I am very fortunate to have been involved in Texas martial arts and American Karate under the lineage of J. Pat Burleson of Fort Worth. He died on Halloween after battling cancer for many years. He was the first national karate champion and has literally thousands of black belts. I come under under his tree. Today was his send off, and I was fortunate enough to be able to attend.
Mr. Burleson doing a jump side kick way back in the day.
Grandmaster Burleson and me back in 2014 when he came to Chicago to do seminars. Long story, the owner of the schools is a guy I used to train with in Minneapolis in 1991.
This was today. You can Google some of these people if you want. L-R Joe Corley, Troy Dorsey, me, Jeff Smith, Helen Chung, and my instructor, Rudy Smedley.
It was a whirlwind day. I flew out to DFW this morning and back to ORD this afternoon. I would go to the ends of the earth for J. Pat Burleson. He revitalized my karate. I used to teach for a living but had stopped training for several years before he came up here in 2014. Sad day but a happy day also seeing old friends.
Mr. Burleson doing a jump side kick way back in the day.
Grandmaster Burleson and me back in 2014 when he came to Chicago to do seminars. Long story, the owner of the schools is a guy I used to train with in Minneapolis in 1991.
This was today. You can Google some of these people if you want. L-R Joe Corley, Troy Dorsey, me, Jeff Smith, Helen Chung, and my instructor, Rudy Smedley.
It was a whirlwind day. I flew out to DFW this morning and back to ORD this afternoon. I would go to the ends of the earth for J. Pat Burleson. He revitalized my karate. I used to teach for a living but had stopped training for several years before he came up here in 2014. Sad day but a happy day also seeing old friends.
