Quote Originally Posted by Kendoguy9 View Post
If I remember correctly (Cliff or another Yagyu guy please correct me) Yagyu Nobuharu sensei was never supposed to be the soke of Yagyu Shinkage-ryu but his older brother died in the war so the ryu fell to him instead. I think he is the first Yagyu head to have had a job besides teaching kenjutsu.
Nobuharu-sensei's brother died quite young, not in the war. And perhaps it would be more accurate to say that Nobuharu-sensei was the first to have a vocation aside from teaching kenjutsu. His grandfather rented out rooms and raised chickens to support his family after the Meiji Restoration took away his stipend. After the firebombing of Nagoya deprived him of the ancestral Yagyu house and dojo, Toshinaga-sensei (Nobuharu-sensei's father) sold knives and cutlery in Seki, Gifu until the end of the war.