1976-2026: 50 years of European society of biomechanics

Since the European Society of Biomechanics was founded in 1976, we are celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. As part of the celebrations, the Council decided to establish an archive of historical documents to preserve the society's legacy properly. While we collected photos and documents, we took the opportunity to write a brief history of this scientific society. Under the conviction that this little narrative might be of interest to many readers of the Journal of Biomechanics, we proposed to the Editorial Board to publish it as a Letter to the Editor. We begin with a brief history of biomechanics, culminating in the creation of the International Council of Sport and Physical Education Working Group on Biomechanics, from which the International Society of Biomechanics was born in 1973. The scope of this society, focused on the biomechanics of movement, was narrower than the breadth of this emerging scientific domain, as documented by the papers published in the Journal of Biomechanics since 1968. We believe this was the main reason for the establishment of the European Society of Biomechanics (1976) and the American Society of Biomechanics (1977). In the following 50 years, this niche research topic has experienced an explosive growth, and the European Society of Biomechanics has grown from a group of 20 scientists in a room to a modern scientific society with over 1600 members.