Dr. Sargent's New System of Measurements.

The main points of the following article are taken, word for word, from Scribner's Magazine for July, 1887:-

At no time in the history of our country has more attention been given to the subject of physical training than is given to it at the present day. Schools, colleges and Christian Associations are building costly gymnasium, while athletic clubs are forming in many of our towns and cities. With the representatives of our institutions of learning, and with a portion of the intelligent public, the object of the encouragement given to athletics is to counteract the enervating tendency of the times, and to improve the health, strength, and vigor of our youth.

This being the fact the question arise, how large a proportion of young men in the land systematically practice athletics? Probably less than one per cent. How large a proportion of those who are members of athletic clubs take an active part in the sports patronized by their respective clubs? Probably less than ten per cent. The cause of this want of interest in athletics is, doubtless, an increasing tendency to pursue sport as an end in itself rather than as a means to an end.

In making excellence in the achievement the primary object of athletic exercises, we rob them of half their value in various ways:

1st, by increasing the expense of training; 2d, by increasing the time devoted to practice; 3rd, by reducing the number of active competitors; 4th, by relying upon the natural resources rather than upon cultivated material; 5th, by depriving the non-athletic class of every incentive to physical exertion; 6th, by arousing the spirit of antagonism and fostering viciousness and brutality; 7th, by depriving them of their efficacy as a means to health.

It is unnecessary to go further. The object has been merely to show that all sports, pursued as ends in themselves, are necessarily limited to a very small class, and constantly tend to degenerate.

What then can be done to make physical exercises more attractive to the masses and to relieve our sports from some of the evils that degrade them? The best way to accomplish this is to remind the individuals of the ultimate aim of physical exercise. Do not the harmonious development of the physique and the building up of the highest type of manhood, offer an inducement to work for?

It is unfortunate for us that little systematic effort has been made to obtain reliable information by means of physical measurements. Although there is abundance of data in regard to certain girths and dimensions, yet no one system has ever been adopted by any two examiners. What is most needed at the present day is a uniform system of measurements, and a common understanding as to what points and under what conditions the various parts of the body are to be measured.

Having resolved some years ago to make physical training his profession, Dr. Sargent began a system of independent investigation with regard to the growth and development of the body under the various conditions of life.

He resolved to widen the range of observation, believing that on the simple factor, weight, height, and chest girths, could not be based a true estimate of ones physical condition. Realizing how much depends upon the proportion of the different parts of the body, he began his observations by an extended series of measurements. His next aim was to test the strength of the most important parts, for although as a rule, the girths of the different limbs represent the potential strength of their respective muscles, yet there are many exceptions, and the measurements have to be confirmed by an actual strength test. These trials were made by means of three spring-dynamometers, a spirometer, manometer, a pair of suspended rings and a set of parallel bars. The tests were limited to the back, legs, chest, upper arm and fore-arm. Before summing up the result of the arm of chest tests, the number of times that a person had lifted himself either way was multiplied into a tenth of his weight; the object being to credit each person with the number of foot pounds lifted, rather than to reckon the number of times the body was raised without respect to its weight. A tenth of the weight was taken in order to reduce the number of figures that would result from the multiplication. The girths of the head, chest, (natural and inflated), waist, thighs, uppers and fore-arms, these being the parts tested were summed up. The difference between this amount, which was taken to represent the potential strength and the amount found to represent the actual strength, was termed the condition.

In tabulating the first thousand measurements, the sum representing the potential strength, and the sum representing the actual strength were found to correspond closely in healthy people who had received no preparatory training. This fact, an accidental discovery, was made a relative standard to work by. If the actual exceeded the potential strength, the condition was marked plus the amount of the excess. If the actual fell short of the potential, the condition was marked minus the amount of the deficiency.

To ascertain the influence of the various conditions of life upon the growth and development of the individual, answers to certain questions were solicited. It often happened that these answers would account for some peculiarity of development, or some deficiency in the size of body or limbs, or for extreme muscular weakness that could not by otherwise explained. Immediately before and after the strength tests, the head and lungs were examined and any peculiarities noted.

After the measurements fo a thousand individuals were obtained, they were tabulated according to age, and the attempt was made to obtain the average height, weight, chest-girth, etc. The averages thus obtained have been used as a working basis up to the present time. Immediately after the examination of the individual, he was furnished with a book, in which his measurements at the time specified were compared with those of an average man of the same age. If a measurement fell below the average, the fact would be indicated by a minus sign; if above, by the plus.

Still Dr. Sargent felt that a more precise exposition of measurements was needed; one in which the relation of one part to another was determined. Everyone who has attempted to draw any conclusion from the measurements of the body must have realized the need of some guide to show not only the relative standing of one individual as compared with another, but also the relation of every part of the individual to every other part. The same man may be above the normal in one measurement, and below in another. The extent of the variation is the desirable thing to know. In one instance this variation might not exceed the physical limits; in another it might result in a deformity. These differences are but vaguely suggested when expressed in figures, yet it is futile to tell a person that he is above or below the average without indicating the degree, or informing him of its significance.

It is to meet this difficulty that Dr. Sargent has prepared the anthropometric chart. It is intended to furnish the youth with an incentive to systematic and judicious physical training, by showing them at a glance their relation in size, strength, symmetry and development to the normal standard as deduced from the measurements of ten thousand individuals, ranging from seventeen to thirty years of age.

In a second paper, a diagram of the chart and an explanation of its use will be given.