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Positive Aikido: A True Story of Traditional Teachings

by Dave Rogers, Henry Ellis and Derek Eastman

153 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); illustrated; catalogue #04-2476; ISBN 1-4120-4668-8; US$18.50, C$21.00, EUR15.50, £11.00

Featuring two of the most senior instructors in Britain and one of their American students as Authors, Positive Aikido has it all. If you're a martial art enthusiast or practitioner, this is one book you have got to have in your library.

Read more!

About the Book      About the Author      Excerpts      Catalogue Information

About the Book and Reviews

Positive Aikido will soon be available on bookshelves around the globe.

This book, an in-depth look at our school's special brand of technique, strategy, philosophy as well as unique history, has taken about 15 years to compile, but will soon be offered in print by the world's leading on-demand publisher.

Trafford Holdings Ltd is privately-held corporation, registered in British Columbia, Canada. There are over 120 shareholders, including many authors and all the permanent employees. It was incorporated in 1991. In late 1995, Trafford opened its doors and website. They are the first company in the world to offer an "on-demand publishing service," and they are the best.

The production of Positive Aikido has gone through numerous stages. The hand-drawings describing each of the positive techniques in traditional Aikido were begun in 1987 with the intention of providing new students with a reference guide - at the time to be photocopied for students in the U.S. and later possibly for the U.K. students as well. That plan, however, never took hold as more and more drawings were produced. The drawings of the first four groupings were finished in 1991 and in 1993, the second four groupings were added, along with some transcripts from a recorded converstaion between Sensei Ellis and Rogers on a long roadtrip between Dallas, Texas and Alamogordo, New Mexico. Rogers made his 1st Dan during that trip, and Positive Aikido picked up a lot of its histories and background information. Still, it was no more than a shep of papers cobbled together from various sources.

In 1999, however, with the advent of digital photgraphy, Rogers decided to augment the drawings with some digital photos and possibly put together a proper booklet for students in all the Ellis Schools. The photos, however, required some supporting text - and there was a lot of other material which needed to be conveyed as well. The transcripts were rewritten and cleaned up a bit and the photos were digitally processed for the first four forms. During another visit to New Mexico, Sensei and his assistant Anita Wilson along with Sensei's son did the demonstrations needed for the last four forms. Later, the first four forms were re-shot with Sensei Rogers and one of his first U.S. students, Jeff Glaze of New Mexico.

By this time, Positive Aikido was being developed as a book.

The agent and publishers we first contacted agreed, but the material was still fairly rough. More photos were shot and extensive digital work was done on them to clarify technique. Additional sections were added to describe combat strategy and the philosophy behind Positive Aikido. Sections on ethics and morals within the arts were developed along with material dealing with the selection of a martial art for beginners. And of course, the history section was strengthened and sharpened.

Lastly, a complete reorganization of the material was accomplished with an addition of a section on pins and control and weapons (jo and sword). The finished work is comprised of more than 1000 photos, 600 hand-drawings and complex explanations and tips to make the techniques of Aikido work properly. It includes detailed writing on the "Positive" mindset as well as complete sections geared to beginners, intermediate students and advanced practitioners.

Although several traditional publishers expressed interest in printing the book, and initial negotiations were entered into with one California-based company, the advent of "print-on-demand" technology and the resulting new publishing market, made for a better alternative.

Of this book as it stands now, the authors say this. There are a lot of books on Martial Arts out there, and this one fits in the crowd well - but it also stands alone in the sheer comprehensiveness of the work. It is a nearly complete representation of a single school's technique - it is a historical marker - a book of strategy - an ethical guide - a technical manual - and it is a chart, graph and manifest of all the things which make martial artisits as a whole stand together as sisters and brothers with the same warrior spirit.

http://www.ellisaikido.org http://www.aikido-database.co.uk/positiveaikido/

Reviews

Many publications on the subject of Aikido come and go. A majority all revolve around the same format or topics. It is unusual for a no holds book to be released. To have a warning printed on the first page, invites you in to read more!

This book cannot be classed as a technical, although a whole chapter is dedicated to techniques. The main proportion of the book deals with personal interpretation of what Aikido means to the authors. It draws comparison with modern day Aikido, and the Aikido from the past; all it's good and bad points. There is also a strong emphasis on personal history.

In so many ways, it breaks the boundaries of what a traditional Aikido book is suppose to show and say! The authors are to be congratulated for a no nonsense approach, and breaching the normal concept of what is expected from a book in this category. I'm sure it will cause a great debate among different groups, which should be encouraged. Finally, if the dialogue causes the reader to cough, splutter, or even split blood; at least the cover can be easily wiped.

Mr. Nigel Jones
Principal instructor for Abertillery Aikido Club
under the Amateur Martial Association.
Trained under Sensei Haydn Foster,
& Sensei Ron Russell at the Hut Dojo.

I just received my copies of "Positive Aikido" from Trafford Publishing. The cover is excellent!.

I have only skimmed though it briefly, I like the way it is laid out, I am enjoying the stories and History so far. The rest of this week, I will go through the whole book and then write a review and place it on my website to let others outside of the Aikido world know where to purchase it.

Thank you for being a friend and sharing your martial spirit, it is very refreshing to know a true warrior of the martial art, and one who still practice and teach the old way while embracing the modern.

Continued success, and here's hope that all your First-Run books be sold completely out (smile)...

Most Honorable regards,
Jimm McMurray
House of Discipline Martial Arts
Moo Hap Sool Hapkido
World Kido federation

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About the Authors

Henry Ellis was born May 3, 1936 in a tough coal mining area near Rotherham South Yorkshire, United Kingdom. His childhood was hard and deprived as were most kids in those war torn years. His father, a hardened coal miner, handed down to Henry the strict no nonsense Victorian values that he himself had endured at the hands of his own brutal father. Henry knew nothing other than strict discipline in his youth - something which was to stand him in good stead in his later years. He spent two year in a special school for so called "tough kids" which would have made a "juvenile correction facility seem like a Holiday Camp."

Henry was interested in all sports and, at the age of fourteen, joined a cycling club. At 15 he entered his first Time Trial race and won three prizes, finding himself elevated to be the third rider in the club team. This was his passion until starting Judo at the now famous Hut Dojo. It was whilst practising Judo in the 1950's that he saw the "new" martial art of Aikido.

He then gave up both cycling and judo to concentrate solely on Aikido.

At the age of nineteen he was accepted into the newly formed Aikido section at the Hut Dojo. The descipline and etiquette was something that very few students could take and it was now that for the first time he was able to fall back into the strict discipline that was an every-day part of his early life.

Henry found in Aikido something that appealed to his nature. In those early days Aikido was hard and positive - hence the title of this book. Also in those days there was a true "no nonsense" approach to Aikido. This approach is still Henry's focus and he is proud to have been an important part of Aikido's early development within the United Kingdom.

When initially approached to cooperate in this book, he immediately stated that the book must be honest and practical with no references to floating around the planets and other mystical and magical nonsense.

Whilst Henry believes that the heavy hand of his father shaped his childhood the rest of his life was moulded by his respect for his teacher Kenshiro Abbe Sensei.

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Derek Eastman was born 1943 in West London. Although Derek was too young to remember the war, he clearly remembers the difficult post war years and the devastation of London. Even though life was hard, he recalls that he had a happy childhood. His family later moved to the London suburb of Southall where Derek took an interest in all sports, in particular track and field for which he represented both school and county. On leaving school he became an apprentice mechanical engineer, and bought his first motor bike. At the age of sixteen he joined his friends and their "motor bike gang", they would often visit Windsor and join in the fights with the Queens guards which in those days was the norm.

Derek was very game, but often came off the worse for wear. He decided to toughen himself up and join the Hut Dojo which he had often passed on the road. He visited the Hut and it was here that he met his teacher Henry Ellis. In 1968 Derek had two dojo's and as a member of the Martial Art Commission he needed a name for his dojo's. He approached Henry Ellis and asked if he could use his name for his organisation as Mr. Williams had used Abbe sensei's name for the Abbe School of Budo". Mr. Ellis agreed and they joined their schools together to form the "Ellis Schools of Traditional Aikido."

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Dave Rogers was born in 1966 in Providence, Rhode Island, USA. He grew up in Seekonk, Massachussettes, the proud son of truck driver and former Navy enlisted man, Ed Rogers and his wife, Beverly.

While not sports-oriented, Rogers surprised his parents by joining an American Kenpo Karate class led by Donald Hume in 1980. Upon graduation from High School, he then promptly joined the U.S. Air Force, and was soon stationed at RAF Greenham Common, Berkshire, United Kingdom. It was here Rogers and his long-time friend Al Montemar moined the Basingstoke Aikido Club where they met their teachers, Senseis Henry Ellis, Derek Eastman, Keith Webb and David Warne.

Practices in the 80s with this group were fierce, but the two Americans stayed until the base closed in 1990 with the advent of a treaty with and eventual collapse of the Soviet Union.

Rogers promised to open a club in the U.S., and the first Ellis School in America opened its doors in Alamogordo, NM just a few months into 1990.

Although serving in many different capacities over the years including with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Unit in Somalia, 1993; a 5-year stint as a daily newspaper reporter and editor; and several years as a graphic artist for the State of New Mexixo, Rogers has always maintained the U.S. branch of the shcool. in 1999, he finished a manuscript which was originally intended as an informative brochure for the U.S. branch of the Aikido School. In 2000, it became obvious that the brochure was now a book, and Rogers contacted his teachers to ask for their help.

This book, Positive Aikido, is the result.

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Excerpts

Ancient martial art taught to Alamogordo students

First U.S. black belt in history of school awarded to Alamogordo man

In 1875, as the age of the Samurai came to a close, a Shinto priest in Japan wrote a poem likening the unending flow of time to a great river. The priest, Hoshino Chikanori presented his poem to a master swordsman and teacher of the martial sciences.

Neither man would realize that the river of time would eventually wash the ancient family fighting system to Alamogordo New Mexico nearly 115 years later. In 1905, two Japanese men met in Hokkaido. One, a young martial artist by the name of Morehei Ueshiba, and the other, Takeda Sokaku - the head of the Takeda family, and a very accomplished practitioner and teacher of several family systems of fighting technique which had been passed down through Japan's History.

Although Sokaku died in 1943 while teaching in the Aomori Prefecture, he left many fine students behind. One of these was Morehei Ueshiba, the founder of Aikido, a system of secret technique distilled from the many arts Sokaku had mastered and passed on. This was taught only to the students with the highest credentials.

World War II nearly assured the extinction of this system.

In 1955, however, years after World War II, Ueshiba mailed a series of letters to his students - the remaining Japanese teachers who had studied Aikido during its early development. The letters freed these teachers from their oaths to keep the technique secret, and in fact, offered the instruction of the system to anyone interested.

A man today remembered by many as "the last samurai, Kenshiro Abbe, received one of these letters where he was living in Britain. Abbe, the youngest man and later, the oldest man to win the All Japan Judo Championships was also the master of several other martial arts.

One evening at his club, "The Abbe School of Budo," he offered to demonstrate Aikido and as Ueshiba had requested, teach it to anyone interested. One of the first to take advantage of this was Henry Ellis, who, along with another student of Abbe, Derek Eastman, spent his life teaching the martial art throughout the United Kingdom.

In 1985, Ellis and Eastman were operating an Aikido Club near a U.S. nuclear ground-launched cruise missile base.

Their two American students, Al Montemar and Dave Rogers studied the art until 1990 when the base was closed.

Rogers ended up in Alamogordo.

Today, two of Rogers students have begun their quest to keep the early Aikido technique of the young Ueshiba alive, and one of the students, Paul Emel, a State of New Mexico employee at the NM Museum of Space History, has become the first U.S.-produced black belt in the school's history.

Beginning Aikido classes in Alamogordo

Emel and Bill Loose, who is working to complete the requirements necessary to get the opportunity to take his own test for 1st Dan (black belt), have opened classes to interested students at Sun World Gym on 9th Street. For both men it has been more than eight-years of work to get to the point they are at now.

"About four or five years in, it just sank in that the whole point of doing this is so that one of these days I would be teaching this to someone else," said Emel. "It has come to a point now that I have passed the Dan Grade test, that I no longer have control over the Aikido. In a way, it now owns me and I can't put it down. No matter what happens, I will still have this information and training. It is now my responsibility to make sure it doesn't die.

"Since the time I started practicing Aikido, I have only seen three other students receive their brown belt," said Emel. "In that time there have been no other black belts awarded. This is a very high honor. Even if I had failed the test, I am very grateful to even be considered."

In the past 50 years there have only been twelve other black belts awarded before Emel's. Of those twelve, all of them received their instruction in Britain.

Emel and Loose's classes come after 14 years of teaching in the Alamogordo area by their instructor, Dave Rogers.

Rogers offered classes to students from all walks of life- everything from high-school and college students to local and state police and federal marshalls. Rogers School, named after the informal name of Kenshiro Abbe's school, "The Hut," developed many fine students since 1990. Emel and Loose are considered two of the best.

Emel explains the process of learning he has experienced and will be passing on with his own students.

"In the beginning, the attacks are very slow - even static, or stationary," he said. "These are things like grabbing the wrist, or lapel of the shirt. They would be done very slow and with an eye toward safety first.

"As the technique improves and the strength and flexibility of the person improves, we speed things up." said Emel. "The attacks may still come in slow, but they are stronger and done with the opponent "on-balance," so that the technique will actually have to work to make anything happen."

In the end, however, things become harder explains Emel.

"By the time you are ready to take a Dan Grade test," he said, "you should be capable of taking a full-speed attack from an opponent who is trying to hurt you, and not only are you able to avoid the attack, but you can do any technique in the system you wish."

Emel chuckles a little when asked if the training becomes a little harsh. "Yeah, eventually it is a bit harsh," he said. "But in the Ellis Schools, a black belt is not handed out in a certain amount of time. It is earned through years of training, and only given when the instructors see that you are fit to hold such a rank. A black belt is not just something that you wear, it is the life that you live."

Visiting teachers reconnect the ties of history and a book is written

Emel's and Loose's teacher, Dave Rogers still comes to train at the Alamogordo dojo, and even Rogers' teacher, Henry Ellis, has been a regular visitor to his U.S. Headquarters here over the years.

Ellis has flown from Britain to New Mexico numerous times since 1991. His last visit was to confirm the grading of Rogers to 3rd Dan, a grade which has taken Rogers nearly two decades to achieve.

During that time, Rogers has been working with Ellis and Eastman to produce a book detailing the technique, history and philosophy of their school of technique.

"Positive Aikido - A True Story of Traditional Teachings" will hit bookshelves all over the world in January and include a book-signing here at Hastings in January or February.

An extremely complex project due to the fact that much of the information, drawings and photographed techniques have never been seen before in print, the book has taken the three men years to complete.

"I would like to thank Dave Rogers for the many years of hard work that has now brought this book to its final chapter and completion after approximately 15 years," said Ellis. "The book originated from taped discussions on a long and horrendous car journey from Alamogordo to Dallas and back. The book details the history and unique technique of the Ellis Schools where Dave Rogers trained as an assistant to all the high ranking black belts when he was stationed in the United Kingdom with the U.S. Air Force.

"2005 will be a great year for our school," said Ellis. The publication of the book will be a great start to 2005.ÊIt is also the celebration of 50 years of British Aikido and the arrival of the legendary master Kenshiro Abbe Sensei to the shores of Great Britain."

Celebrating the life's work of a great teacher

The School's headquarters in Britain along with other organizations and its U.S. Headquarters here in Alamogordo, is jointly organizing the biggest ever martial arts event in the history of the U.K.

The "Kenshiro Abbe Sensei 50th Celebration" to be held at theÊCrystal Palace National Sports Center in London, England, will not only present demonstrations of Aikido, it will be an opportunity to honor all the martial arts that Abbe Sensei was a master of:ÊAikido, Judo, Karate, Kendo, Kyudo and Iaido.

"Dave Rogers has been invited as a "Special Guest" to represent the ESTA schools in the U.S.," said Ellis. "There will be many important dignitaries on theÊ"Special Guest List including the Lord Mayor of London, the Japanese Ambassador to the United Kingdom, and other organizations and high-ranking government officials.

"There will also be many senior martial artists who were so important to the development of martial arts in The U.K.. from the late 1940's," said Ellis.

The training of times past continues

Here in Alamogordo, classes meet every Monday and Wednesday at Sun World Gym. Loose and Emel work with people on a regular basis, trying now to pass on the skills they have learned to the next generation of students.

"The first couple of lessons for me were very confusing," said Emel. "They were using Japanese terms and I had no idea what they meant.

"Probably the first year, the only thing I was interested in was learning the technique, not really paying attention to self-discipline, determination, focus, goals or anything else," he said. "I just realized one day that it was all there - and I never noticed it was being put there.

"Now I have been given permission to teach Aikido to students of my own," said Emel. "Classes are being held and we are accepting new students all the time. At the same time, classes are currently small with plenty of room. Sun World Gym is a small club, but has plenty of state-of-the-art equipment and our practice hall is neat, clean and well organized."

According to Loose, the new children's class is also picking up momentum. "The children's Aikido class was started two months ago," he said. "My intent for the class is not to make the kids expert Ê"Aikidoists" , but to teach them how to respect and work well with each other, and to show them how to focus on the task at hand. Team work is a major factor in the class.

"The Aikido Technique is a means to achieve this goal," said Loose. "The students will be taught dojo etiquette, how to respect others and the basic mechanics behind the techniques, with the more strenuous technique excluded. Ages range from six to 13-years-old."

Chikanori's "river of time" flows on with these children's classes. Chikanori began his adult life as a warrior - later a great field commander - and later still, a priest and teacher.

To his greatest student, Takeda Sokaku, he said," The time of the sharp edge is over." But Chikanori could not have seen the great journey his family's technique would take, changing hands through generations and eventually being passed to children in a little town called Alamogordo.

To begin Aikido classes here

To enroll in these classes, interested parties should act quickly as space is limited. For details contact Sempai (Bill) Loose, 1st kyu (brown belt) at 439-0716, or e-mail Sensei Paul Emel at: paulandjess@charter.net.

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Catalogue Information

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