Sihak Henry Cho

In 1961, Sihak Henry Cho opened a school in New York City that is believed to be the first permanent commercial Taekwondo school in the United States. Like Rhee, he originally came to the United States as a student (while working on his MBA). While visiting New York City, he visited a Judo school and gave a Taekwondo demonstration. Judo was popular at the time and was about the only martial art with which Americans were familiar. Spectators were amazed at his kicks and wanted to know more about Taekwondo. Cho decided to stay in New York and became one of the early pioneers of American Taekwondo.

Other early Korean Taekwondo masters included Richard Chun (1962), Chong Lee (1964), and Hee Il Cho (1969). Unlike some other oriental martial arts that were being taught by unqualified instructors, these early pioneers of Taekwondo offered the public highly qualified instruction and built solid public support for Taekwondo. The early migration of these and other skilled Taekwondo instructors to the United States gave Taekwondo an early lead in American martial arts.

American Taekwondo Growth

In 1972, the American Collegiate Taekwondo Association was formed to sponsor tournaments and insure quality Taekwondo instruction in American universities. In October of 1974, Taekwondo was admitted into the United States Amateur Athletic Union, largely due to the efforts of David Rivenes, president of the Amateur Athletic Union, and Ken Min of the University of California at Berkeley. This official recognition of Taekwondo as an amateur sport in the United States launched it into a period of sustained growth.

The First Annual National AAU Taekwondo Championship was held at Yale University in March 1975, followed by a second one in Kansas City in 1976, and a third one at the University of Berkeley in 1977. In September 1977, the AAU hosted the Third Taekwondo World Championships at the Chicago Amphitheater. More than forty-six national teams, consisting of over five hundred contestants, officials, and master instructors, participated in the event. Each year, hundreds of Taekwondo tournaments are held in the United States under the sponsorship of various Taekwondo organizations.

American Contribution to Taekwondo

By the 1980s, American Taekwondo martial artists began to resent the continued dominance of both Korean and Japanese instructors in the United States. They felt the oriental principle of loyalty to the head of a style limited the growth possibilities of Taekwondo in America.

Oriental martial artists demand absolute loyalty to a single art to preserve the art, honor the instructors, and to preserve and increase their personal power base. Oriental students often sample different styles while children and concentrate on one style by their teenage years, building a strong loyalty to the style. American martial artists do not feel this loyalty to a particular style; they want to experiment. Americans martial artists do not believe a single martial art may encompass all aspects of the fighting arts, so they began to borrow techniques from many different fighting styles and form their own styles.

The American contribution to Taekwondo came primarily from the American tournament scene. In the early 1960s, American martial artists generally fought from a stationary position using 80 percent hand techniques and 20 percent foot techniques. Kicks were usually at abdomen level or lower and few fighters would kick using their lead leg. The standard kicks were front kicks or roundhouse kicks off the back leg. The counter reverse punch and the step-through lunge punch were the standard hand techniques. Open tournament competitors in the same period (1962-1964) were better kickers, but their hand techniques were primitive (overhead knife-hand strike, etc.) and they fought from a stationary stance, with no footwork. Counter techniques and combinations were virtually unknown.

Then some fighters began using roundhouse kicks to the head (using both the leading and trailing legs), spinning back kicks, and jumping side kicks. Most of these kickers came from the Southwest, possibly due to Jhoon Rhee's influence in the area. East Coast fighters introduced the jumping double front kick and used a leading leg roundhouse kick more than other early stylists, while West Coast fighters stuck to the older Japanese styles.

In 1965, Mike Stone came home from the Army and won nine consecutive tournaments without being defeated, primarily using a leading leg roundhouse and double ridge hands. In the late 1960s, Chuck Norris became a champion by combining Korean kicks (including a leading leg side kick) with Japanese hand techniques. He was also the first American fighter to introduce combination techniques successfully.

Joe Lewis also came to fame during this time by using a leading leg side kick and crossing back kick, showing the effectiveness of single technique specialization. Lewis also proved the effectiveness of the lead punch.

After these fighters started winning with lead techniques, the techniques began to gain recognition, although they would not become widely popular until the 1970s. Footwork during this period was the standard back and forward movement that is still prevalent today.

After the WTF concentrated on the sport form of Taekwondo, Korean instructors began emphasizing competition techniques rather than traditional fighting techniques. For example, touch block replaced power blocks in sparring. American tournament point fighters established the basis for the American style of Taekwondo.

As Taekwondo continued to grow in the United States, Taekwondo instructors wanted independence from foreign governing organizations. Instructors began grouping themselves and forming American based Taekwondo organizations. One of the first is the American Taekwondo Association.