While the passion for fitness began in the early 1900s, it was not until the 1980s that fitness commercialized in the aerobics. The 1980s became an incubator where the rise in free-market economics and the development of new technology mixed with the Me-generation creating a new cornerstone of American culture: the admiration of a fit body.
April Braden
About April
April Braden is from rural Illinois, where she knew from the age of 8
that she was going to study history. She moved to the big city of Chicago to study American history at Loyola University, Chicago where she received her Bachelors and Masters. Currently, she is in the American Cultural Studies doctoral program at Bowling Green State University. Her areas of interest are late Twentieth Century US History, Urban History, Vernacular Architecture, Cultural History, and the History of Consumerism. When not found in a library, she enjoys spending time with her husband and two cats binge watching Doctor Who, dreaming about old buildings, and reading historical fiction.