow of his fist.
Labels: Dennis Rogers, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman, Strongman Feat
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All Contents, Including Images and Text, Copyright © 2010 by John Wood and Thunderdome Media Inc., Not to be reproduced without permission, All Rights Reserved
Monday, September 10, 2007
  Siegmund Breitbart | In the early part of the 20th Century, Siegmund Breitbart was one of the most well-nown strongmen the world had ever seen and stories of his great strength graced newspapers all across the country. He bent steel bars, drove nails with his hands, supported automobiles, twisted horse shoes, pulled wagons with his teeth and even bit through chains! Breitbart was from a family of blacksmiths and was known professionally as "The Iron King" -- like many strongmen of the period, he also had his own mail-order training course. He would probably have ended up a household name had he not tragically passed away from blood poisoning at the age of 42. |
Labels: Mail Order Course, Nail Driving, Oldtime Strongman, Siegmund Breitbart, Strongman Feat
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All Contents, Including Images and Text, Copyright © 2010 by John Wood and Thunderdome Media Inc., Not to be reproduced without permission, All Rights Reserved
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Alexander Zass: The Amazing SamsonAs far as Oldtime Strongmen go, few were more impressive than Alexander Zass.
Bending or breaking nails, twisting horse shoes, driving nails, supporting feats, scrolling steel, breaking chains, carrying horses, -- he did it all.
The Amazing Samson attributed much of his strength to isometric training.
Labels: Alexander Zass, Amazing Samson, Isometrics, Nail Driving, Strongman, Strongman Feat
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All Contents, Including Images and Text, Copyright © 2010 by John Wood and Thunderdome Media Inc., Not to be reproduced without permission, All Rights Reserved
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