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Joe Weider Bodybuilding Biography
Joe Weider The Master Blaster, Trainer of Champions
Josef Edwin "Joe" Weider was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada on November 29, 1919. His parents were Jewish immigrants from Poland called Louis and Anna. Joe was fascinated by bodybuilding and health from a very early age and managed to publish his first issue of a magazine that he put together called Your Physique in 1936 when he was only 17 years old.Joe always had a passion for health and exercise and he was the founder of Weider Nutrition, which was the first sports nutrition company in the USA and probably the world. It is now called Schiff Nutrition International, which was responsible for creating and marketing of Tiger's Milk nutrition bars and other related products which were the very first sports foods ever sold to the American public.
He built his first set of barbells using car wheels and axels that he got from a scrap yard. Joe was only getting started and was responsible for designing many different training courses, which he first published in the early 1950s and he called it the Weider System of Bodybuilding.
His first marriage was to Hedwiges "Vicky" Uzar and they had their first and only child, which was a daughter that they called Lydia Ross who later gave him three grandchildren. He divorced Vicky in 1960 and married the highest paid pin-up girl in the U.S called Betty Brosmer in 1961.
Betty and Joe started working together with his brother Ben and together they authored many books specifically on bodybuilding. Together the three of them started the International Federation of BodyBuilders (IFBB). In 1953 his first magazine that he started at 17 called Your Physique and he changed its name to the Muscle Builder magazine.
This name later changed again to the well-known Muscle & Fitness in 1980. Joe was responsible for many other publications as well as he started to build the Weider publishing empire. The titles of these publications include Mr. America, Muscle Power, Shape magazine, Fit Pregnancy, Men's Fitness, Living Fit, Prime Health and Fitness, Cooks, Senior Golfer, and Flex.
Joe and his brother ben also published a book called Brothers Of Iron and in 1983 the Weider publishing company was named "Publisher of the Year" by The Periodical and Book Association. Joe and Ben decided to sell Weider Publications in 2003 when it was sold to American Media.
There were a number or law suits against Weider and some were settled out of court but he was fined over $400 000 for false advertising of products like the weight-loss products and the muscle gain products that he said would gain muscle faster than taking steroids.
Joe Weider eventually died at the age of 93 from heart failure on March 23, 2013. He had been recuperating in the Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles, California from a heart attack. He leaves behind three grandchildren and a legacy to bodybuilders all over the world.
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