How tough were men in the 1800s?

pretty tough but less so than the men from the 1700s

not a history buff wrote:

I'm talking about the guys that dug the erie canal BY HAND. The guys that built skyscrapers without SAFETY HARNESSES. Men must have been in incredible shape left and right...

Most were born into hardship and faced it their whole lives. They were pretty damn tough. Much more so than today.

Here's the thing.

We always look at the ryuns, bekeles, rupps, etc. And we've only had track and field sport for what, 50 or 100 years basically? Imagine the REALLY talented FREAKS 200, 500, 1000, 10,000 years ago that go unwritten. Just an interesting thought.

They were super tough but also really stupid.

"DNA....durrrrr.....what's that?"

the modern world wrote:

They were super tough but also really stupid.

"DNA....durrrrr.....what's that?"

Don't confuse education with stupidity. Plenty of "educated" people today that are damn stupid. 19th century folks weren't as educated...but were smarter because they had to be to survive. I'm talkin street/common sense smarts which very few today have.

Well I'm a man who discovered the wheel. And built the Eiffel tower out of metal and brawn. Thats what kind of man I am.

not very tough. Most couldn't even break 3 in a marathon or 5 in a mile.

dfszdzdsfdz wrote:

not very tough. Most couldn't even break 3 in a marathon or 5 in a mile.

Those 'accomplishments' demonstrate weakness, so of course they couldn't do that.

Educated Guy wrote:

the modern world wrote:

They were super tough but also really stupid.

"DNA....durrrrr.....what's that?"

Don't confuse education with stupidity. Plenty of "educated" people today that are damn stupid. 19th century folks weren't as educated...but were smarter because they had to be to survive. I'm talkin street/common sense smarts which very few today have.

As someone who lacks the common sense to pick up on a very simply constructed joke, you seem to be Exhibit A for your own point.

someone had to do it wrote:

pretty tough but less so than the men from the 1700s

Men from the 1700's wore makeup, powdered wigs and stockings. Men from the 1800's were tougher.

the average man was quite a bit smaller due to poor nutrition, hardship, etc. very possible people had superior mental toughness,though.

KPACK wrote:

the average man was quite a bit smaller due to poor nutrition, hardship, etc. very possible people had superior mental toughness,though.

Sounds like the typical Kenyan or Ethiopian.

the modern world wrote:

Educated Guy wrote:

Don't confuse education with stupidity. Plenty of "educated" people today that are damn stupid. 19th century folks weren't as educated...but were smarter because they had to be to survive. I'm talkin street/common sense smarts which very few today have.

As someone who lacks the common sense to pick up on a very simply constructed joke, you seem to be Exhibit A for your own point.

I think neither of you knows what 'common sense' means

I would imagine they were pretty tough. Life was pretty miserable and a struggle. Which is probably why most everybody was drunk most of time and died in their late 40's.

seriously. Something I've thought about before is body odor. People used to wear very heavy cotton, and I'd guess that many didn't have huge multiples of clothes. That, and also that women didn't shave their hoo-hoo's. It is definitely a good time to be a het!

Cromwell wrote:

someone had to do it wrote:

pretty tough but less so than the men from the 1700s

Men from the 1700's wore makeup, powdered wigs and stockings. Men from the 1800's were tougher.

Those were upper class people. The common man certainly didn´t wear any of that. The higher classes has been a bunch of whimps after the middle ages. I recently read in Stefan Zweig´s autobiography about how middle class men in the late 1800s Vienna tried to become fat and move as slowly as possible already in their mid-20s.

not a history buff wrote:

I'm talking about the guys that dug the erie canal BY HAND. The guys that built skyscrapers without SAFETY HARNESSES. Men must have been in incredible shape left and right...

Yep. Multi-day, go-as-you-please races were big then with ample money on the line, lost of publicity and a significant fan base. Though the records of that era have since been surpassed, those guys regular did over 600 miles in 6-days. They were fit and tough.

Mid to late 1800s was a pretty manly time in.America. The US fought the Mexican-American War, Spanish-American War, and of course the American Civil War and the United States won all of them (if you count the CSA as its own country).

In Europe the early to mid 20th century was the most manly time on that continent. Only incredible amounts of testorone could cause those kind of conflicts and revolutions.

most men back there had a dozen kids, and didn't viagra. men today are literally turning into women from plastics.