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47th ronin
22nd December 2001, 01:42
Does anyone know if this is a pen name for S.J.Jorgensen? My copy of Police Wrestling states that Arthur Hobart Farrar is a pen name(nom de plume), in the back where they advertise other books, the publisher's name and adress is covered by a label stating:
S.J.JORGENSEN
403 Maritime Building Seattle, Wash.

Joseph Svinth
22nd December 2001, 04:36
I haven't a clue. Never heard that Jorgensen used a pen name before, but maybe he did. My guess is that Jorgensen just marketed the books. My reasoning:

This was found on the Google cache of http://users.telerama.com/~bookshlf/SPORTSGAMES.html ,

Arthur Hobart Farrar, AMERICAN JUDO A MANUAL OF KODOKWAN JUDO, THOROUGHLY MODERNIZED AND PARTICULARLY ADAPTED FOR USE IN OUR ARMED FORCES. ENGAGINGLY TOLD LESSONS IN THE ART OF HAND-TO-HAND COMBAT, RUGGED WITH
THE STRENGTH AND SPIRIT OF AMERICAN MANHOOD AND WOMANHOOD, Padell Book Co. 1943 Softcover, approx. 7-1/2"h x 5"w, 96 pages, illustrated with Bl & Wh Drawings. In Good- condition, no d/j $24.50

The title doesn't sound like Jorgensen's style, but you'd have to compare text and photos to know for sure. An aside: at the current URL, one finds two copies of a 1935 book I've never heard of:

JOHNSON SMITH & CO., JIU-JITSU JAPANESE FEATS OF ATTACK AND DEFENSE IN PERSONAL ENCOUNTER "JIU-JITSU GIVES POWER OVER AN ADVERSARY THAT COUNTS FOR MORE THAN STRENGTH", Johnson Smith & Co. 1935 Softcover, approx. 7-1/2"h x 5"w, 64 pages + very large Advertising Supplement Section, illustrated with Bl & Wh Drawings. In Good to Fair condition, no d/j $42.50

JOHNSON SMITH & CO., JIU-JITSU JAPANESE FEATS OF ATTACK AND DEFENSE IN PERSONAL ENCOUNTER "JIU-JITSU GIVES POWER OVER AN ADVERSARY THAT COUNTS FOR MORE THAN STRENGTH", Johnson Smith & Co. 1935 Softcover, approx. 7-1/2"h x 5"w, 64 pages, illustrated with Bl & Wh Drawings. In Fair condition, no d/j $28.50

Back to business. To see a cover illustration of Farrar's "American Judo Illustrated," see http://www.lts.net/~hogston/oopbooks.html

Ah, here we go: http://digital.library.upenn.edu/books/cce/1971r.html The estate of Max Padell renewed the copyright of a Farrar book's 1943 book, "How to Fight," in 1971. However, the Library of Congress does not list Padell as a pseudonym. Instead it is the publishing house.

American judo, by Arthur Hobart Farrar.
[New York, Padell book co., 1943]
96 p. illus. 19 1/2 cm.

Farrar, Arthur Hobart. [from old catalog]
How to be a detective,
New York city, Louellen publishing co. inc., 1937.
61 p. illus. 20 cm.

Farrar, Arthur Hobart. [from old catalog]
How to fight, a fighter's manual; a thorough-going, comprehensive self-instructor of fighting in and out of the "ring" with special emphasis on long and short range fighting and clever "inside" information; designed for the pro or the amateur fighter.
[New York, Padell book & magazine co., 1943]
93 p. illus. 20 cm.

In theory, pseudonyms are to be included on ISSN applications, but of course it isn't as if the FBI checks the things. So it could be Jorgensen, but why? He published and sold his own stuff.

A search shows that Padell was a small/vanity publisher in NY. They published both non-commercial fiction (authors included Kenneth Patchen and Henry Miller) plus commercial texts on varied topics, to include sexual abnormality (1933), nudism (1935; the cover and some pages appear at http://www.zapix.com/laurel/nudism.html ), sex facts for women (1936; several pages appear at http://www.mum.org/sexfacts.htm ), hypnotism (1944; this book was a favorite of L. Ron Hubbard's; see http://www.factnet.org/Scientology/lrhoccult.htm ; images from it appear online at http://www.privatepages.com/P/H/REAL/Print/lessons.shtml ), simplified card tricks (1945), secret codes and decoding (1945), fingerprints for identification (1945), tragedies of white slaves (e.g., prostitutes, 1945), another study in sexual abnormality (1952), the shocking problem of teenage girl gangs (1952), lesbianism (1953), and that sort of thing. So how-to judo would certainly have been in order for the company.

Anyway as Jorgensen normally self-published and had his own line of books, my guess is that he simply served as a distributor. (There was a school called something like American Jiu-Jitsu in the Seattle phone book of 1940 that was NOT a Nisei club. From what little I know, it had its own instructor -- who I do not know -- and that Jorgensen made occasional visits and helped with demos.)

joe yang
22nd December 2001, 04:50
COOL!

47th ronin
22nd December 2001, 05:22
Thanks Joseph,
I think you are right, Jorgensen probably distributed the books for Padell. I guess that means I have a "west coast" copy of Police Wrestling. The books by Arthur Hobart Farrar are not bad for pulp martial arts books, the ones I have appear to be written by someone with some knowledge of judo and wrestling.

I have a copy of the Johnson Smith book you mentioned(in my cheesy book section), it is probably most notable for being mentioned on a Tracy Kenpo site as it refers to Kenpo as descending from Jiu-jitsu, not as refined, just the killing techniques, blaa, blaa ,blaa.

I am still curious who "Arthur Hobart Farrar" is.