The ideas of the Berlin teacher Friedrich Ludwig Jahn (1778-1852) laid the intellectual foundation for the gymnastics movement, and the approval of the Prussian King Friedrich Wilhelm IV ensured that it could be implemented.

Jahn had already formulated the ideas of the gymnastics movement in 1811, but it took some time before the time was ripe. As a result of the Carlsbad Decrees, the gymnastics movement was banned in 1820. The reason for this was the basic national-political attitude of the gymnasts, who not only wrote the slogan "fresh, pious, cheerful, free" on their banners, but also propagated the unity of Germany. On June 6, 1842, Friedrich Wilhelm IV then proclaimed the new doctrine that physical exercise was "a necessary and indispensable part of male education" and should be "included in the circle of national education".

In Wiesbaden, it took another four years before the first gymnastics clubs were founded. In May 1846, 25 young men from Biebrich-Mosbach applied to the Duchy of Nassau state government in Wiesbaden for permission to found a gymnastics club. This permission was granted on 21.07.1846: The Biebrich gymnastics community was born. On 22.06.1846, 120 registered members had already founded the "Wiesbaden Gymnastics Club". Men's gymnastics and fencing were the first disciplines in the later large club, which has played a decisive role in the city's sporting life since 1923 as the "Turn- und Sportverein Eintracht Wiesbaden" and is usually referred to as "Die Eintracht" for short.

Gymnastics clubs were also founded in Erbenheim and Mainz-Kastel in 1846 and in Schierstein in 1848, although it is worth noting that the Kastel club wanted to see itself as a "democratic gymnastics community". It is easy to see from the name that the primary goals of the gymnastics movement in the 19th century were not only physical training, but also comprehensive reforms in the state and society. By practising various disciplines, gymnasts were to be educated to become "all-round educated people with a connection to the nation". In addition to gymnastics on apparatus, Jahn's actual canon also included athletics, swimming, fencing, games and hiking. What was new was that gymnastics was performed in public places.

The first highlight in Wiesbaden's gymnastics history was the flag dedication on 02.05.1847 in the presence of representatives from 20 gymnastics clubs. On April 6, 1848, Jahn also paid a visit to Wiesbaden on his trip along the Rhine. The event was celebrated with a large parade and a festive event at the Hotel Vier Jahreszeiten. In a speech in Biebrich shortly beforehand, Jahn, now a member of the Paulskirchen Assembly, had created a spirit of optimism among his radical-democratic supporters. During the March Revolution of 1848, the gymnasts also took up arms - after the suppression, they were again subjected to repression. A second ban on gymnastics was imposed and the club's activities were suspended for around ten years. It was not until October 1859 that the Wiesbaden Gymnastics Club resumed its activities, and in May 1860 the "Biebrich-Mosbach Gymnastics Club" was re-established. In August 1861, the Kastel gymnastics club was revived, this time without the democratic addition.

Reduced to physical training, gymnastics finally established itself in the state and society in the second half of the 19th century. It was also permitted for women and introduced as a school subject. In 1868, the umbrella organization, the Deutsche Turnerschaft (DT), was founded. With the proclamation of the German Empire in 1871, the gymnasts' wish for national unity was fulfilled. The motives for physical education changed over the decades, as did the framework conditions and club names. As a whole, however, the gymnastics clubs remained an institution.

In the 1860s, the era of "club bureaucracy" began. A fire brigade department, a music corps and finally a gymnastics choral society were founded at the Biebrich gymnastics club. However, internal disputes within the club meant that in 1875 a "men's gymnastics club" entered the scene as a competitor and existed alongside the "gymnastics and fire department club" for almost 20 years before all the Biebrich forces joined forces in 1894 to form the Biebrich Gymnastics Club, which still exists today. The club underpinned its importance as an important local institution by building its own gymnasium, which is still at the heart of club life today.

On a political level, the gymnasts became increasingly supportive of the state during the German Empire. They came to terms with Bismarck's policies and allowed themselves to be instrumentalized by them: In Prussia, gymnastics was reinterpreted as military education. Workers and social democrats were denied access to bourgeois clubs. As a result of this exclusion, workers' gymnastics clubs were formed: the "Freie Turnerschaft" was founded in Wiesbaden in 1896 and "Frisch Auf" was founded in Biebrich in 1902. From the end of the 19th century, women were also allowed to join gymnastics clubs. TV Biebrich made the start in 1896, and shortly afterwards the Wiesbaden gymnastics clubs also accepted female members.

The next breaking point came with the wave of sport coming over from England and America. Competitive contests, the idea of performance and the record principle of sport were alien to the gymnasts. In addition, the increasing internationalization of sport clashed with the national ideals of the gymnasts: sport, especially soccer, which was becoming increasingly popular, was dismissed as "un-German". The disputes ended in a "clean divorce" in the early 1920s: sport and gymnastics were separated from each other.

After the ideological splintering in the Weimar Republic, the so-called "Third Reich" saw the opposite development: the "Gleichschaltung". In the 1930s, the gymnastics club in Kastel was gradually merged with the soccer club, Borussia, and the gymnastics club to form the "Turn- und Sportgemeinschaft 1846". Organized civic sport allowed itself to be taken over by the National Socialists without any significant resistance: The chairman of the Deutsche Turnerschaft, Edmund Neuendorff, wrote to Reich Chancellor Hitler as early as 1933 that the DT would stand shoulder to shoulder with the SA and Stahlhelm. The workers' sports clubs and denominational clubs, on the other hand, were banned. The Kastel gymnasium, clubhouse and sports ground were destroyed in an air raid in 1944, and the other clubs in the town suffered similar damage.

After the Second World War, it was therefore necessary to start again from scratch and improvise. For example, TV Erbenheim (TVE) had to run the 100 m diagonally because the sports field at the waterworks was not long enough. Nevertheless, the TVE organized another Gauturnfest in 1949. The table tennis department continued to play in the pubs. However, the rebuilding after the "Third Reich" and the Second World War was not just about buildings and sports facilities, but also about ideas and goals. After the occupation of Wiesbaden by American troops in March 1945, the military government initially banned all gymnastics and sports clubs. Most of the halls were confiscated, provided they had not been destroyed. The clubs had to reapply for a license and then prove their worth.

Non-profit status and a democratic basic order were the pillars of club life in the Federal Republic. In the 1960s, the "Memorandum on the Golden Plan for Health, Play and Recreation", or "Golden Plan" for short, formed the central task in German sport. The German Olympic Society had identified a public investment requirement of over six billion DM for the creation of recreational, play and sports facilities. After 15 years, the plan was almost fully implemented; halls and sports grounds were built throughout the country, including Wiesbaden.

Today, the popular sports statistics of the city of Wiesbaden show that gymnastics is still the number one sport, albeit in a completely new direction. In 2008, a total of 67,800 people in Wiesbaden were members of sports or gymnastics clubs. Of the 114 sports offered by 219 clubs, gymnastics is the largest, with 18,696 members. However, the canon no longer has much to do with the strict Jahnian gymnastics of the past: gymnastics, dance training and back training have largely replaced competitive apparatus gymnastics everywhere. This development is symptomatic of the entire modern gymnastics movement. If you want to promote gymnastics, sport or exercise in general, you have to be open to new developments, is the motto.

A major challenge in the 21st century will be whether the gymnastics club will have to see itself more as a service organization today and in the future in view of the increased demands placed on exercise classes and its coaches, while at the same time the loyalty of its members is decreasing. The question also arises as to how it can maintain or even strengthen voluntary work as the basis of its club activities in times of extreme social differentiation, globalization and changing leisure behavior.