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ENTER MAEDA:
In 1904, "Judo's founder Jigoro Kano sent one of his strongest young judoka, Mitsuyo Maeda (1880-1941) with Jojiro Tomita to the White House to assist in a judo demonstration for President Teddy Roosevelt. After a formal demonstration, an American football player in the audience issued an impromptu challenge." The less adept Tomita took to the floor instead of Maeda. "Tomita failed with a throw and was pinned helplessly beneath the football player's bulk. Maeda, abashed by Tomita's poor showing and frantic to reassert the superiority of Kodokan Judo,stayed on. He persuaded some Japanese businessmen to stake him $1,000 in prize money and embarked on a long career of challenging all comers throughout North and South America. The 5'5'', 154-pound Maeda was said to have 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 settled he was feted as Conte Comte ("Count Combat") and his savage system of fighting, now called 'Gracie Jujutsu,' is employed by certain fighters in present-day 'no-holds-barred' professional matches."
According to a Japanese martial arts magazine called GONG Fighting Technique:
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.
Maeda was a small man, 164 cm, 70 kilo. He had very good balance. He was very persistant and never gave up on anything. When he was a boy, he learned Tenshin (Tenshin Shin'yo)Jiu-Jitsu and went to Tokyo Senmon School, and practiced his techniques at the Kodokan.
Maeda as a young man.
Maeda opened up dojos in northeastern US, but he and his fellow judo players actually had a difficult time attracting students since at the time, judo was not popularly known in the US. He actually had a wrestling/judo match with a Brooklyn, New York wrestler nicknamed "Butcherboy" that took place in the Catskills, New York. Maeda defeated the wrestler and relied on such matches as a display of the efficacy of judo techniques. His victory raised the pride of local Japanese in the area. Eventually he went to Brazil in 1914 or 1915.
Maeda went from the US, Europe, Mexico to Brazil. He taught San Paulo policemen, at an Army college, as well as ordinary citizens. He settled in Belem (Northern Brazil), a port city near the Amazon river in Brazil.
The fighting technique Maeda taught was called Jiu-Jitsu. It was a technique of self-defense he learned from fighting with all kinds of fighters from around the world while he was forbidden to go to the Kodokan. He combined armlocks, "body-pushing" (wrestling?), and he called it Jiu-Jitsu.
Maeda demonstrates a hold.
MAEDA'S TECHNIQUES:
Maeda traveled the world and learned from his experiences and slowly developed his own unique expression of judo. When Kimura encountered Helio Gracie, what he saw reminded him of the earlier judo methods that were rough and tumble. Prewar (prior to WWII) Judo had body locks, leg locks, unusual choking techniques that were discarded because they were not legal in contest judo, which had evolved slowly over the years.
Why did Maeda refer to his fighting style as "Jiu-Jitsu" and not Kodokan Judo? Maeda was expelled from the Kodokan for three years by Jigoro Kano (founder of Kodokan Judo) for fighting professional matches for prize money. It would of been in Maeda's own interest to refer to his fighting style as "Jiu-Jitsu", which is a more general term for such techniques. Second, Maeda was also schooled in Tenshin Jiu-Jitsu before he took up Kodokan Judo and was later exposed to western combative arts. His own personal fighting style would of differed from Kodokan Judo. This is speculation however.
There is a new Japanese biography on his life called:
Raion no yume. Konde Koma, Maeda Mitsuyo den
(A Lion's dream. Count de Koma, Maeda Mitsuyo's biography)
Publisher is Shogakukan.
Author is Kouyama Norio.
Maneuver into Armlock
