Article originally published in the Nouvelles du Cercle vaudois de généalogie (No. 121, May 2025). Written by Pierre-Yves Pièce, editor, in collaboration with Roger Rosset.
English translation provided with the author’s written authorization.
Special thanks to Michel Raynaud, President of the Fédération Française d’Haltérophilie – Musculation (FFHM), for sharing this article to EWF for publication.
Original publication text can be found bellow.
Jules Auguste Rosset (1879 – 1973): A Vaudois of weight!
Roger Rosset, our member and former State Archivist of Geneva, made a significant revelation to us shortly before the 2025 General Assembly held at the Château de Nyon: Jules Auguste Rosset,originally from Bougy-Villars (VD), is the father of the French Weightlifting Federation (FFPH),founded on March 23, 1914! Jules Rosset, described as an excellent wrestler and weightlifter,presided over this Federation until 1923. Very quickly, he proposed to Baron Pierre de Coubertinto officially include Weightlifting in the Olympic Games.
This discipline, which was included in the Intercalary Olympic Games held in Greece in 1906, nevertheless aroused some reluctance. But thanks to the support of François Étienne Reichel, known as Frantz Reichel, secretary general of the National Sports Committee and the French Olympic Committee, weightlifting was included in the program of the 1916 Olympic Games. With the outbreak of the First World War, it was not until the Antwerp Games of 1920 that weightlifters entered the competition. Rosset then took advantage of this opportunity to found the International Weightlifting Federation (FIH / IWF), which he presided over from 1920 to 1937, and again from 1946 to 1952.
Thanks to his tenacity, Jules Rosset finally managed to have the sport of weightlifting permanently included in the Olympic Games program at the International Congress in Prague in 1925. The required movements were reduced to three two-armed bar exercises, and one-armed figures were banned, as they “harmed the athletes’ aesthetics” and” left room for an element of acrobatics that did not seem desirable. ” Rosset still imposed a limit of three attempts per exercise, with a ban on downgrading in weights. Note: Some of the information is taken from Modern Weightlifting, No. 295, April 1973.
The family of Jules Auguste Rosset
Jules Auguste Rosset, son of Auguste-François Rosset (1854-1917) and Mathilde Boccard (o 1853 in Annemasse, France), was born on 1 January 1879 in Plainpalais (Geneva). First a gardener, then a butcher, he became famous thanks to weightlifting. He married Louise Marie Marin (born 1868) on December 24, 1904 in Paris. Jules Auguste was 25 years old and his wife was 36. On November 30, 1972, at the age of 93 (! ), he married in Paris 12ewith Bernadette Marie Victorine Chabin (1914-1984).
His new wife was 58 years old, retired from the SNCF, and divorced from François Marie Voland since September 12, 1953. Their union lasted only 3 months: Jules Auguste Rosset died on March 18, 1973, at 8 p.m. at the age of 94, at the number 43 Boulevard de Picpus in Paris. Jules Auguste Rosset does not appear to have had any descendants, but he had a younger brother, Marc François Rosset, born in 1880.
Thanks to Roger Rosset for this interesting information on this illustrious Vaudois… little-known in his native canton!
