VIII. 2 Parkour- history
Georges Hébert
In Western Europe, a forerunner of parkour was French naval officer Georges Hébert, who before World War I promoted athletic skill based on the models of indigenous tribes he had met in Africa. He noted, " their bodies were splendid, flexible, nimble, skillful, enduring, and resistant but yet they had no other tutor in gymnastics but their lives in nature." His rescue efforts during the 1902 eruption of Mount Pelée on Saint-Pierre, Martinique, reinforced his belief that athletic skill must be combined with courage and altruism. Hébert became a physical education tutor at the college of Reims in France. Hébert set up a " méthode naturelle "( natural method) session consisting of ten fundamental groups: walking, running, jumping, quadrupedal movement, climbing, balancing, throwing, lifting, self-defence, swimming. These were intended to develop " the three main forces ": energetic( willpower, courage, coolness, and firmness), moral( benevolence, assistance, honour, and honesty) and physical( muscles and breath). During World War I and World War II, teaching continued to expand, becoming the standard system of French military education and training. Inspired by Hébert, a Swiss architect developed a " parcours du combattant "— military obstacle course— the first of the courses that are now standard in military training and which led to the development of civilian fitness trails and confidence courses.
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