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kenjgood
3rd February 2001, 08:45
I hope I posted this in the correct forum.

Years ago when I first started training, my teacher said that Moses Powell was his teacher in New York.

Anybody have any information on or personal experience with Moses Powell?

I saw a brief clip of him on a video when he was younger.
Demonstrating falls, takedowns and other techniques of a system I belive he developed and called "Tijitsuki".

I found the following website references:

http://www.hillsidejiujitsu.com/

&

http://www.espytv.com/sanuces.htm

Thank you in advance.

Steve Delaney
3rd February 2001, 15:06
What's with those funky Hakama??

Neil Hawkins
4th February 2001, 06:20
G'Day Ken

Can't offer much I'm afraid, but I do know that Moses Powell was a student of Florendo Vistacion (Professor Vee) in New York during the 70's. He is mentioned often in conjunction with Professor Vee.

He has no links to Japanese Jujutsu that I am aware of. His style - Sanuces Ryu, is, I believe, one of a number of American Jujutsu styles based on Professor Vee's teaching.
Regards

Neil

kenjgood
4th February 2001, 10:32
Thanx Neil.

When I first started training many moons ago, my first teacher claimed his teacher was Moses Powell.

My teacher was from the New York area before migrating to California. Although highly skilled, after a few years with this gentleman, I started questioning the validity of anything he said.

Just trying to back track.

Neil Hawkins
4th February 2001, 12:24
Ken

I don't want to drag this down, or antagonise anyone, but I believe that Powell was one of the crowd of American "Grandmasters" who were big on rhetoric but small on verifiable backgrounds. I cannot comment on his physical abilities as I have never seen them.

To head off on a tangent I have a question for you if I may.

This should probably be in the CQC section, but if it develops I can move it. Anyone else feel free to jump in, please.

Given your extensive background in firearms and practical shooting and a background in jujutsu, do you think it is possible to incorporate the two?

In the style of jujutsu I practice it is stressed that a weapon is a natural extension of the body, all the weapons we practice with utilise the same body movements as the empty hand techniques.

I have tried to incorporate this philosophy into my shooting and whilst I have had limited success on the range, I am told, by Police instructors that I shoot with, that my stance and action is not conducive to accurate shooting. Admittedly the club is more concerned with competition shooting (police and service match), rather than practical shooting.

I have had success teaching weapon retention utilising some jujutsu sabaki and techniques, but once the weapon is drawn most revert to a shooters mindset (point shooting is not taught to our PD's or military outside of SWAT or SF).

From what I've read from Fairbairn, Applegate and others point shooting does seem to fit in with the philosophy of jujutsu, is this the case, or is a firearm a 'special' weapon deserving of special handling?

I was wondering if you had any opinions.

Thanks

Neil

Joseph Svinth
4th February 2001, 21:26
Some additional websites with info on Powell.

http://www.altinet.net/~karate/etmpsr1.htm

http://www.veearnisjitsu.com/professors.htm (Prof. Vee, David James, whose methods can be seen on "MA: The Real Story.")

A student. http://www.blackvoices.com/member_photos/profile/0,1052,42249411,00.html

Another student.
http://www.kamauryu.com/sarjeant.htm

[Edited by Joseph Svinth on 02-04-2001 at 08:05 PM]

Juan Perez
5th February 2001, 00:22
When I was much younger, I studied, for about a year and a half, with Lou Ferrer, a student of Prof. Visitacion (Vee Arnis). What I noticed was the similarity in technique demonstration between Mr. Ferrer, Mr. Powell (and his students), Tony Mayo (Mr. Ferrer's student) and Mr. Ronald Duncan's senior students (Mainly Greg and Carl). All of the above frequented the NYC tournament circuit and competed in "self-defense" demonstrations. Besides the speed, theatrics, and change-overs, their routines displayed an affinity to the audience. Mainly, they were all crowd pleasers. Athletically, I can say that they were well versed in timing and concentrated alot on "henka." If you have seen one of these gentlemen perform, you have basically seen them all. How effective these techniques were, well one can argue either way (the "what if" concept). I was just lucky to find the right teacher for me, in the end.

[Edited by Juan Perez, Jr. on 02-04-2001 at 06:27 PM]

kenjgood
5th February 2001, 15:01
Thanx to everyone for their input. Appreciate it. I sent an e-mail directly to one of the websites that claimed they answered Mr. Powell’s email.

I had some specific questions that were not answered. Oh well.

Neil: As far as the correlation of Jujutsu and firearms engagements, for me at this point they are one in the same in terms of strategic principles, weapons retention, weapons take-aways, taking people off there feet as they are getting shot, movement across the ground, breath control and mind-set.

Here is a thread that deals with this concept:
http://www.swordforumbugei.com/ubb/Forum16/HTML/000005.html

There are specific stances that will enhance your consistency and accuracy based on your body type and physicality. My basic philosophy on this matter is, look at what the fastest most accurate shooters in the world are doing and study the biomechanics.

As a caveat, one of my instructors talked to Doug Koenig a few weeks ago (one of the biggest names in the sport), and his basic take on all the new or specialized shooting techniques was: [Paraphrase] “IPSC shooters are always trying to more out of something that is fairly simple to do, just shoot”

http://www.safariland.com/dougk.htm

Without opening a huge can of worms here, I am often asked: Is it point/reflexive or sighted fire? My answer is an unequivocal and committed answer is…..Yes.

The engagement distance, size of target and timeframe required will determine the type of shooting sequence required.

I wonder if a bow with a laser sight, level, multi-range dots, counter weights would be very useful firing from a horse at a live target moving across the battlefield? However if you were planning on winning the next Olympic Games, this might be the tool and aiming method of choice.




[Edited by kenjgood on 02-05-2001 at 09:42 AM]

5th February 2001, 23:01
Mr Hawkins,

To further confirm your suspicions I recently observed Ken Good during a break at a AJJ seminar demonstrating projectile weapon retention and takeaways based on jujutsu principles.

It was very impressive.... very!

And I'm not easily impressed

If you ever have a chance to get "a hold" of Ken J. Good I highly recommend it. Heck, he's a great guy as well!

Toby Threadgill

Neil Hawkins
5th February 2001, 23:46
Toby

He's on my list!

Ken

Thanks, Some interesting comments on the Swordforum list, must get over there more often. (BTW thanks for plugging my CQC article at EJMAS)

You are 100% correct when you say distancing is important. I instruct some security officers in restraining techniques and weapon retention and their concept of distance and timing is way off, to the point of becoming dangerous. The major problem I've found is that when carrying a firearm most people forget everything else, the gun dominates their thinking, must draw, must fire, etc. When in reality the better option is to use sabaki and/or evasion to adjust distance, and maybe respond with empty hands or a backup weapon (most carry extendable batons or maglight torches).

Back to the range, practice, practice practice.

Regards

Neil

profsarj
6th February 2001, 04:28
As Moses Powell is one of my direct teachers, I would be happy to answer questions. Please feel free to e-mail me at:
kamauryu@everythingblack.com.

Thank you,

Darrell Sarjeant

Kamuii
6th February 2001, 04:40
Greetings! :)

As an active member of Sanuces-Ryu Jujutsu, you can ask me anything at all. If I do not have all the answers I will do my best and personally look them up and ask forward and give you the answers you inquire, since my instructor IS A DIRECT STUDENT of Dr. Moses Powell. He has also has been awarded a 10th Dan and has been left in charge of Sanuces-Ryu for the areas of the Caribbean and South America by Dr. Moses Powell as well.


Note for Neil:
Prof.Visitaccion learned Jujutsu from two japanese (stiil in research). One of them was a japanese soldier in WWII, but I am still researching the name. The other had trained also Wally Jay at a time, but I do not have his name at hand. At least this much I have, but I am still getting more info on this...

Also:
Prof.Visitaccion taught his art of Vee-Jutsu, which had Jujutsu and some of his filipino arts as well. Now Moses Powell learned from Visitaccion up to an extent that there was no more to learn from that style, in other words Prof. Visitaccion taught him all there was to learn. Later, with the blessing from Prof.Visitaccion(Powell's sensei), he founded Sanuces-Ryu Jujutsu.

Hope this helps. Any questions feel free to ask. :)


Best,

[Edited by KAMUII on 02-06-2001 at 03:26 AM]

Ron Tisdale
6th February 2001, 19:26
Hello Mr. Hawkins,

I'm not a shooter myself (been to the range a few times is all), but one of my aikido instructors was a competition shooter for quite some time. He has created an instructional program based on Yoshinkan aikido basics for unarmed and armed LEO. If you are truly interested in trying something like that out, or hearing more about it, I can try to get some info from him to you. Just email me at rtisdale@ncsus.jnj.com if you are interested. For what its worth, he took myself and several other untrained people and had us shooting reasonably well in a short period of time. I doubt I could reproduce the results though since I haven't tried or practised since then (not too into guns). I am glad that I at least aquired some familiararity with that particular tool, though.

Ron Tisdale

john mark
9th February 2001, 14:23
I was never a gun control advocate until after moving to South Florida.

I think it is an extremely important issue that we all need to think about.

Gun Control -- Always shoot with two hands.