Mitsuyo Maeda :: essays research papers

Mitsuyo MaedaIn 1904, "Judos founder Jigoro Kano sent one of his strongest immature judoka, Mitsuyo Maeda (1880-1941) with Jojiro Tomita to the White House to assist in a judo demonstration for chairperson Teddy Roosevelt. After a formal demonstration, an American football player in the audience issued an impromptu argufy." The less adept Tomita took to the floor kinda of Maeda. "Tomita failed with a throw and was pinned helplessly beneath the football players bulk. Maeda, abashed by Tomitas poor showing and frantic to reassert the superiority of Kodokan Judo, stayed on. He persuaded around Japanese businessmen to stake him $1,000 in prize money and embarked on a long career of challenging all comers throughout mating and South America. The 55, 154-pound Maeda was said to get to engaged in over 1,000 challenge matches, never once losing a judo-style competition and only once or twice suffering defeat as a professional wrestler. In Brazil, where he eventually settl ed he was feted as Conte Comte ("Count conflict") and his savage system of fighting, now called Gracie Jujutsu, is employed by certain fighters in present-day no-holds-barred professional matches." 1B I O G R A P H Y It was Maeda who brought Jiu-Jitsu to Brazil. As a member of the Kodokan, Maeda went to America with his kohai Satake, etc. as Judo ambassadors. He was said to have fought more than 100 fights and in Spanish-speaking countries in Latin America, he was respected as Count Koma (Conde Koma). Maeda was born in Aomori Prefecture in 1878. When he was a boy, he learned Tenshin (Tenshin Shinyo) Jiu-Jitsu. He moved to Tokyo when he was about 18 and went to Tokyo Senmon School. He began practicing Judo and a record of him unveiling the Kodokan is dated 1897. He was very persistant and never gave up on anything. He was naturaly talented in judo and rose through the ranks quickly to establish himself as the most promising young judoka in the Kodokan. Maeda was a small military personnel at 164 cm, 70 kilo.In 1904, he travelled to the U.S. with one of his instructors, Tsunejiro Tomita. The starting time and only place they demonstrated judo together was at the U.S. Army honorary society in West Point. Contrary to what has been published, they never went to the White House to playact the President, Teddy Roosevelt. It was the Kodokan great, Yoshitsugu Yamashita who taught Roosevelt judo at the White House and later engaged in a match with a wrestler nearly twice his coat at Roosevelts request, which took place at the U.