Steve Reeves

A Dedication to a friend...

Steve Reeves -

Rest in Peace

(Updated 5-2-00)

It is with deep sadness we announce that Steve Reeves unexpectedly passed away May 1, 2000 at a hospital in Escondido, CA. Preliminary findings show a blood clot due to complications from lymphoma took his life. SRIS President George Helmer was there to comfort Steve during his final days.

Until very recently, Steve was in excellent health and looked forward to many more years of promoting fitness and working with SRIS. At Steve's request, SRIS will continue its efforts to promote his legacy. The Society sincerely sends its heartfelt sympathy to the family and friends of Steve Reeves.

We will always miss Steve and we will always consider him truly as One of A Kind. Thank you Steve for leading the way, thank you for helping so many, and thank you for all the exceptional things you've done in your lifetime.

Art and Photos Featuring Steve Reeves...

Art Donated by Jim Dallmeier Illustrator of Steve Reeves Body Building Book.

Steve Reeves Bio...

Steve Reeves: Bodybuilding's Perennial Star by David Chapman

It's not easy being a god; Steve Reeves should know. In his most famous cinematic role as Hercules, he had to be gored, pummeled, stabbed, and crushed, but like a true immortal, Steve always emerged from these disasters looking as handsome and muscular as before. Off screen, Reeves was idolized, pursued, and virtually worshipped by thousands of admiring girls and envious young men.

Thanks to his godlike appearance, Steve Reeves inspired an entire generation to take up weights and exercise so that they could look like he did. Of course, no one ever did look quite like him; Reeves had a kind of charisma and physical perfection that only comes along once in a generation. Being a god may have had its drawbacks, but we are grateful that he was there to inspire us all.

Despite his divine destiny, Reeves began life about as far from Mount Olympus and the ancient gods as it was possible to get. Glasgow, Montana is a tiny town a few miles from the Canadian border, where the northern plains stretch for miles in every direction. It was there on January 21, 1926 that Steve Reeves was born.

Steve's father, Lester, was a farmer who attempted to work the stubborn Montana soil. He was killed in a farming accident before his son was two years old, leaving Steve's mother, Golden, with a young son and an uncertain future.

When Steve was ten years old, he and his mother moved to Oakland, California. In an attempt to bolster the family finances, Steve found employment as a newspaper delivery boy. Even while he was on the job, the Montana boy found time to exercise his young muscles. Steve would pedal his bicycle furiously up the steep Oakland hills in an attempt to build his calf muscles and would practice his coordination by throwing his papers precisely on the top step of every porch.

Steve enjoyed wrist wrestling and could beat every opponent who challenged him except for one smaller rival who had a strength far in excess of his stature. Steve was mystified until he visited his adversary's home one day and found him working out with weights in his backyard. This was Steve's first encounter with barbells, and it made a great impression on him.

The young man began to work out with his friend, but his serious weight lifting had to wait until he entered Castlemont High School. There he began working out with weights on a regular basis. Steve found that his young muscles responded quickly to the exercise, but he needed more direction than his school coaches could give him.

By a tremendous stroke of luck, Oakland was also the home of Ed Yarick, an experienced trainer who operated one of the best bodybuilding gymnasiums in the world. Yarick took the young Montana native under his wing and began training him. After two years of intensive instruction under Ed's care, Steve began to put on more muscle than ever before.

World War II put a temporary halt to Steve's career, for as soon as he graduated from high school, he joined the Army and was sent to fight in the Philippines. Nothing could stop Steve's meteoric rise, however, and when he returned from fighting in 1946, he came back to Yarick's gym and redoubled his efforts. His hard work began to pay off when he won the Mr. Pacific Coast title in both 1946 and 1947.

Steve's greatest triumph in bodybuilding to date occurred in 1947 when he won the top prize in the world of bodybuilding. In that year he was crowned Mr. America. As it has for many others, Steve's Mr. America victory became the stepping stone for many other benefits. Suddenly, the handsome young athlete became a celebrity. Photographs showing his broad shoulders, massive arms, and slender waist seemed to be everywhere.

Steve did not escape the notice of film makers. One of the first to contact the young victor was Cecil B. DeMille, the famous director of screen epics. He needed someone to play the Biblical hero Samson in his next extravaganza, and Steve seemed just the one for the job.

When DeMille asked Reeves to shed 20 pounds of hard-earned muscle, however, Steve rebelled, and the role was given to Victor Mature. Despite this setback, Steve continued to pursue bodybuilding and to hope for a career in films. He placed second in both the 1948 Mr. Universe and the Mr. USA contest and gained top honors in the Mr. World competition that same year. Two years later, he won another of the career milestones that were available to physique stars of the time when he traveled to London, England, and was judged Mr. Universe for 1950.

After he won these competitions, film makers once again pursued Steve, this time with greater success. In 1954, he played a small but important part in "Athena", a film that ironically poked fun at the health and fitness movement then sweeping the country. It was not until 1957 that Steve finally graduated to roles more worthy of his talents. In that year, he was asked to play the muscular lead in an Italian production called "Hercules", and from then on his career as a film muscleman went full speed ahead.

Most of the movies that Steve starred in were action pictures set in the time of ancient Greece and Rome and full of strength feats and special effects. The films were instant hits with the fans, and Steve devoted most of his energy to satisfying the public's demand for more of these movies. In all, Steve starred in 18 motion pictures between 1954 and 1968.

Unknown to his many fans, however, the muscular movie star had suffered from a terrible injury. During the 1959 filming of "The Last Days of Pompeii", Steve's chariot slammed into a tree, dislocating his shoulder. Despite the agonizing pain, Reeves was able to snap the shoulder back into its socket by himself. He continued filming, but at a terrible price. From then on, each stunt he performed in every succeeding movie injured the shoulder a little more until finally he was forced to relinquish his strenuous film career and concentrate on other challenges.

Steve Reeves returned to the west coast after his cinematic career was cut short. In 1963, he married a Polish countess, Aline Czarzawicz, and the two retired to a ranch in Southern California, where they began to raise horses.

Because he could no longer work out with heavy weights, Steve devised other methods of exercise. He became interested in "power walking", his term for strenuous walking while swinging weights in either hand.

No matter what he did, however, Reeves continued to have a great influence on hopeful musclemen. He showed a generation of young men the potentials of bodybuilding through his contest victories, his magazine articles, but most importantly through his appearance in movies. His handsome face, bold stage presence, and perfectly symmetrical physique destined the young muscleman for a role beyond the posing dais, and Steve Reeves did not disappoint those who saw in him a perfect spokesman for the burgeoning sport of bodybuilding.

As a physique star and later as a popular film personality, Steve Reeves is living proof that a muscular build and a healthy lifestyle can translate into a successful career. His masculine good looks combined with his powerful physique provided a model for the young bodybuilders of an entire generation. To most of us, he still is god.

SRIS sincerely thanks Mr. David Chapman for his contributions in writing this excellent biography in 1996. Sadly, Steve unexpectedly passed away from complications due to lymphoma in Escondido, California on May 1, 2000. He will be deeply missed by many.

filmography

The film listing may be complete, but the TV credits are not:

FILMS

A Long Ride from Hell (1968)

The Pirates of the Seven Seas (1964) Also known as Sandokan the Pirate, this film is a sequel to Sandokan the Great

Sandokan the Great (1964) with Rik Battaglia

The Slave (1963) (aka The Son of Spartacus)

The Shortest Day (1963)

The Trojan Horse (1962)

The Avenger (1962)

Morgan the Pirate (1961)

Duel of the Titans (1961) with Gordon Scott

The Last Days of Pompeii (1960)

The Thief of Baghdad (1960)

Giant of Marathon (1959)

Goliath and the Barbarians (1959)

The White Warrior (1959)

Hercules Unchained (1958)

Hercules (1957) with Sylva Koscina

Athena (1954) with Debbie Reynolds, Jane Powell, and Linda Christian

Jail Bait (1954) with Ed Wood regular Dolores Fuller and Lyle Talbott

TELEVISION

The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show (1952)

The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet (1953?)

Love that Bob with Bob Cummings

The Ralph Edwards Show (1954) The late, great Ed Wood was watching this show when he first saw Steve Reeves

Topper (1953) with Anne Jeffreys and Leo G. Carroll. Steve Reeves' guest shot garnered the most fan mail of any Topper show, which ran from 1952-1955.

To go to the Official Steve Reeves Home Page, Click Here

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