These novitiates usually know little or nothing about mine or the sport's past. My early interest in weights extended beyond bodybuilding to Olympic lifting and powerlifting. My home town, Ephrata, along with the rest of the state of Pennsylvania, was highly influenced by the fact that the Father of American Weightlifting, Bob Hoffman, operated out of York, which is only 30 miles from my hometown. Then there were Terry Todd and Ernie Puckett, the first official champs in organized powerlifting training on the bench press, squat and deadlift. By the way, Dave, I also got to see and talk to John Grimek on a number of occasions.
Iconoclast means image-breaker.
I discarded that junk almost immediately. And I've never sacrificed my view of the truth. No, not a blind rebel, but a radical for the truth. The first many years, Joe and I got along extremely well. Joe had a love for knowledge and philosophy, similar to mine at the time.