Gymnastic wall bars (also known as a gymnastic ladder, Swedish ladder, Swedish wall or as stall bars) were invented at the beginning of the 19th century by the Swedish teacher Per Henrik Ling who, when suffering from arthritis, realized the therapeutic potential of wall-bars exercise. With the support of the Swedish king, Ling founded The Royal Institute for Gymnastics, where he taught gymnastics as an art, which later became the working system across all of Europe. He later invented the . With the arrival of immigrants in America, the wall bars were quickly adopted in the USA.