The Triangle & Physical Education Magazines

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The Triangle was first published by the students in the Physical Department of the Y.M.C.A. Training School in February, 1891. Amos Alonzo Stagg and James Naismith were listed among the editors. By June, 1891, the monthly journal was published by the Triangle Publishing Company, located at ‘Corner State and Sherman Streets’, for 10 months each year, subscription price at $1.00 per year or 15 cents per copy, and a circulation of 1,000 copies per month. Dr. Gulick, M.D. served as President, J. Naismith, editor, and F. N. Seerley, Business Manager. The game of Basket Ball was introduced in the Triangle in the January 15, 1892 edition (Vol. 1, No. 10, p. 144-147) in a four-page article written by James Naismith and included the original 13 rules. Contributing authors included L. Gulick, H.Kallenberg, R. Tait McKenzie, and F. Seerley with editorials, book reviews, ‘unobjectionable’ advertisements, and articles about base ball, foot ball, and other sports, exercise, and articles about influential figures such as Friedrich Ludwig Jahn, and timely topics and current issues such as the future of athletics, methods of grading, photography and athletics, and organization of the physical department of the YMCA Training School. By March 1892, the name of the journal was changed from Triangle to Physical Education, published by the Triangle Publishing Company at 786 State Street in Springfield, MA. The name of the company remained the same, “as the triangle stands for the principle which we believe. The change of name does not indicate any change of position on our part.” T. P. Bond replaced F. Seerley as business manager. The introductory journal began with ‘Our Platform’ and included an article about ventilation in the gymnasium. Topics with relevance to the Training School, International YMCA, and the American Association for the Advancement of Physical Education (A.A.A.P.E.) included issues related to, for example, sport, exercise, physical training for those with disabilities, teaching teachers, physical education for women, basket ball for women (by Senda Berenson), physical educators as medical graduates, debate about international systems of gymnastics, treating sport injuries, physical measurements, changes in official basket ball rules, ethics of sport, and rules of volley ball. An advisory committee was added in August 1892 with notables in the field that included E. Hitchcock, Amy Morriss Homans, Dudley Sargent, and William Anderson. According to our records, the last issue was Vol. v, No. 5, July, 1896. Around this time The American Physical Education Review, later changed to Research Quarterly, was published quarterly by the A.A.A.P.E. Another monthly publication, Mind and Body, published in WI had apparently started in March 1894. Gulick and others on the advisory board were frequent contributors to both publications and may explain why Physical Education was no longer in circulation.