70-Year-Old Tough Guy Scorns Hollywood He-Men As “Decadent Weaklings”

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 12, Issue 13, 16 January 1948, Page 8

70-Year-Old Tough Guy Scorns Hollywood He-Men As “Decadent Weaklings”

Professor L. V. Voss, 67-year-old Californian physical culturist, selfstyled “Mankind’s Perfect Speciman,” • challenged Hollywood’s he-men to endurance tests. Scornfully he described them as “decadent weaklings who train in bars and work out at harmful and useless sports like tennis and golf.” Voss makes these boasts:— He could outcrawl Johnny Weissmuller in a 12-miles race in a high sea. Out-fence Cornel Wilde, flatten John Garfield in the boxing ring, wrestle the stuffing out of Burt Lancaster. Outwalk Victor Mature from Hollywood to New York. (“Mature would get tired and when he awoke I would be in New York’s Madison Square Garden dancing the Blue Danube while carrying four 2001 b. men.”) Trounce Humphrey Bogart and Errol Flynn in a rowing race. Invite' William Bendix, Brian Donlevy and Allan Ladd to strap 4001 b. cakes of ice on their backs and walk until jt melts. Voss averred he had performed all those feats, had also pulled 12 loaded autos with his teeth.

“Hollywood men bend their arms” says Voss, “and the ladies swoon—pshaw—you could blow them all over.”

Voss’ favourite pupil was Douglas Fairbanks, jun. “But. I saw him a few months ago, and he has decayed from soft living.” Voss’ formula for staying a heman at 70: Eat twice daily, ice-cold baths, and a gallon of water to drink before each meal. Breakfast: Three pints of cooked cracked wheat, daubed with half a pound of butter. Dinner: One loaf of black bread, six ounces of cheese, a glass of wine. Declared grey-haired Voss: “Hard liquor is ruinous—just as bad as cigarettes and meat.”