Karl (Carl) Busch - The Underrated Strong Man

If you do a google search on strong men then you'll most definitely run into plenty of stories and images on Sandow, Saxon, The Russian Lion - George Hackenschmidt, and possibly even Jack LaLanne as he often performed feats of strength that could easily label him as a vintage strong man as well.

There are quite a few very nearly unsung heroes of iron though, and I would place Karl Busch very high on that list of sometimes overlooked masters of iron.

Karl was not only a very strong man but he was also an exceptional wrestler that once took on the likes of Frank Gotch (this match ended in a draw and was contested under the greco roman style). It was noted that Busch gave up 30 lbs of weight and was yet still able to hold one of the most accomplished wrestlers of that time to a draw, that's definitely an impressive feat in itself.

Here's a slightly cleaned up photo of Karl performing a "Two-Hands Anyhow" lift around the year 1900, possibly 1901. He also executed a "Bent Press" of 250 lbs at a bodyweight of 175 lbs. Now while I understand that many of the "strong man lifts" were more about leverage and timing it's still darn impressive to me that he was able to move weights that far above his own bodyweight.

There's not a lot of info regarding Karl out there, but I'm still digging and will glady add anything more that I might be able to find on here in the future.