# Help on Chow Research



## Mattattack (Mar 13, 2018)

Hello all,

I'm doing some Kenpo Karate lineage research and I'm posting this to do a bit of crowdsourcing. I'm hoping some of you can suggest sources on William K.S. Chow. 

Kenpo history is controversial and there is A LOT of contradictory stuff out there, so any primary sources/documents any of you can point met to would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for your time!


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## Headhunter (Mar 14, 2018)

Lineage facts in kenpo is myths and stories there's no way of knowing any of it


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## Mattattack (Mar 14, 2018)

So I have found out. It's like solving a rubiks cube while wearing oven mitts...in the dark. The best I'm hoping for is secondary sources to compare and suss out what seems plausible. Hence why I'm asking for assistance.


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## Headhunter (Mar 14, 2018)

Mattattack said:


> So I have found out. It's like solving a rubiks cube while wearing oven mitts...in the dark. The best I'm hoping for is secondary sources to compare and suss out what seems plausible. Hence why I'm asking for assistance.


Maybe have a look on kenpotalk and ask around. There's a few guys who students of ed Parker who may know


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## Flying Crane (Mar 14, 2018)

Headhunter said:


> Maybe have a look on kenpotalk and ask around. There's a few guys who students of ed Parker who may know


They might be able to point to people who were students of Chow, who might be available


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## hoshin1600 (Mar 14, 2018)

the greater question is are you prepared for the truth?


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## Mattattack (Mar 14, 2018)

hoshin1600 said:


> the greater question is are you prepared for the truth?



I did research on Mitose before this. Researching my doctoral dissertaiton was less frustrating. Trust me, I'm not going into this with any illusions.


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## hoshin1600 (Mar 14, 2018)

Mattattack said:


> I did research on Mitose before this. Researching my doctoral dissertaiton was less frustrating. Trust me, I'm not going into this with any illusions.


but what if the entire thing was a figment of his imagination and the art came to him from a dream,,,if this is your art will you be ok with that, will you believe it?  will others believe you when you tell them?
as Steven King wrote in Pet Cemetary....."_sometimes dead is better"._ in this case sometimes fiction is better.


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## hoshin1600 (Mar 14, 2018)

i would be interested in your conclusions on Mitose, if your open to share in a PM.


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## Flying Crane (Mar 14, 2018)

hoshin1600 said:


> i would be interested in your conclusions on Mitose, if your open to share in a PM.


Likewise


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## Mattattack (Mar 14, 2018)

hoshin1600 said:


> but what if the entire thing was a figment of his imagination and the art came to him from a dream,,,if this is your art will you be ok with that, will you believe it?  will others believe you when you tell them?
> as Steven King wrote in Pet Cemetary....."_sometimes dead is better"._ in this case sometimes fiction is better.



At some point someone made all of it up. Purity tests lead to frustration. I was OBSESSED with figuring out whether Mitose made it all up or not. I'm less worried about what I'll find out about Chow. The one thing that seems consistent in the stories I have seen of him is that Chow was a tough sonofabitch, and my particular branch has been in the hands of other capable martial artists since then like Adriano Emperado, so I'm not worried about feeling completely invalidated if I find out Chow invented stuff out of thin air.


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## hoshin1600 (Mar 14, 2018)

Mattattack said:


> At some point someone made all of it up. Purity tests lead to frustration.


agreed.  linage and history do not equate quality. sometimes but not always.
but people tend not to like you too much if you burst their bubble.


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## Buka (Mar 14, 2018)

Mattattack said:


> At some point someone made all of it up. Purity tests lead to frustration. I was OBSESSED with figuring out whether Mitose made it all up or not. I'm less worried about what I'll find out about Chow. The one thing that seems consistent in the stories I have seen of him is that Chow was a tough sonofabitch, and my particular branch has been in the hands of other capable martial artists since then like Adriano Emperado, so I'm not worried about feeling completely invalidated if I find out Chow invented stuff out of thin air.



I know a couple of old school Kajukenbo guys out here. Next time I see them I'll see what I can find out.


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## FireWalker (Sep 12, 2018)

well there's the interview in black belt magazine very interesting, where he points out that if you wanna learn his art on the mainland that you go see nick cerio's alot of people are angered at that because they are trying to downplay the chow-cerio connection to fit their own narrative, anyway theres alot of good info in it, here it is : WILLIAM CHOW: The Lost Interview - IronJourney Kenpo


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## Monkey Turned Wolf (Sep 12, 2018)

FireWalker said:


> well there's the interview in black belt magazine very interesting, where he points out that if you wanna learn his art on the mainland that you go see nick cerio's alot of people are angered at that because they are trying to downplay the chow-cerio connection to fit their own narrative, anyway theres alot of good info in it, here it is : WILLIAM CHOW: The Lost Interview - IronJourney Kenpo


I think he was more interested in where Chow/Mitose learned from...which is where all the myth and contradictions come in. If you happen to have any info on that, I would love to hear it.


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## Monkey Turned Wolf (Sep 12, 2018)

@Mattattack any update on your research? If you don't want to share publicly, I would appreciate a pm.


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## punisher73 (Sep 20, 2018)

I tried this a few years back and talked with a couple of guys.  Prof. John Bishop would be your best source of information.  He is kind of the "historian" of much of Kajukenbo and was close to Sijo Emperado.

What I have been able to find out through various sources is that no one really knows who/where Prof. Chow learned .  It is pretty much established that Prof. Chow did NOT learn any kung fu to any degree from his father.  If anything, it might have been how in the US, dads "taught" their kids western boxing.

Prof. Chow's style was very down and dirty.  The person that is teaching it closest to what Prof. Chow actually taught is Bill Chun Jr. (Goshin-Jutsu).  Kara-Ho Kempo is the collaboration of Prof. Chow and Sam Kuoha.  Prof. Chow was near the end of his life and broke, he added more stuff to the system, including jumping and spin kicks from GM Kuoha's TKD training.  While Prof. Chow gave approval of what was added to the system he passed on to Kuoha he did not actually teach that stuff him self.  From documents that people have, Prof. Cerio did NOT spend much time actually training with Prof. Chow.  I believe that is totaled around 2 weeks.  Ralph Castro was another student of Prof. Chow's who started his own style and still teaches and incorporated much of what Prof. Chow taught, although he too added alot more "flash" than Prof. Chow had. 

There are pieces and parts of Prof. Chow's art in Tracy Kenpo and some of Ed Parker's Kenpo (changed alot when adding the chinese influence).  If you want to see what much of what Prof. Chow taught look at Ed Parker's book "Kenpo Karate: Law of the Fist".  It was early kenpo that Parker taught when he first came to the mainland before the other influences and is what he learned from Prof. Chow.  Prof. Chow's approach was to end it very quickly, he did NOT have the long drawn out technique sequences for which kenpo became famous for.

Sorry, one last thing.  It was very hard to get people who actually trained with Prof. Chow to talk about the training with him and what he was like.  They kept very private about it.


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## Doc (Jul 27, 2020)

Dam you.


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## Steve (Jul 27, 2020)

Doc said:


> Dam you.


Everything okay?


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## punisher73 (Aug 10, 2020)

Steve said:


> Everything okay?



It was directed to me.  I stole his thunder.


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## Gentle Fist (Jun 12, 2021)

I almost feel like the true history of kenpo is similar to the rise of Gracie Jiujitsu… 

 A small seed from Kano Jiujitsu (Judo) was left in the hands of some tough dudes with a thirst to perfect combat and it developed into its own art based on users experience and not so much traditional concepts.  If you look at Gracie Jiujitsu it is apparent that none of the original students got a full grip of judo but rather just the base concepts.  They ran those few concepts into the ground with reps and physical testing against others wanting to fight.

Kenpo seems to be the same way.  Mitose sparked an interest but had limited knowledge in the arts; and people like Chow and those early Hawaiian  students went out and made it evolve through street tested combat.

Maybe I’m way off, but I feel this is more likely than all the mystical connections claimed by many.

Not sure why so many people want the connection to Asia when an art born from the streets of Hawaii could be seen as pure and natural even more so.


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## Doc (Jun 12, 2021)

Gentle Fist said:


> I almost feel like the true history of kenpo is similar to the rise of Gracie Jiujitsu…
> 
> A small seed from Kano Jiujitsu (Judo) was left in the hands of some tough dudes with a thirst to perfect combat and it developed into its own art based on users experience and not so much traditional concepts.  If you look at Gracie Jiujitsu it is apparent that none of the original students got a full grip of judo but rather just the base concepts.  They ran those few concepts into the ground with reps and physical testing against others wanting to fight.
> 
> ...


Not a whole lot to argue about there and it pretty much sums it up. The Kenpo of Hawaii is such a mixture of arts and their influence, depending upon lineage the degree of the various influences may vary. it is no wonder this melting pot of cultures spawned the original mixed martial arts style, Kajukenbo. But let's not completely ignore the dominant Chinese Influence, whether you believe it came from Sifu Chow and teachings from his father or other sources. While I feel that influence seemed to take a back seat to what Henry Okazaki brought to the table, I also know that the Chinese Influence was either added to or was resurgent in Kenpo in the Parker Lineage under Sifu Ark Wong and his senior student Haumea Lefiti, with other influences as well like Jimmy Woo. And while most of that influence was stripped away when Modern Ed Parker's Kenpo Karate was created in the late sixties, there was/is enough "flavor" and references to the Chinese embedded within the framework for those who would have the experiences to explore and find it. And most certainly, while missing to a large extent in Modern Kenpo, it was always quite prominent in Mr. Parker's personal interpretations as he continued to grow and evolve, and it accounts for things he did in his own execution but did not generally teach because the framework he settled on for his business was not generally conducive to its inclusion. But the material lives on in the few he trusted with the information, like his son Edmund K. Parker II.


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