Who has done the most for Martial Arts in the United States?

47MartialMan said:
Are we talking about personal inspiration or deserved recognition on a internationa; scale? :)
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Here is what was in the original post: (see below)
Dragon Fist said:
Hello everyone,

With your help, I would like to know who the general Martial Artist thinks has done the most for his/her art in The United States.
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Here is the original thread.

With your help, I would like to know who the general Martial Artist thinks has done the most for his/her art in The United States.


Here are a couple of Notable Martial Arts Masters in no particular order.

Bruce Lee
1940 - 1973 Jeet Kune Do

James Mitose
1915 - 1981 Kosho Ryu Kempo

Robert Trias
1923 - 1989 American Karate

Remy Presas
1936 - 2001 Modern Arnis

Angel Cabales
1917 - 1991 Eskrima

Yip Man
1893 - 1972 Wing Chun

Morihei Ueshiba
1883 - 1969 Aikido

Jigoro Kano
1860 - 1938 Founder of Judo

Gichin Funakoshi
1868 - 1957 Shotokan

General Choi Hong Hi
Founder of Tae Kwon Do

Ed Parker Sr.
Founder of American Kenpo Karate

Al Tracy
Founder of Tracy’s International Studios of Self Defense

Hanshi Bruce Juchnik
22nd Inheritor Kosho Shorei Ryu Kempo

Now I know that there are allot more names that I could have added to this list, I just had to narrow it down.

I hope to not offend anyone.

Thanks,
 
Forgot to mention
Chin Siu Dek aka Jimmy H. Woo
founder of the ancient Chinese art of "Tsoi-Li-Ho-Fut-Hung.
Known today as San Soo Gung Fu
 
The most over looked person of all, our great "American Student". Without them all of the great names would be unknowns. Lets honor them for a change.:supcool:
 
Bruce not only helped advance the art for the artists by presenting a seldom-heard perspective but he also was instrumental in bringing martial arts into the mainstream American culture.
 
Well inOlympic style TKD it would be Steven Lopez and his family, they are at the forfront of the sport over the last ten years.
Terry
 
Bruce Lee, Pat (Mr. Miyagi) Morita (r.i.p.), Ralph (Danielsan) Macchio, and Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donateelo, and Raphael :"The Ninja Turtles", and the Power Rangers.

I say them because they were the primary "Martial Art School Fillers" from the 60', 70's, 80's and 90's. They caused the largest interest in the arts, whch has fueled the schools and styles here, and their propogation.
 
President Teddy Roosevelt had a brown belt in Judo and helped to bring the art to the USA.
 
There are several names that most will know of. But to me any instructor that offered or now offers M/A training so the people who seek it out can learn. Some of the past names mentioned deserve credit because they helped bring exposer at a time when less new or heard much about M/A arts. But the names now and in the future are those instructors passing on there knowledge I will say perhaps hollywood made M/A more popular then any one person ever did. We all have seen a movie watched TV exposer is the true answer. Your city schools still give that.
 
um...the students

without whom the martial arts would be dead, dead, dead. nobody to support the industry, nobody to carry on the knowledge, nobody to stroke the egos of everybody who's been named so far.

without students to fill the classes, martial arts would be nowhere.

the students have done the most for martial arts in america.
 
For the record: I believe the best teachers are from people you won't see in Black Belt Magazine, MMA Fighter, Inside Kung Fu, or Tae kwon Do times. They are normal folks that bring something extraordinary to the table. These people inspire the students to strive and do better. However, the best leaders have a way of promoting self motivation. By this I mean the student strives to be better and learns well, the teacher is just there to instruct and nurture.


Choi, Young Sool - hapkido, without him there would have not been a Bong Soo Han or Ji, Han Jae, or Won-Kwang Wha. They have done a lot to promote hapkido.

Ueshiba and Seagal for Aikido.

Gen. Choi for Tae Kwon Do, Ernie Reyes Sr. and Jr. have done a great deal as has Jhoon and Phillip Rhee to promote TKD.

Jeff Speakman for Kenpo

I will put Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Bruce Lee, and Chuck Norris together. They all are actors that brought the martial arts into the forefront.

Van Damme for Shotkan. For better or worse these people have been in the public eye and for better or worse they have been good for the martial arts business.
 
I can't think of anyone who even comes close to Bruce Lee.

Before him, there were only a very few people teaching Chinese Martial arts to non-Chinese in America... after him, almost all the schools opened up. His intro letters of westerners opened the doors of Hong Kong to several non-Chinese in a way that they had never before been.

I remember hearing about a guy teaching CMA in New Jersey before Lee. He was writing that when he heard Lee had been allowed to teach westerners, he got the courage to write to his teacher, cite the preceedent and begin doing the same.

I read a book on NHB (the old name for MMA) and read that the author, in the course of intervewing dozens of MMAists, hadn't found even one who, when asked, didn't think of Bruce Lee as an inspiration either in the past or in the present.

It was Bruce Lee who really lauched the idea of mixing modern western sports science (powerlifting, heavy bag, muscle recovery theories etc.) with Eastern martial arts... its hard to believe that so few did it before him. I have read about karate teachers only buying boxing heavy bags after seeing Bruce Lee doing kung fu on one... they didn't think it was compatable with TMA.

Much of the mutual respect between eastern and western martial arts actually comes from Bruce Lee and Gene Lebell. They were able to beat WMA using Western modified Eastern methods and then be sufficiently gracious in victory that it spawned a peace that still more or less endures. I have seen the scans of the sorts of stuff Eastern TMAists and WMAists were saying about each other from the fourties to the early seventies - when it really stopped being so prevalent.

What about the idea of using pylometrics in MA training? Bruce Lee was very possibly the first to ever do so in MA ... he did before the US Olympic track team had put it into practice after picking it up from the Soviets. His popularization of the method launched it in the MA world.

His mantra "seek the truth in combat" inspired generations of hardcore fighters who took what worked for them... and spawned the MMA revolution.

Then there is the matter of the entire art of JKD - which owes its existance to him.

Also, Lee is often considered (although I think he would have disagreed) the father of "RB"SD - the books published after his death that depict individual, very simple, gross motor techniques outside of any systematic organization are sometimes believed to have launched the RBSD movement.

Lastly, his high-profile publicity aided in publicising the martial arts.
 
Pop-culture has done much to promote the martial arts in the United States. Without pop-culture we wouldn't have gems like: karate chop, judo kick, numbchucks, and kung fu fighting.

Pop-culture allowed the arts to become mainstream. I can remember as a child, I had friends who trained and they were instructed by their parents not to tell anyone. Now when you drive around any town, you see the evidence of the martial arts proudly displayed on the back window of minivans and SUV's.

So my vote for who has done the most of MA in the USA is pop-culture.
 
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