MARILYN SCHNEGGENBURGER

Neighborhood gym

Until six years ago Marilyn Schneggenburger hardly knew what gymnastics was. Then one night she went with her husband to nearby Buffalo to see the Turners Circus, a sort of gymnastic jamboree. It looked like such fun that the Schneggenburgers decided to go to gym class themselves. Within the year, Marilyn was studying gymnastics in earnest. By last spring, at the ripe age (gymnastically speaking) of 28, she had become good enough to enter the Olympic tryouts. Meanwhile, determined that they should get an earlier start than she did, Marilyn began teaching gymnastics to her three young daughters in the backyard at Tonawanda.

"While they worked out with me," says Marilyn, "other kids in the neighborhood would hang over the fence and watch. Pretty soon mothers were asking me if their youngsters couldn't try it, too." Marilyn agreed to start some classes, and to her surprise 70 kids showed up.

"Now," says Marilyn, "the neighbors keep asking me if I'm going to have the class again. I love teaching the kids, so I guess I'll have to."

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