 Last week, we took a look at the origin of American Kempo Karate that included the summary of how senior Grandmaster Ed Parker took Chinese and Japanese influences, modified them heavily, and developed his own system of self-defense. So let's take a tour of some of the larger variations of the art and examine the evolution of American Kempo Karate. In the previous video, we took a look at the origin of American Kempo and how Ed Parker learned a system of self-defense and then modified it to address American street fighting. I encourage watching that episode first if you haven't already and there is a link in the description below. In this episode, we're going to build on that and take a look at this young system and how it evolved over the past 60 years. Now, as I've said in previous videos, American Kempo has a very fractured community. There is a great divide between different organizations which often result in some nasty politics. Many of those politics and disagreements stem from the changes in the system we're going to be going over today. Now with that being said, the intention of this video is not to take any sides, discuss those politics, or to point any fingers at who may or may not be doing Kempo correctly. Our goal today is to explore the system of American Kempo and the stages it developed over the life of Ed Parker and some of the directions it has branched off to today. To summarize, a man by the name of James Mitosi brought his family's customized style of Karate from Japan to Hawaii where one of his top students, William K. S. Chow, took it, blended it with his family's Chinese art background and created what he called Karahou Kempo. Hawaiian-born Edmund K. Parker trained hard under Chow and with his blessing took this system and over his lifetime modified it into a systematic art, emphasizing a scientific mindset and teaching it as a study of body mechanics. Mr. Parker was like a bigger-than-life person, his energy. I don't know if you've ever been in the same room as him, but when he walked into the room it was like just an energy that you can't describe. You knew that there was something special about him that you didn't want to test or try. I actually have felt him do some stuff on me and even as he got into his later 50s and close to his passing he was still moving pretty good. He still moves very fast, very powerful, very explosive. It was impressive to see. It was scary to be on the other end of it, hoping that he was going to have good control because things were coming at you fast and hard. American Kempo teaches its students an array of basics, which includes strikes and maneuvers as well as a whole curriculum of principles and laws of motion. These principles are then put into a series of example self-defense sequences. Katas, or forms, are also taught to teach a student a deeper study of those principles and how the mechanics of the system can flow together. These principles, along with extensive sparring and freestyle tactics, create an extremely robust self-defense system. But he had been in quite a few street altercations that he could kind of see what worked, what didn't work. So it was cool to know that it was a battle-tested art. It wasn't just something that was given to him and said, do this and this is why. Ed Parker also believed in allowing his students to adapt the art for themselves and encouraged open thinking and contributions to the system as long as they adhere to the underlying principles. What he wanted to tell people is, no matter how you look at things, you're going to find your strong points. I don't want to say it's complex, but it is sophisticated to the point where it's not an ordinary practice because Ed Parker knew that some of the components of what we taught were going to be situations against a skilled fighter, not just someone who's just throwing a punch kick or coming up on you. And he also wanted you to find solutions. This opened the door for Kempo to become an organic community art. As a fun side note, for those of you who are familiar with Adriano and Burato, he and his brother Joe were both top students under William Chow at the time Ed Parker began to train with them. Adriano would later go on to become one of the founders of Kajugenbo, a martial art with a mixture of karate, judo and jujitsu, Kempo, and boxing. Although it took a very different path than Ed Parker did, it's interesting to think of how many arts today stem from the same roots. Ed Parker began teaching at Brigham Young University and eventually opened up his first Kempo school in 1956 in Pasadena, California. The Kempo he taught at this time was to ride from the system he had learned from Chow. Chow had also taught him advanced motion and Ed Parker took this information and began to restructure the art. He modified techniques, made additions, and deleted anything he felt was obsolete. Students were encouraged to ask questions and he would modify the art based on his own experiences and that of a student. To Ed Parker, understanding why a technique was used was just as important as learning how to perform it. Based on the fact that we are allowed to question our instructor, and growing up when I was doing traditional karate and taekwondo, and I used to hear people say, you know, when my instructor used to say, jump, you say, how high? I said, that's a lie. I said, when my instructor said jump, I jump. If you wanted me to go higher, he'd say it higher. You never questioned your instructor. I said, one of the first things I learned in American Kempo was to ask questions. You know, you need to know the why. Why are you doing this? Why would we do that instead of this? And that to me is superior because understanding it makes it so much easier for you to relate to it. In 1960, he released a book called Kempo Karate, Law of the Fist and the Empty Hand. This book was a fantastic guide for those training in the art at the time. It is loaded with instruction on traditions and etiquette, conditioning drills both mental and physical, the study of human anatomy, basic strikes, and his entire curriculum of self-defense techniques. It is interesting to note that throughout this entire book, he refers to the system as Kempo Karate, not yet calling it American Kempo. As the system grew through the years, it was referred to by many names, such as Original Kempo, Traditional Kempo, Chinese Kempo, Ed Parkers Kempo, and eventually American Kempo. Some of the distinct features of this version of Kempo that differ from today are the belt ranks and the organization of self-defense techniques. In this curriculum, there were only three belt colors, white, brown, and black. White belts received brown stripes during promotion, brown belts received black stripes, and black belts received red stripes, which red often represents the color of mastery. Ed Parker also created the KKAA, or the Kempo Karate Association of America, as well as starting the Long Beach International Karate Championships in 1964. This event drew martial artists from all over the world and still exists today. The emblem for the IKC can be seen in full color, representing all the belt colors of Kempo Karate at that time. The self-defense portion was composed of 62 techniques grouped together based on the attacks, such as tackles, grabs, punches, weapon attacks, and so on. This would be the basis of what would become the Web of Knowledge, or the way techniques would be categorized based upon the way a person was attacked. Each technique was broken up into modular steps and were simply referred to as 32A, 32B, 32C, and so on. As Ed Parker's system of self-defense grew, he wanted to spread out and open more schools and introduce Kempo Karate to more of the American population. In doing so, however, he understood that the system would need to be modified and he wanted to put together on paper a standard curriculum that would be taught at each Kempo school, keeping dojos unified and the quality of teaching consistent. Now, here is where the first major split of American Kempo occurred and also the source of much of the bad blood and politics that still linger today. Two of Mr. Parker's senior students were Al and Jim Tracy. Much of what occurred between them is subject for debate with accusations on both sides and stemming to some of the ugliest Kempo politics that still remain. Regardless of what happened, the Tracy brothers did not want to go the same path as Ed Parker and they parted ways. Al Tracy led the family in their own Kempo schools based heavily on the art they learned from Ed Parker. They kept many of the traditions and structure of the system as they grew and opened a very successful chain of schools that can still be found across the country today. Ed Parker dropped the modular breakdown, eventually creating fuller and longer defense sequences while the Tracy's kept the shorter combinations. If I was teaching like five swords, I'd go, okay, this is called Technique One block drop. Technique Two, Technique Three. So you had A, B, C, D, all this alphabet breakdown which we went into base technique and then the extension. So there wasn't more techniques. They just broke down more and named them with letter attachment. The Tracy system of Kempo is one of the most widely known sister schools today with a successful competitive history and widespread reach across America. It is also generally accepted that the Tracy's took over the KKAA while Ed Parker created the International Kempo Karate Association during his effort to spread his art overseas. The two styles continued to diverge as Ed Parker continued to modify and change the system while the Tracy's embraced what they call original Kempo and claim a closer tradition to William Chow. In any case, despite any he-said-she-said sentiments, it is unfortunate that the animosity remains today. On October 31st, 2017, great-grandmaster Al Tracy passed away. Both families have lost a father and perhaps one day the anger can be put aside and new allegiance is formed. I think we have to praise them for really getting out out there in the beginning with the franchises. Ed Parker defined his system differently when he was starting a blueprint in the 50s, the 60s. And it was a fighting system, too, as a lot of it was on fighting. Mr. Tracy passed away recently, so we would only hope that his legacy has passed on through his people as we would with Mr. Parker and those people. As Ed Parker sought to spread his art across the country, he knew he needed a regimented, fully-documented system that could be given to each school to use as their curriculum. With the help of his senior students and his son, Ed Parker put together a series of American Kempo manuals that laid out all the basics, kattas, and techniques to be taught. This first manual was released in 1970 and it bore some major changes from what he taught in the 60s. First, the modular self-defense techniques were dropped in favor of new sequences that would demonstrate how basics and principles worked together. A new lexicon was developed in favor of the previous number system and the terminology and the technique name served as a memorization tool for the practitioner. For example, Talon meant wrist grab and Ram meant a tackle attempt. A technique named obscure wing meant delivering an elbow strike outside of your opponent's peripheral vision. Additionally, Ed Parker added four more belt colors to the rank and divided the 128 defense sequences among them. In order to promote to the next rank, students had to complete 32 self-defense techniques instead of basics and a kata. Once the techniques were completed at Green Belt, the student then had to learn extensions for the first 32 orange belt techniques. This rank was sometimes referred to as green-orange. Upon completion of the extensions, they were promoted to brown belt. And at this point, three katas, known as forms 4, 5 and 6, were required in order to achieve a black belt rank. This system is often referred to as the 32-tec manual, and such manuals are hard to come by today, existing only in the hands of those who received them originally. One of the challenges of the system is that many felt it was a lot of material for students to master at each belt level. This was fine for those who devoted themselves, but as Ed Parker wanted to appeal to a wider population, he noticed that many students were getting discouraged early in their training. He added the rank of yellow belt, which consisted of the first 10 techniques of orange. This allowed the student to get a good taste of the system and achieve their first rank earlier and give them a sense of accomplishment and motivation to go forward. In the early 1980s, Ed Parker released the second manual and the system exploded with new material. Most notably in this version is the distribution of techniques among belt levels. Many schools continued to express concern at the amount of material per belt level. Ed Parker considered dropping the required techniques for per belt from 32 to 16, but decided it was too drastic of a change and he settled on a 24-tec system. Brown belt was divided into three degrees that counted backward, keeping it in line with the Q ranking system of traditional arts. In this new 24-tec system, ranking worked as follows. 10 techniques were required for yellow belt, then 24 for orange, purple, blue, green, third brown, and second brown. As in the first manual, in order to progress from this point, students had to learn extensions of previous techniques. Orange belt extensions for the first degree brown belt, purple extensions for black belt, blue extensions for second degree black belt, and green extensions for third degree black belt. At this point, the student had learned the entire curriculum and further promotion was based on teaching and contribution back into the system. This was a lot of new material that was added to the system. As Ed Parker continued to craft the curriculum, many of his senior students created techniques and caddes and brought them to him, and upon approval, Mr. Parker added them into the system. One of the things he wanted his black belts to do, like us, is always think on our own. Hence why he had some do thesis. He wanted to see how you thought. Some of the things even Ed Parker did, they weren't his. The kicking set wasn't Ed Parker's, that was Mr. Kelly's, that was Seabock Tom Kelly's. The staff set was Mr. Chuck Sullivan's. So he allowed his students to help him for the best interests of all to flourish. You know the bottom line is you only have two hands and two feet. And it's going to be the same in 10 years, in 20 years. Two hands and two feet. What's really going to change or evolve is your thought process. Ed Parker's students all wore white geese, keeping with the traditional karate uniform. In this revision, Mr. Parker added the black key to be awarded to students who had reached their brown belt status. This was to distinguish the instructors from the beginning and intermediate levels. Today, this black key has become synonymously known with the American Kempo system. Some schools keep with the black and white tradition while others make black uniforms their standard throughout all ranks. Belt knot placement was also to be placed on the left for males and on the right for females. This was a nod to the Chinese idea of chi, being stronger on the left for men and stronger on the right for women. Only instructors were allowed to wear their belt knot in the center, representing a balance of energy. This version of American Kempo became deeply rooted and is probably the most common curriculum the system had. In the late 1980s, a third and final Kempo manual emerged of Ed Parker's American Kempo system. This third manual featured the 16 technique system that Mr. Parker had considered earlier. This new manual was very similar to the previous 24 system, with the main difference line in the distribution of techniques. In this curriculum, 10 techniques were required for yellow, then 16 for orange, purple, blue and green, and then 20 techniques with three levels of brown and first-degree black belt. This time, the previous required extensions were put into place for promotion to second, third, fourth and fifth-degree black belt, with further promotion coming with time and contribution into the system. Ed Parker passed away on December 15, 1990, right as his manual began distribution. Many schools adopted it, while others stuck with the previous manual. With Mr. Parker's passing, a major hole occurred in the American Kempo community. He had not appointed a successor and a power vacuum occurred with many senior belts stepping up to lead the system. It was kind of sad to me how when he passed away, the organization splintered off and created their own organizations, and everyone was kind of doing their own thing, and it really just created a void of any one person in leadership and created probably six or seven or eight different Kempo organizations that it's still kind of that way now. As Mr. Parker had continuously changed his system throughout his life, each generation of black belts were positioned in the others. Everyone feels like their way is the best way, and there's a lot of criticism of, you know, well, I'm with so-and-so, he does it this way. That's how it should be done, not this way. So there's a lot of that, a lot of, well, you're doing it wrong, unfortunately. So it's still very fractured and splintered, in my opinion. Other schools took a more extreme turn, and with their experience with Mr. Parker, they put their own spin on it to take Kempo into their own generation and revolution. One of the most offshoots is Kempo Sub-Level 4, created by Dr. Ron Chappelle. Dr. Chappelle took his training with Ed Parker and created a system that focuses on the fine details of human anatomy. The name refers to one of the principles Ed Parker taught, in that there are four ranges in hand-to-hand combat. Out of contact range, within contact range, contact penetration, and contact manipulation. This last range refers to being close enough to your opponent to manipulate their body, and the techniques, throws, takedowns, and control techniques are all done from this range. Dr. Chappelle felt that this fourth range had a sub-level to it. It analyzed the idea that utilizing precision strikes and nerve activations along with structural alignment created enhanced effectiveness, not just for Kempo, but for any close-range art. They're using the delayed sword as a meridian strike from here to here. He just went into the actual infrastructure of the pressure point stuff. And into those pressure points, they were just going into their research. And it's still under research. Jeff Spiekman is one of Mr. Parker's most notable students. He was an ambassador for American Kempo into the film media, and starred in well over a dozen films. There isn't a Kempo student alive who hasn't heard of Mr. Spiekman or his 1991 film, The Perfect Weapon. Jeff Spiekman was a very close student of Mr. Parker, and they were working together while the perfect weapon was in production. Mr. Spiekman has become a well-known figurehead in the American Kempo community, and his organization is home to Jeff Spiekman schools all over the world. He has remained a respectable name in Kempo and has continued to carry on the quality of Mr. Parker's teachings. What might be perhaps his most notable achievement, and definitely one that's become widely known in the martial arts world, is his Kempo 5.0 system. Kempo 5.0 is a radical modification to Ed Parker's Kempo. He drew inspiration for Mr. Parker in taking an art and modifying it in his works. There is no secret that Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu has become widely popular in America and that MMA has taken a firm hold in the sporting world. Explosive techniques, expert takedowns, and a highly effective system of ground fighting has made Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu a formidable art. When Mr. Parker first began to craft American Kempo, boxing and judo were popular arts, and stand-up fighting was the norm. Now while ground fighting and wrestling has been around for centuries, it wasn't until recent years that the great season of other schools brought Jiu-Jitsu to the mainstream classes. Realizing this new trend, Jeff Spiekman sought to create a new version of Kempo that incorporated it. We came here to tell you about Kempo 5.0, a new system of martial arts that incorporates the last generation of Ed Parker's Kempo with mixed martial art fighting in theory. Now many people often ask me, what does the name Kempo 5.0 mean? Now we took a look at the three Kempo manuals that Mr. Parker put out. These manuals are referred to as American Kempo 32, 24, and 16 tech systems, or versions 1, 2, and 3. In the 24 tech manual, or version 2, there was a massive curriculum expansion with many new techniques developed by him and his students. Some of these techniques originated for movements and principles outlined in the katas and were extracted and implemented as self-defense techniques. Kempo katas, or forms, are sequences of techniques in the formation to categorize ideas and demonstrate the flow of movement. The act of creating new techniques from the forms created by one minor side effect. Students were learning forms that had techniques in them that weren't taught until later belt levels. I myself had questioned this in my early training. When learning the kata that had an unfamiliar technique, I was told I would learn that technique in the next belt level or two. In his teachings and continuation of American Kempo, Mr. Speakman created a new manual and restructured the organization of techniques so that they were learned at the same time as the forms. This new manual went out to all Speakman schools burying the words version 4.0 in order to be in a fourth manual. With Kempo 5.0, Mr. Speakman and his top students have crafted a completely modified version of the American Kempo system. The most notable change is the inclusion of ground fighting. Take downs, locks, submissions, chokes, and other Brazilian jujitsu techniques are featured in an effort to teach students how to utilize and defend against ground fighting. Additionally, techniques are now organized by what is called combat models, so that techniques that are based off a similar scenario are grouped together and teach variations of a situation. I like where he's going with the grappling. I like the grappling I myself do jujitsu. I'm a blue belt. So I think it was a good idea to incorporate grappling into Kempo. Which I applaud in that he has the courage to say we need to change and we need to do things a little bit differently moving into a more modern society that has this to deal with now. So I tip my hat to him in that way for creating something of his own with a little bit more practicality of learning, not necessarily saying that you want to go to the ground all the time. But God forbid you get taken to the ground it's better to know what you're doing what your opponent is trying to do and then to not have that knowledge. It's still Kempo. So he uses the Kempo upper body entry and then he goes into the grappling stuff. So God bless him. And anybody like Jeff or anyone who's out there keeping the torch burning and carrying on the flame to the generations to come, I applaud them. Mr. Speakman is also a firm believer that a student needs extensive sparring and fighting experience in order to make their self-defense effective. Part of Kempo 5.0 is a rigorous freestyle program called the 5.0 Fighter and has students spar in a complete fight from stand up all the way down to the ground and into chokes and submissions. With the heavy blend of traditional Ed Parker Kempo, ground fighting and freestyle sparring, Jeff Speakman's Kempo 5.0 is a very dynamic and not the only one making the change as many schools across America are now teaching their own blend of Kempo and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. I have had the fortune of being able to train in a variety of Kempo that includes Tracy Kempo, traditional Ed Parker Kempo, Jeff Speakman's Kempo 4.0 and 5.0 system, as well as a customized Kempo Brazilian Jiu Jitsu hybrid curriculum. They all have something wonderful to offer and have a rich history that continues to grow today. Hopefully one day the different Kempo organizations will take this slide and come together again to take Ed Parker's signs of motion to new and exciting levels. Again, one of the things that I'd like to see in the future would be a unified Kempo. You know, where we're all together working towards the same goals, regardless of how many people do things differently. So those are a few of the stages we've seen in the evolution of American Kempo. I've experienced a few of them firsthand. Interestingly enough, one observation stood out to me and helped me establish my own personal training path. Now, while the curriculums and the techniques wildly varied from school to school, most of the time the underlying principles and laws remained. This really helped me understand just how pliable Kempo really is and as long as you preserve the foundational ideas of the system, then you can have a thousand different versions of the art. So I would really like to hear from those of you who have experienced different versions of American Kempo or any Kempo for that matter. Now I hope you've enjoyed this video of how communities grow by subscribing and sharing with each other. Thank you so much for watching.