From Dr. Ken Leistner: Dick "Smitty" Smith

[Mark Rippetoe]

http://startingstrength.com/index.php/site/smitty

[franklie]

Bill Starr mentioned him in some of his writings about his time at York.

[Mark E. Hurling]

I barely remember hearing about "Smitty" from time to time in a few articles. That was a nice tribute, giving him some of the recognition it sounds like he was due.

Leistner, never disappoints in his writings. I've only barely scratched the surface of most of his stuff. I know he had a great series of articles called Life in the Loft, but have read maybe only one or two of them.

[nevermind]

Often the people who make the biggest difference in the sport are neglected for the big companies making all the money.

How many people like Smitty helped directly develop the champions, but got swept under the corporate brands of Weider or Hoffman, and never given enough credit?

RIP

[Goatamon]

"However I have concerns that he will not be remembered, not be appreciated, and will not be given his place in the sport’s history, a place that he deserves and has earned."

I sorta worry about this kind of thing when it comes to powerlifting. At least weightlifting has "Muscletown USA", but powerlifting has nothing of the sort. I worry that information about the formative days of powerlifting and all those legends like Chip McCain and Cole are going to disappear, because most of it is not written down anywhere. It's all in the minds of people like Gallagher, Todd, Rip and Starr. I hope someone sits down to write such a book before we lose the people who were actually there.

Anyways, this was a nice little tribute, although I didn't know much of anything about "Smitty". I'll have to look him up.

[Alberto Velazquez]

Dr. Ken's articles were the first thing I read in POWERLIFTINGUSA back in the 80's and 90's. Before I discovered Rip and SS, Dr. Ken's writings along with Bradley J. Steiner and Stuart McRobert made the most sense to me. They all emphasize the compound lifts along with common sense nutrition and recovery to get big and strong. Goat, York does have is Hall of Fame where one can read about the legends of the sport. Rip I hope Dr. Ken like Marty keeps contributing.

[Mark E. Hurling]

Before I discovered Rip and SS, Dr. Ken's writings along with Bradley J. Steiner and Stuart McRobert made the most sense to me.

Sounds like you and I trod a lot of the same reading grounds.

[Alberto Velazquez]

Sounds like you and I trod a lot of the same reading grounds.

Funny that I discovered them in the mainstream muscle comic books. I made the most progress after reading their works. I trained by myself in a apartment building basement.

[Mark E. Hurling]

I've been reading Steiner since the 70's and have several of his books. Same with McRobert although I didn't discover him until the 90's. Steiner to this day can't quit over-using ALL CAPS, underlines, and bolding to convey his points in his MA newsletter. McRobert was always terribly gloomy and fatalistic about genetics and hardgainers. But absent the detailed analysis of lifting and form you see in SS, they had some worthwhile things to say about lifting, microloading, cycling workouts, and the like without all the sizzle and hooraw of Weider or Hoffman.

[kcc]

I saw this article via the Starting Strength Facebook page, which caused me to visit the article section on the main site. I've been enjoying reading Marty Gallagher's bios about the greats. Thank you for the great article and for making me realize that there were many more available. I've been spending most of my free team here in the forum and this was a nice change of pace.