This bulky device (A9 – approx. 1870) was invented by the Swedish physiotherapist, doctor, and designer Jonas Gustaf Vilhelm Zander (1835-1920) for strengthening the arm flexors (M. biceps brachii).
Zander’s “fitness devices” (about 76 different ones) were in use worldwide from 1865 to the 1930s.
With mechanotherapy (resistance gymnastics), Zander’s “therapeutic gymnastics” of that time almost won the Nobel Prize for medicine.
During World War One these heavy devices (some with electric motors and steam drives) disappeared from Germany and were replaced by lighter ones (Hoffa, Knocke & Dressler, Dr. Fischer, Dr. Hecht). Other treatment approaches conquered the “health market” at that time and Zander’s machines disappeared.
Zander machines were present on the Titanic, and can still be seen in Zander Institutes in Essentuki (Russia) and in Thermas Antônio Carlos (Brazil), today.
Description provided by Tobias Langohr of Germany
