THE TIMELINE
1957—With Cold War undertones and whiffs of military training, President Eisenhower develops a pilot physical education test for school children that includes pull ups, sit ups, a standing broad jump, a shuttle run, a 50 yard dash, a softball throw, and a 600 yard run. He is inspired by Dr. Hans Kraus and Bonnie Prudden, who tested children’s fitness in several countries and found American youth severely behind their European counterparts.
1960—President-Elect John F. Kennedy writes “The Soft American,” an article in Sports Illustrated, before reorganizing the President’s Council on Youth Fitness.
1962—President Kennedy creates a massive publicity campaign to improve youth fitness. This includes hiring The Music Man composer Meredith Willson to create a theme song entitled “Chicken Fat”.**
1966—President Johnson begins issuing the Presidential Fitness Award to elite athletes who test in the top 15 percent for all events at their grade level.
1990—President Bush appoints Arnold Schwarzenegger as Chairman of the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports.
2012—President Obama eliminates the Presidential Fitness Award, advising teachers to ditch the test and instead teach a more holistic fitness program stressing “motivational recognition to empower students to adopt and maintain an active lifestyle.”
HILARY HARKNESS + ARA TUCKER
THE PRESIDENTIAL FITNESS TEST REIMAGINED
Let’s talk about community, queers, and fitness. Namely, how we’ve become so good at community-building, that “queering” something has come to mean opening it up to a wider variety of people.
— Ara Tucker
From 1957–2012, youth in the United States were occasionally inspired but mostly tormented by the Presidential Physical Fitness Test, a Cold War competition in which children tried (and mostly failed) to pass a variety of ridiculous athletic challenges in front of one another, and to do the same challenges in gym class year after year. Depending on how old you are, this might have involved promotional materials featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger or a shaming dance number called "Chicken Fat." We have provided a full timeline of the test's evolution, from Eisenhower to Obama.
Headmaster asked Hilary Harkness and Ara Tucker to reconsider the test and consider redefining what a Presidential Fitness Test can look like. Tucker's essay explains a new format for the exam, one in which Jocks aren't the only athletes, and Harkness developed a series of patches one might achieve, using an unlikely real-life hero as a guide.
Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) is famous today for his man loving, fiction writing, and jail time. He was also a 6’4” wall of muscle who stood up to bullies and wrote his devastating masterpiece “De Profundis” while serving two years of hard labor at Reading Gaol.
— Hilary Harkness
