Eugen Sandow

Eugen Sandow, born Friedrich Wilhelm Muller in Konigsberg, Prussia, on 2 April 1867 and died on 14 October 1925, was a German bodybuilder and showman who became interested in bodybuilding at the age of ten during a visit to Italy. After a time in the circus he studied under the strongman Ludwig Durlacher in the late 1880s and, on Durlacher's recommendation, began entering strongman competitions, performing in matches against leading figures such as Charles Sampson, Frank Bienkowski and Henry McCann. In 1901 he organised what is believed to be the first major bodybuilding competition, held at the Royal Albert Hall in London and judged by Sandow with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Charles Lawes-Wittewronge. He is known as the father of modern bodybuilding.