Archive for July, 2007
Jiu-do Book Update
As you may know from reading this blog, Jiu-jutsu or Jiu-do: Selection from Kodokwan Method is the book I am currently working on reprinting. I made a big push this weekend and got my files out, so I’m just waiting on a proof copy now. I thought the cover turned out pretty well and wanted [...]
First Edition! Carnival of Martial Arts #1
I am pleased to welcome you to the first edition of the Carnival of Martial Arts. To avoid playing favorites, the submissions below are presented in the order of receipt.
Jujutsu Humor
The early 1900s newspapers often poked fun at the “jiu-jitsu” invasion. Satirical pieces were written on the convolutions of jiu-jitsu holds, as metaphor for happenings in the Russo-Japanese war, and, of course, comparing jiu-jitsu to good old-fashioned wrestling.
The couple lines below will be appreciated by the grapplers who have seen the endless debates over the [...]
Paper Bludgeon: the Millwall Brick
The other day I read a post on Boing Boing about constructing the Millwall Brick, which is the first I had heard of it. The Millwall (or Chelsea) Brick is an improvised weapon constructed out of rolled and folded newspaper.
The history behind the Milwall Brick is that football (soccer) hooligans, frisked at the gates, were [...]
Knife Fighting Instruction
MacHeath had a jackknife, which he kept out of sight, and used almost poetically if Bobby Darin’s description is any indication. Jim Croce gave Bad Bad Leroy Brown a .32 gun in his pocket for fun and a razor in his shoe, and he didn’t specify what Big Jim Walker carried, but a knife sounds [...]
Test Pic from Jiudo
The image manipulation has been a difficult process with the Jiudo reprint, but I’ve finally made some headway. The difficulty was in preserving the excellent original line drawings without carrying along a big white box of empty space around them. I’ve learned this is called “transparency” in the image editing field. The other benefit was [...]
Butting in the Revolutionary War
For Independence Day, I thought the following account would be an appropriate choice. It is an excerpt from a butting article I am working on (I have collected dozens of these types of accounts) that took place during the Revolutionary War. Butting, in its broadest sense, was headbutting. It was predominantly practiced by African-Americans, and [...]
William Ewart Fairbairn: The Legendary Instructor
Combatives researcher Phil Mathews has put together another excellent biographical article on yet another combatives pioneer. This time the subject is none other than William Ewart Fairbairn, possibly the biggest name in the field.
Fairbairn spent time in the Royal Marines in the 1900s, the Shanghai Municipal Police in the 1920s, then taught combatives at Camp [...]
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