The Kano Society

The main news this edition is that Allan Zipeure—our oldest member—celebrates his 90th Birthday on 11th November—Many Congratulations!

There are further biographical details in this edition and a 20 minute Birthday  video of Alan is available.

This and the Hatta / Mayer  video mentioned below  are available from the Kano Society please email sensei@kanosociety.org

We are pleased to report that the May meeting went very well. On that occasion the family of Ichiro Hatta came to meet us and gave us some photographs of Sarah Mayer  who had lived with the Hatta family in Japan in the thirties.

We in return gave the family a short video compilation of Sarah and Ichiro based on the letters she wrote to Gunji Koizumi.

He had a severely damaged leg and having tried other sports without success, he consulted Gunji Koizumi on the possibility of doing Judo with such a ‘handicap’.

GK or ‘The Old Man’ as Allan refers to him, thought that for  Allan to practise Judo was an excellent idea and prescribed him a course of exercises to build up his muscles. He was helped in this by  Percy Sekine and the result was that Allan became a very strong and effective Judo man who nobody would ever imagine to have any  disability whatsoever.   Allan Zipeure has always been a very strong man and a very determined one too. He puts his success in life down to his firm belief in never giving up—and,  as Koizumi told him, always fight to the end.

As a young man he was a formidable athlete holding a number of  championship medals in athletics including the hop step and jump, the long jump  and particularly the ‘broad jump’  in which he achieved the amazing length of 10 ft 3.5 inches and was Canadian Army champion.  He also wrestled and boxed for  the army  although did not really like boxing.

During the army he served as a staff sergeant and was given the task of teaching troops unarmed combat including how to kill an enemy. He never  liked this task but it was an unfortunate  necessity of the time.

Allan put his full energy into everything he did and when attending the first European international Judo competition in Paris in 1951—he came up against the giant Anton Geesink and fought him for several minutes despite the enormous 8 stone discrepancy in their sizes—Allan of course being by far the lighter man at 12 stone to Geesinks 20!.

He developed his favourite techniques such as his famous seoinage by hours of repetition and never shied from hard work and practise.

GK had Allan tour the country with him to demonstrate judo and particularly the Kata.

 Nage-no-kata was a firm favourite of their demonstrations but as Uke, Allan had to be very careful not to roll as he landed since many of the ‘dojos’ were actually stages or cinemas with a slope to them and there was a danger of his rolling off the edge.

Allan has continued to compete to a ‘ripe old age’ He fought in his last international against Brazil  at the age of 54 and was still competing in the veterans championships at 67.

Most of ‘Zip’s’ friends who have been interviewed for his birthday video describe him as the ‘one of the toughest men’ they have ever come across’ (Ralph Smith) —but  everyone who comes in contact with him is also struck by his kindness and integrity.

Bulletin 11 Part 2