S.G.M. ED PARKER

Edmund Kealoha Parker (March 19, 1931–December 15, 1990) was an American martial artist, promoter, teacher, and author.

Parker was born in Hawaii and raised a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.^[1] He began his training in the martial arts at a young age in judo^[2] and later boxing. Some time in the 1940s, Ed Parker was first introduced to Kenpo by Frank Chow. Frank Chow introduced Ed Parker to William Chow, with whom Parker trained while serving in the Coast Guard and attending Brigham Young University. In 1953 he was promoted to the rank of black belt.

Parker opened the first commercial karate school in the western United States in Provo Utah in 1954.^[3] By 1956, Parker opened his Dojo in Pasadena, California. His first black belt student was Charles Beeder. There is controversy over whether Beeder received the first black belt awarded by Parker.^[4] The other black belts in chronological order up to 1962 were: James Ibrao, Rich Montgomery, Rick Flores, Al and Jim Tracy of Tracy Kenpo, Chuck Sullivan, John McSweeney, and Dave Hebler.^[5] In 1962, John McSweeney opened a school in Ireland, which prompted Parker to change the name of his organization from the Kenpo Karate Association of America to the International Kenpo Karate Association.

Parker was well known for his business creativity. He helped many martial artists to open their dojos. He was also well known in Hollywood where he trained a great many stunt men and celebrities; most notable was Elvis Presley, to whom he awarded a black belt Kenpo. He also left behind a few grand masters who are know around the world to this day such as Frank Trejo who runs a school in California.^[6] He also helped Bruce Lee gain national attention by introducing him at his International Karate Championships. He served as Elvis Presley's bodyguard during the singer's final years, did movie stunt-work and acting, and was one of the Kenpo instructors of martial arts action movie actor Jeff Speakman. He is best known to Kenpoists as the founder of American Kenpo and is referred to fondly as the "Father of American Karate". He is formally referred to as Senior Grand Master of American Kenpo.

Parker had a minor career as a Hollywood actor and stunt man. His most notable film was Kill the Golden Goose.^[7] In this film, he co-stars with Hapkido master Bong Soo Han. His acting work included the (uncredited) role of Mr. Chong in student^[8] Blake Edwards' Revenge of the Pink Panther.^[9]

Edmund K. Parker died in Honolulu of a heart attack on December 15, 1990. His widow Leilani Parker died on June 12, 2006. Of their four surviving children, only his son, Ed Parker Jr., remains active in the system his father created.

AMERICAN KENPO

The modern history of American Kenpo began in the 1940s, when Great Grandmaster James M. Mitose (1916-1981) started teaching his ancestral Japanese martial art, Kosho-Ryu Kenpo, in Hawaii. Mitose's art, later called Kenpo Jiu-Jitsu, emphasizes punching, striking, kicking, locking, and throwing. Mitose's art was very linear, lacking the circular motions in American Kenpo.

William K. S. Chow studied Kenpo under James Mitose, eventually earning a first-degree black belt. Chow began teaching an art, which he called Kenpo Karate, that blended the circular movements he had learned from his father with the system he had learned from Mitose. Chow experimented and modified his art, adapting it to meet the needs of American students.

Ed Parker learned Kenpo Karate from William Chow,and according to Al Tracy, eventually earning a sandan (3rd-degree black belt) in December 1961.

The system known as American Kenpo was developed by Ed Parker as a successor to Chow's art. Parker revised older methods to work in modern day fighting scenarios. He heavily restructured American Kenpo's forms and techniques during this period. He moved away from methods that were recognizably descended from other arts and established a more definitive relationship between forms and the self-defense technique curriculum of American Kenpo.

Parker began codifiying his early understandings of Chinese Kenpo into a distinct and evolving personal interpretation of the art. Here he dropped all Asian language elements and many traditions in favor of American English. During this period, he de-emphasized techniques and principles organized in the same manner as in Chinese and Japanese arts in favor of his own curriculum of forms and techniques. Parker took his art through continual changes. Parker always suggested that once a student learns the lesson embodied in the "ideal phase" of the technique he should search for some aspect that can be tailored to his own personal needs and strengths. Furthermore, Parker's students learned a different curriculum depending on when they studied with him. Some students preferred older material to newer material, wanted to maintain older material that Parker intended to replace, or wanted to supplement the kenpo they learned from a particular period with other martial arts training.

One of the best-known students of Ed Parker is Elvis Presley.

Within American Kenpo there is a basic belt system consisting of White, Yellow, Orange, Purple, Blue, Green, Third Brown, Second Brown, First Brown, and First through Tenth Black. Different organizations have different belt systems, for example the WKKA (World Kempo Karate Association) includes an "advanced" rank for each belt signified by a stripe of the next full belt's color worn on one end of the belt. and also includes a 3 degree Red belt prior to first degree black. The black belt ranks are indicated by half-inch red 'strips' up to the 4th degree, then a 5 inch 'block' is for 5th. Thereafter, additional half-inch stripes are added up to the 9th degree. For 10th degree black belt, two 5 inch 'blocks' separated by a half-inch space are used.