Sports – LIFE

The ‘Peril and Ecstasy’ of Surfing,1963

Fri, 16 Jun 2017 08:30:27 +0000

In May of 1963, as the surf craze swept the U.S. and popular images of surfers tempted newcomers into the water in the days before wetsuits were common, LIFE magazine had a message its readers: Surfing was fun but it wasn’t all fun and games. It was also dangerous, especially when it came to the waves off the North Shore of Oahu.

The magazine explained to unfamiliar readers how the sport worked there: “The men who ride the big ones in Hawaii actually ski down the shoulder of a wave away from the curl… They call the first breathtaking schuss ‘taking the drop.’ Their boards accelerate up to 35 mph so rapidly that they kick up waves like speedboats. And a merciless mauling awaits the unfortunate who doesn’t complete his ride. He is driven downward by the appalling maelstrom, tossed around, sucked back down and frequently, after fighting up for a desperate gulp of air, hammered down again by the next wave.”

And yet a brave group of surfers sought out the big waves anyway, for what LIFE called the “peril and ecstasy” of the sport’s toughest waves. Enabled by new innovations in balsa wood surfboards that had opened new vistas to surfers in the 1940s, the surfers returned again and again, despite the risks.

Looking at these photos by George Silk, it’s not hard to see what drew the surfers back to the water. Some experienced, what surfer Fred Van Dyke described to Silk as, “the greatest feeling the world.”

Nick Beck of Honolulu caught a wave on his light board.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A pair of riders, cutting frothy furrows in the wall of a wild 18-footer, seemed headed on a collision course at Sunset Beach.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Surfer Rick Grigg caught a ride at Banzai Beach, Oahu, Hawaii, 1963.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A teenage girl rode the surf, 1963.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hawaii, 1963.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Preston Leavey, paddling frantically to get on a wave and begin his ride. A camera, was bolted to the front of the board and recorded the glitter of refracted light from the spray.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Before riding in on great waves surfers had to fight their way out past foaming barriers.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

At Sunset Beach, a surfer rode a thundering 15-footer.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hawaii surfers, 1963.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Kaohi maneuvered desperately to cling to his board as he tried to ride into the tunnel of a wave at Banzai Beach.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hawaii surfer, 1963.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post The ‘Peril and Ecstasy’ of Surfing,1963 appeared first on LIFE.

When Champions of Women’s Diving Were Called ‘Athletes Second, Girls First’

Thu, 18 Aug 2016 08:00:08 +0000

The 1959 swimming and diving championships of the Amateur Athletic Union, which were held in Palm Beach, Fla., didn’t exactly look like the diving events that you would see at a national competition today.

Even though the event was supposed to be the indoor championships, it was held outside due to the heat. And the 200 or so girls and young women of the AAU wore the same modest one-piece bathing suits that can be seen in many poolside photos from the 1950s, not the sleek and modern suit today’s divers wear. Finally, perhaps unsurprisingly for 1959, much of the attention they garnered at least in the pages of LIFE magazine focused a great deal on the looks of the “pretty plungers,” rather than their skill. The burnt cork that they applied below their eyes, to minimize the glare off the water, was compared to eyeshadow.

They could not, LIFE noted dismissively, “disguise the fact that they were athletes second, girls first.”

The pictures that ran alongside the story were black and white, and provided no information about who won or what the events even were. But the photographer, Peter Stackpole, also captured these vivid color images of the divers in action. And, seeing them now, it’s clear that LIFE’s unnamed writer didn’t quite get the point. Decades later, we can’t know how central athleticism was to any of these women’s identities, but they were athletes, no hedging required. Though Stackpole did not record who among his subjects proved victorious, his photos provide evidence that a gravity-defying dive could be as impressive then as it is today.

Women’s diving champions in Florida, 1959.

Peter Stackpole The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post When Champions of Women’s Diving Were Called ‘Athletes Second, Girls First’ appeared first on LIFE.

The Best of LIFE: Summer Olympics

Fri, 05 Aug 2016 08:00:57 +0000

Great sports photography is an art of its own, and there are few chances to practice that art like the Olympics. As the world’s athletes gather to compete, so too do the photographers who capture them in action.

During LIFE Magazine’s decades as a source of the world’s most iconic photography, the magazine covered its fair share of Olympics. The images produced are as varied as the sports they portray. The photographs show the quiet moments before the race begins. They show the concentration and strength needed to win and the joy of knowing you might have done so. They show the graceful, almost abstract, forms of bodies in motion, and the iconic moments when athletes become legends.

Here’s a look back at some of the best LIFE Magazine photography from the summer Olympics.

LIFE magazine Olympic covers through the years.

LIFE Magazine

Jamaican athlete Herb McKenley standing on a track at the 1948 summer Olympics in London.

William Sumits The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Competitors diving into pool during swimming events at the 1948 summer Olympics in London.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

US decathlon winner Robert B. Mathias waiting for turn at pole vault at the 1948 summer Olympics in London.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Czech track and field gold medalist Emil Zatopek leading pack during the 1952 Olympic games in Helsinki, Finland.

Mark Kauffman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Cycling at the 1952 summer Olympics in Helsinki, Finaland.

Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Athletes competing in the 10,000-meter walk at the 1952 summer Olympics in Helsinki, Finland.

Mark Kauffman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Robert B. Mathias attempting the pole vault at 1952 summer Olympics in Helsinki, Finland.

Mark Kauffman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Gunhild Larking, Sweden’s entry for the high jump, clearing the high bar during the 1956 summer Olympics in Melbourne, Australia.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fencers competing in the 1956 summer Olympics in Melbourne, Australia.

John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

US Runner Wilma Rudolph winning women’s 100-meter race at the 1960 summer Olympics in Rome.

Mark Kauffman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

German Armin Harry (C) during men’s 100-meter dash event at the 1960 summer Olympics in Rome, Italy.

George Silk The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

U.S. platform diver Frank Gorman competing in the 1964 summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan.

Art Rickerby The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

U. S. swimmers competing during the 1964 summer Olympics in Tokyo.

Art Rickerby The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

American track stars Tommie Smith (C) and John Carlos (R) standing on podium after winning gold and bronze Olympic medals, respectively, raising black-gloved fists, in support of civil rights/black power, while Australian silver medalist Peter Norman stands by at the 1968 summer Olympics in Mexico City.

John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

US swimmer Mark Spitz training for the 1972 summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany.

Co Rentmeester The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

US wrestler eventual gold medal winner Wayne Wells (top) overpowered West German Adolf Seger in freestyle welterweight elimination match at the 1972 summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany.

Co Rentmeester The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

US track athlete Steve Prefontaine running a race at the 1972 summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany.

Co Rentmeester The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

U.S. gymnast Ludmila Turishcheva in action on the vault at during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany.

John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Kenyan track star Kipchoge Keino finishing ahead of teammate Ben Jipcho (574) in the 3,000-meter steeplechase final at the 1972 summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany.

John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post The Best of LIFE: Summer Olympics appeared first on LIFE.

Yoga’s 20th-Century Evolution, in Classic Photographs

Tue, 21 Jun 2016 08:00:48 +0000

A comprehensive survey by Yoga Journal and Yoga Alliance found that more than 36 million Americans practice yoga, with those people spending a combined $16 billion a year on accessories, classes and other yoga expenses. In addition, 80 million people who had never done yoga said they thought chances were good that they’d give it a shot.

That means things have changed considerably since the early 20th century, when the practice first began to move into the American spiritual and athletic mainstream. But, from LIFE Magazine’s very first years in the 1930s, the publication and its photographers were chronicling that growth.

In 1937, the magazine followed the news that a Yale scholar from India had examined the science behind yoga, which was explained to readers as a mystic Hindu practice that let the expert, through muscular control, detach from mind and body to allow the “higher world-soul” to join with him. “Whatever the religious result of yogic exercises may be,” the magazine reported, “they undoubtedly have therapeutic value, help general bodily health.” A few years later, in the article from which the first slide above is drawn, the magazine profiled the “lithe young devotees of an ancient and honorable religion” whom photographer Wallace Kirkland had met on a trip to India. In the decades that followed, with the help of celebrities such as violinist Yehudi Menuhin and participants in the truth-seeking of the 1960s and ’70s, the magazine stopped having to explain what yoga meant to readers.

As for the reason behind the practice’s popularity, perhaps it came down to the explanation offered by Tom Law, the “yoga guerrilla” profiled by LIFE in 1970: “Yoga gets me reconnected,” he said. “As soon as I get into the position it begins to happen for me. The center of the earth becomes located in my stomach, my head is in the stars, and yet I am here too. Yoga really works, which is why I think it will be popular.”

Boy twisting himself into a yoga position, 1940.

Wallace Kirkland The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Folk singer John Jacob Niles performing elbow-standing exercise, adapted from yoga, to relax. 1943.

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Hindu man practicing yoga, 1949.

Eliot Elisofon The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ballet dancer and actress Ricki Soma arching backward as her father Tony Soma and other family members take various Yoga positions, 1947.

Lisa Larsen The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Sir Paul Duke on the BBC TV show, “Laughter and Life” showing yoga exercises, 1949.

William Sumits The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Violinist Yehudi Menuhin observing Yogi Vithaldas, 1953.

Wallace Kirkland The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Hindu swami performing yoga on a Ganges riverbank, 1953.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Teenagers practicing yoga, 1953.

Nina Leen The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Douglas Madsen, sometime sculptor, clothes and jewelry designer, teaching yoga to neighbors in Big Sur, 1959.

J. R. Eyerman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Practicing yoga in Central Park, 1961.

Leonard McCombe The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

American women at Rancho La Puerta learning yoga exercises, 1962.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Entertainer Mitzi Gaynor performing yoga, 1962.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Women practicing yoga at the Every Woman’s Village, 1966.

Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Tom Law, during his yoga meditations in desert, 1969.

Michael Mauney The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Yoga psychedelic trip, 1970.

Ralph Morse The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

1265626.jpg

Actress Eva Longoria in a yoga pose on the January 21, 2005 cover of LIFE Magazine. (Photo by Andrew Southam/LIFE Picture Collection)

The post Yoga’s 20th-Century Evolution, in Classic Photographs appeared first on LIFE.

Jesse Owens in 1955: Our Man in India

Fri, 19 Feb 2016 08:00:18 +0000

Jesse Owens’ triumph at the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games is one of the great stories of American sport, and a victory that might never have happened had the track star not decided that his competing would be a statement against Hitler’s racist regime.

But the story of Owens’ post-Olympic life a difficult one. His athletic feats did not exempt him from the struggles wrought by institutionalized racism in his home country, and those struggles could not be erased by any number of gold medals. As he would later say, “After I came home from the 1936 Olympics with my four medals, it became increasingly apparent that everyone was going to slap me on the back, want to shake my hand, or have me up to their suite. But no one was going to offer me a job.”

He attempted to capitalize on commercial offers following his victory, but those quickly dried up. He bought a Negro League baseball team, but the league disbanded after a few short months. He worked as a gas station attendant, ran a dry cleaning business and even raced against horses in an endeavor he recognized might be perceived as degrading, but as he explained, “You can’t eat four gold medals.”

In 1955, nearly two decades after the Olympics, the U.S. State Department dispatched Owens, then 42, on a goodwill tour of India. LIFE photographer James Burke documented the trip, during which the Olympian coached Indian athletes and gave speeches to schoolchildren. The magazine called him “a practically perfect envoy in a country which has violently exaggerated ideas about the treatment of Negroes in the U.S,” hinting at the political motives that may have been at play in the decision to send him overseas, and noted that Owens “generally charmed everybody in sight.”

Even so, the trip did not erase financial problems at home. Owens’ life would be cut short by lung cancer in 1980. His legacy, however, persists.

Liz Ronk edited this gallery for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter @lizabethronk.

Jesse Owens demonstrates his form to sprinters in India.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Jesse Owens coaches Indian athletes during his goodwill tour in 1955.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Athletes huddle around Owens in India, 1955.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Owens helps Indian athletes with their starting positions, 1955.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Owens demonstrates good form, 1955.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Owens helps Indian runners learn good form, 1955.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Attentive athletes look on as Owens coaches them during his 1955 trip to India.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Owens addresses schoolchildren as goodwill ambassador to India, 1955.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Original caption: “Arithmetic lesson by Owens interrupts the routine of a class of 6-year-olds at a Delhi school.”

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Jesse Owens speaks about sportsmanship to students at Delhi University.

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Original caption: “One end of cloth clenched between his teeth, Jesse Owens learns the trick of turban-wrapping in manner of the Sikhs as he visits New Delhi.”

James Burke The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The post Jesse Owens in 1955: Our Man in India appeared first on LIFE.

19 Spirited Vintage Photos of Cheerleaders in Action

Mon, 02 Nov 2015 10:49:53 +0000

“Rah, Rah, Rah! Ski-U-Mah! Hoo-Rah! Hoo-Rah! Varsity! Varsity! Minn-e-so-tah!” So went the very first organized cheer at an intercollegiate football game, a rallying cry meant to break the University of Minnesota squad’s losing streak. Though college football had begun in 1869, and all-male pep clubs had long sung fight songs to inspire their teams to victory, it wasn’t until the turn of the century on this day, Nov. 2, in 1898 that a fan named Johnny Campbell led the cheer that would earn him the title of America’s first cheerleader.

Like Campbell, the majority of early cheerleaders were men in large part because squads did not begin opening their ranks to women until the 1920s. The gender balance shifted further during World War II, when an increasing number of women filled positions vacated by men who had been drafted to fight in the war. By the 1960s, the sport became dominated by women, as National Football League teams began to organize professional squads.

LIFE magazine covered cheerleading in abundance, from the magazine’s inception in the late 1930s until it ceased publication in 1972. Cheerleading’s mid-air splits and synchronized pom-pom shakes were a win-win subject for a magazine that traded in stimulating visuals and glimpses into everyday American pastimes. Here, in celebration of the sport’s 122th anniversary, are LIFE’s greatest images of America’s purveyors of pep.

Liz Ronk edited this gallery. Follow her on Twitter @lizabethronk.

Cheerleaders 1939

Alfred Eisenstaedt / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleader 1946

Alfred Eisenstaedt / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1947

Ralph Crane / The LIFE Images Collection

Cheerleader 1950

Loomis Dean / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1952

Robert W. Kelley / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1952

Mark Kauffman / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1953

Francis Miller / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1953

Nat Farbman / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1954

Lisa Larsen / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1954

J.R. Eyerman / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1958

Gordon Parks / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1958

Stan Wayman / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1958

Paul Schutzer / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders, 1960.

Robert W. Kelley / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders, 1960.

Francis Miller / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders, 1964

Larry Burrows / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1965

Lynn Pelham / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders 1966

Bob Gomel / The LIFE Picture Collection

Cheerleaders, 1971

Grey Villet / The LIFE Picture Collection

The post 19 Spirited Vintage Photos of Cheerleaders in Action appeared first on LIFE.