Return to the hijack - A shoot arranged heavily in the favor of a chosen few -- is a work, of sorts. Anytime a promoter cooks the books to favor his buddies - is being very unfair to the other competitors involved. We are not talking about the type of present day competitor. The early guys were largely made up of non professional fighters. Giving them a lil more than a week to prepare - while your buds know months in advance fo a date....is shysty to the extreme.

Although the outcomes were not guaranted - they were heavily weighted in favor of the names that art had contracts with...his stars and friends. I doubt that #1 or 2 were very weighed...but the load got heavier as more money came in.

A free ride for one, is an unfairness to all involved...and as such, they did a work on the fairness of it all. Although there were no predetermined outcomes and the moves were real - if you were to, say - have a guy fight 2 times in one night - and then take on the 'champ' who was fresh as a daisy.....thats a work. And you can always find last min subs to jump into the ring....you could even call out to the crowd in attendance and maybe find someone nutz enough to jump at the chance. Ids it fair to the unknown? Sure, from his point of view - hes getting a shot he never would have. Is it fair overall, not really.
Cannon fodder for the stars - willing fodder - is still grist for the mill.

Spurious info, fudged weight classes - shady **** overall - its all one sided for the promoters buddies..and Rocky was a movie.

The 'bum of the month club' is a classic boxing promoters tool to hype a stars numbers - and the bums are always grateful for the shot. At least they picked up a paycheck to get beat down. But at least they bring in journeyman boxers - not recreational boxers, to face the up and coming next champ.

The UFC of today is - from where I sit - a more fair offering to those that choose to step into the ring. Art Davies may have started the UFC - but it is better overall without him.

Perhaps using the term'work' was abit much, in relation to how its used in pro-wresting.

But it was a lot shorter than using:
a competition that was formulated and set up in a shoddy manner in order to favor a certain group of Art Davies friends and chosen stars, that he knew he could hype and promote to a level where he made a lot of money off of the efforts of guys willing to get their faces possibly busted open for a paycheck (or none at all), without even the courtesy of decent notice so they could prepare properly for the event.

So maybe the above is a shoot to you...to me its a work. You are far more forgiving of shysty promoters than I am, it seems. It may be the nature of the beast, but thats not the way Art promoted the early UFC...not to the registered competitors and not to the fans either.

Vince McMahon would have been proud.

End of re-hijack

If anything was fascinating about Street Kingdom, it was the mathematics and the culture of Islam that I knew nothing about. Gods and Earths talking the mathematics, wow...that stuff has NEVER been exposed to the mainstream, at once sad and frustrating.

Funny thing about the Service, this is where a lot of sharing took place.
We were seperated, and Black men from all over the country would learn things that they may have never seen before while becoming soldiers. So yes the Miltary is a good source for transporting new ideas. I'm sure that when the drill instructor was teaching h2h, somethings were added. But you would have to know the south to know who was a drity fighter or not, and how long ago were tactic used proir to these hand to hand lesson.
I grew up in washington D.C. unlce was a Golden Gloves champ... he introduced me to Sugar Ray Leonard before he turned pro, They boxed on the same team.
Long story short, this is when I was introduce to JHR in 87, at fort Braggs 35th signal B. I was treated like a sucker, cause I hadn't seen that type of hand play before. My sources then were from Chicago and Brooklyn. I moved to Staten Island in 93.

My father-in-law was a boxing in the late 40's and early 50's he was also a Marine. I demo the L for him this is a defensive posture used by some of the Houser (cats who do 52\JHR). The first thing out of his mouth was that's Gheecee fighting right there. Then he proceeded to tell me a story about how they (Marines) were told to stay clear of the Gullah when off the post.

My Grandfather is from Gainsville South Carolina he didn't know it by any name,
but when I described it to him, he told me plenty.
So this is not something that was put on parade, and yes there are other influences that help to make it what it is.
But how much of that stuff is really new? judo although played differently is a close cousin to some forms of wrestling. And other than style throwing punches is nothing new...
so here is some points from the ejmas site. enjoy
p.s. Like I said before I came here not to prove 52, but to try and clear up misconception. If you don't know about something then you dig around and try to put the pieces together. But the most out spoken people just run their mouths, yet they know they know nothing they just like to hear themselves talk. That's fine I've been on other forums and down that road, why continue if it's not a discussion and your (their) mind is already made up? I have other things to do...
I'm back here because some one made a good point. I train Kali at the Fight club in the city on thursdays nights. Neo tribe. Not sure about tomorrow but I'm not hard to find.
ok here you go...

Henry Bibb, a runaway slave from Shelby County, Kentucky, writes that on Sundays, slave owners would give slaves whiskey. In return, the slaves entertained the slave owners by dancing, playing the banjo, and fighting. "Before fighting," said Bibb, "the parties choose their seconds to stand by them while fighting; a ring or a circle is formed to fight in, and no one is allowed to enter the ring while they are fighting, but their seconds, and the white gentlemen. They are not allowed to fight a duel, nor to use weapons of any kind. The blows are made by kicking, knocking, and butting with their heads; they grab each other by their ears, and jam their heads together like sheep. If they are likely to hurt each other very bad, their masters would rap them with their walking canes, and make them stop."

By knocking the popular George Hough unconscious in just six minutes, Black Perry, an Afro-British convict, wins the heavyweight championship of Australia. Although Perry won £100 for his efforts, he also lost. After all, he never received another invitation to fight a white man, and died penniless in a Sydney street a few years later.

The United States Army fights the Second Seminole War in Florida. Although this war is usually portrayed as an Indian war, it was actually a war against African slaves who had escaped into the Everglades. Large numbers of runaway African slaves also lived in northern Mexico and the southwestern United States, where they regularly fought against Texas Rangers and almost as frequently assimilated into the mainstream Indian or Mexican societies.

The African American boxer Tom Molineaux of Virginia fights the English champion Tom Cribb of Bristol at Copthall Common, in Sussex some thirty miles from London. Although Molineaux did not know it, the outcome of the fight was prearranged. In the words of Cribb’s manager (and fight referee) Ap Rhys Price, they "must not let the ****** win for Old England’s sake." Therefore, Molineaux lost the 33-round fight after Price gave Cribb two minutes to recover from a knockout in the twenty-eighth. The two men met again at Thistleton Gap, outside London, a year later. While Cribb had spent the time training with the Scottish pedestrian Captain Robert Barclay, Molineaux had spent his time in taverns. During this second fight, Molineaux went down in eleven, and Cribb became the toast of London

The warfare of the Nguni tribes of Natal starts involving more killing than name-calling. Earlier Nguni battles had involved both sides lining up 100 yards apart, then throwing magical weapons, insults, and javelins at one another until it got dark or someone got hurt. Then, around 1810, Nguni battles became savage affairs marked by sophisticated envelopment tactics and the relentless pursuit of fleeing enemies. While this change is often attributed to the creation of new weapons by a Nguni clan leader called Shaka Zulu, it also owed something to the pressure that the Nguni people felt from drought, pestilence, and human overpopulation. (Warfare is usually more popular than abortion or infanticide for reducing overpopulation.)

1809:

While in exile in Brazil, the Portuguese royal family creates Rio de Janeiro’s first organized police force. The most famous member of this force was Major Miguel Nunes Vidigal, about whom novelist Manuel Antonio de Almeida said excelled "at stick, knife, fist, and razor play, absolutely unbeatable with blows of the head and feet." Nevertheless, the Luso-Brazilian elite usually associated capoeira with urban gang warfare rather than the forces of law and order. According to historian Thomas Holloway, about 10% of Rio’s arrests between 1810 and 1821 were for capoeira, a term that the Brazilian police defined as "gatherings of blacks, slave or free." Support for Holloway’s interpretation (which is not traditional) includes Bira Almeida’s stories about capoeiristas fighting with straight razors as recently as the 1950s and the apparent absence of musical instruments from capoeira play until the mid-nineteenth century. (The berimbau, or musical bow, for instance, only dates to the 1830s.) While it is tempting to see capoeira as a masculine version of the female-centered sacred dances done in the Brazilian Candomblé religion, there is no clear causal association in either the tradition or the sparse nineteenth century documentation.

1804:

A Fulani puritan named Usman dan Fodio launches what is arguably sub-Saharan Africa’s first modern jihad. (That is, one meant to spread the Faith rather than acquire land, ivory, or slaves.) Reminders of the power and spectacle of these nineteenth century holy wars are provided in the Sallah processions still held in southern Niger and northern Nigeria. Firearms were not widely used during these early Sudanese jihads, partly because firearms were hard to acquire and repair, and mainly because powder was expensive to make and dangerous to store. Besides training in cavalry skills, spiritual training included participation in a flogging game called sora, which required young men to hit one another on the body with sticks while making no outward expressions of pain. If they did, then they were judged unfit to be men, for, in the words of a modern choral accompaniment, "Lazy boys will not be able to endure/The thrashing of the ribs that only a donkey can withstand."

1800:

Bill Richmond becomes Britain’s first esteemed black pugilist. A natural middleweight born on Staten Island, New York in 1763, Richmond’s fighting skills came to the attention of a British general named Hugh Percy after the 14-year old soundly thrashed three of Lord Percy’s soldiers during a barroom brawl in 1777. Percy took Richmond with him to England in 1778, and Richmond took up prizefighting in 1791. Richmond fought Tom Cribb for a purse of 25 guineas in 1805. He lost, and turned to managing a tavern (the Horse and Dolphin) and training other black fighters. Said Richmond, "If a man of color cannot fight for the English title, then at least I can be a [teacher]." Richmond-trained fighters included Tom Molineaux of Virginia, Sam Robinson of New York, Joseph Stephenson of Maryland, plus others known only as Sutton, Massa Kendricks, Bristow, and Johnson. Richmond was also a pioneer of the practice of using raised stages during indoor mills, and fighting stripped to the waist rather than dressed in shirtsleeves.

1796:

A West Indian boxer named Joe Lashley reportedly becomes the first black prizefighter to kill a man in the English prize ring. But this was probably not the first time, only the first time in England, as American and West Indian planters were inveterate gamblers, and according to the Virginian Thomas Jefferson, an English education consisted mostly of learning "drinking, horse racing, and boxing." Boxing matches between slaves were also common in New York and Virginia before the Revolutionary War, and Texas and Louisiana before the Civil War. The source of inspiration is obvious, as the matches were called cockfights, and the players were called "chickens." Eye-gouging brawls were also reported between members of prison work-crews, where the prisoners were held together by iron collars, or jougs, connected by chains. Such collars date to the 1550s, and were originally used by the Scots and Dutch for punishing apprentices who struck their employers. As errant slaves would have been returned to their owners for punishment, most pre-Civil War chain-gang fighters would have been white. Post-Civil War chain-gang fighters, on the other hand, could have been of either race.


"he man who was
to become the senior bayonet and unarmed combat instructor of black recruits,
Arvin L. "Tony" Ghazlo, a former bodyguard and jujitsu instructor from
Philadelphia,<29> arrived in October, and the next month saw the man who was
to be his principal assistant, Ernest "Judo" Jones, reach Montford Point.
Besides teaching the recruits, these two and their assistants were responsible
for many memorable exhibitions of unarmed combat techniques."

This took place at a benefit for the/an/ex American Middleweight Champion boxer George Rooke. From the New York Times, Nov 30, 1883:

"The boxing match, next announced, proceeded to be one of the most vigorous ever witnessed upon any stage. The contestants were Mr. Julius Caesar, champion of the West Side, and Morris Grant, known as 'Scalping' Grant. These men are full-blooded negroes. The blows upon their heads might have broken paving-stones, if dealt in the same manner, but their heads gave no outward signs of injury. Everybody roared as the pugilists dashed at each other like fast-going locomotives in collision. Mr. Grant was declared the victor."


A Negro Prize Butting Match.
[Subject of Illustration]
GREENVILLE, N.C., July 22--One of the most novel contests known to the sporting world took place here today. With a desire to overdo the white people, the negroes arranged a butting match for a purse of $450 and the champion cap. The entries were Charles Burlington and Bob Brooks, two powerfully-built negro men of about twenty-four years. The butting took place in a large lot on the outskirts of the town, and was witnessed by several hundred people. The contest opened at eleven o’clock, and continued with unabated fury for two hours. At the start Burlington was the favorite, and was loudly cheered by the crowd; but he soon began to show some signs of fagging, and after the first hour failed to come to time, and had to be accorded a brief respite for rest and breath. As soon as the novel contest was renewed, Brooks’s remarkable powers of endurance and thick skull began to tell on his antagonist. A few minutes before the close of the contest Burlington fell down from exhaustion, and had to be carried out of the ring and medical attendance summoned. He was terribly bruised and butted about the cranium and face, and died a few hours after leaving the field. Brooks got [the] purse, and will, no doubt, be arrested and get a good term of imprisonment in the state prison for manslaughter.


(National Police Gazette, August 9, 1879, p.10; illustration p.13)

An Officer Butted by a Negro.
[Subject of Illustration]
A number of Negroes gathered at the corner of Sullivan and Broom streets, this city, on Thursday, 6th inst., and when requested by Officer Hendricks to move on, they refused. Francis Langdon, a short, thick-set darkey caught the officer’s club, which hung in his belt, and lowering his head butted him over. Officer Hendricks was partially stunned by the fall, but recovering, he wrenched his club from Langdon and beat him over the head. The rest of the gang were about to take a hand in the fight when Officer Ryan came to Officer Hendrick’s assistance, and together they arrested both Langdon and a companion named Johnson. Subsequently at the Yorkville court the prisoners were sent to Blackwell’s Island.

(National Police Gazette, February 22, 1879, p.13)

"Kicking-Match.--Two men, named Coon and Lawrence, had a kicking match at a tavern on the Mechanicsville road, above Troy, N.Y., on the evening of April 2. Coon kicked a board placed at a height of 7ft. 4in. which Lawrence tied. The same result followed its elevation a quarter-inch more, but on the next quarter-inch Coon failed to reach it."

National Police Gazette, April 17, 1880.

http://www.nj.com/entertainment/ledger/index.ssf?/base/entertainment-1/1066544062325720.xml

The paper is New Jersey's Star-Ledger; it was published October 19, 2003. The URL will split, so cut'n'paste.

Anyway, it's about bluesman Carolina Slim (Edward Paul Harris), who died in Newark 50 years ago at the age of 30:

QUOTE
Despite his easy-going nature, Eddie Paul could get angry if provoked, friends said, and Fuller recalled his brother once telling him Harris had spent a short stretch on a chain gang. Spread out on an agile frame and close to 6-foot-6, Eddie Paul was nobody's pushover.

Samuel H. Winstead, a retired tobacco and cattle farmer, remembered Harris as handy in the art of "knocking," a kind of boxing that banned gloves and punches to the head and was popular among local black youth in the late '30s and early '40s. "Those who challenged Eddie Paul knew they were in for a tough battle," he said.

Peace...

BrotherD,

thanks for that - EJMAS is a real goldmine for historical information.

I'm curious about "cutting" - I think it's mentioned in Professor Desch-Obi's research and it might pop up once or twice at EJMAS as well. As I understand it, cutting was a form of modified boxing, or a synthesis of European bare-knuckle puglism and some of the African unarmed combat styles, practiced during the 1800s. Assuming that we can literally trace some aspects of the 52s back that far, cutting would seem like a logical research topic. Do you have any more information about it?

We have someone claiming UFC 1-4 was fixed.

Prison guard claims.

Systema.

Does anyone else suspect this might be a hoax?

I chatted (over the Internet) some years ago with a wrestler/grappler/pro-wrestler that commented on the early UFC's being "worked".

I never pressed the matter -- I just didn't care enough -- but it is interesting to hear these opinions (or are they facts?) voiced again so many years later.

-daGorilla

There's even a book out about it. Severn was a red herring. He was thought to be some washed up wrestler, he wasn;t supposed to give Royce any trouble.

Re: Art Davies UFC -
If there has been so much insider agreement about the true nature early - agreement I never saw before but for my voice - then please, just file it away as interesting experience.

The NEW UFC is much more fair, the competition MUCH better - and if Arts old buddies just arrived on the scene NOW? They would most probably not make the finals.

And Jellyman - Big Dan was frickin feared in the pro-wrestling circuit. He worked 'stiff' and would hurt ya..even though he was trying to act and not do so. He was too 'real' to ever get over and relax - no fine tuning of movement was possible...Shamrock was much more flexible....the guys didnt like to work with him because he was very strong - and when the crowd cheered his name - he would forget its all a work. BUT Severn? HE was unable to go lightand act the part - when he heard the roar of the crowd - he went to real mode. Thats why Vinne Mac only let him stay in the old WWF for a short while - he was frickin killin the stars -- and thats not good for the biz.

The boys didnt really like either of them - because they were real in skills - and both were more than happy to remind the starz that they were actors but they were trying to act. That they could easily tear the best of em a new asshole anytime and anywhere they pleased.

Just a lil pro-wresting thing I wanted to tell all about.

BTW - Royce was offered a very lucrative contract by Vinny - and he turned him down.
The reasons why have been debated in the pro-wrestling circuit for years. The late personal friend Ray "Big Bossman" was supposedly there at a few discussions on the speaker phone during negotiations. Supposedly, Royce did not want to become a character, travel the extensive circuit, have to occasionally 'lose' in a work, or put up with getting hit by chairs or bounced through tables....even for the VERY much money Vince was offering for a 1 year, renewable, contract. Ray told me that was a good decision for Royce - because the 'guys' would have been very stiff with him..trying to 'accidentaly' really hurt him - easy to do by accident in a show. Just to 'prove' an ego thing.
Shamrock and Dan S. - they faced the same thing - and gave better than they got. A couple of locker room fights after the show were told to me..and Dan and Ken were always ahead before it was broken up.
And most of the pro boys in the WWF - were more than happy to see them both get 'released from their contracts' (Errrr, FIRED).

OK - enough locker room bullshit for now.

I'm curious about "cutting"
DdlR, the only info I have on cutting has to do with using a razor, and boxing tactics.
with the razor the idea was to cause bleeding this would serve as a warning ,not to go on.

As for boxing cutting was a way to make your guy bleed. By headbutting or rubbing your head into a cut. the other way was to use the gloves to start then open a cut. Blood would get into the eyes, and make your opp. not want to fight or casue him some problems seeing. Other than that I'm not sure what it is. I've read Deshi 's stuff, but he doesn't go into details, I know that he has stuff for his book. Maybe he'll drop it then. As for how far 52 goes back it's just another name for that old thing... The difference is hip-hop ,not blues, or Jazz... Hip-hop is the music that drives it. We follow the beat and the drum leads.
Once you know what to look for there is plenty of info out there some of it is freelance, while a small group maintains the core.
peace

There's even a book out about it. Severn was a red herring. He was thought to be some washed up wrestler, he wasn;t supposed to give Royce any trouble.

Red herring means deliberate misleading or misdirection right?
Who in the UFC knew knew of Severn's real skills? If no one did,
then the UFC wasn't deliberately misleading the public, and it
wouldn't be fair to say Severn was misleading the UFC -- he had the
right to keep his skill to himself, so he was more of a crouching tiger/hidden dragon.

LOL - maybe from Dans perspective - but from the 'chosen few' and Art?
He was supposed to crumble like a house of cards in a tornado - like Ronnie Van Cleif did when faced with a Gracie...HUGE buildup - and only one front kick away from being OWN3D....odd, ol Ron became some sort of what?... 'a commissioner' or something for awhile under the OLD UFC -- I suspect that was a circle jerk, IMHO.
Art could deal from the middle of the deck very handily.

But Dan S. - he really was considered cannon fodder - and no one was more surprised than Davies when a washed up 'pro-wrestler' came on strong.

No one expected him to last a single match - except for Dan himself.

Kudos!

Hate to resurrect this thread, but Tom Green (prof of anthro at Texas A&M, http://anthropology.tamu.edu/faculty/green/profile.htm), finally got back to me with a little video.

A former jailee in the NY prison system speaks about 52 and shows off a tiny bit of it in this youtube video. Start watching at 2:09, where a guy explains in jail, you had to be good with your hands.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNrnybnrox4&mode=related&search

Really tiny. It's about 3 seconds worth.

Really tiny. It's about 3 seconds worth.
That's about all the time needed to put somebody's lights out.

That's about all the time needed to put somebody's lights out.

relevance?

relevance?
How much of the art do you need to see?
If you saw a boxer shadowbox a jab cross bodyhook uppper cut, you've seen the goods, but it doesn't look like a lot.

As a 20 year vet of NYC/Rikers corrections - the 52 blocks/jailhouse rocks? Has turned out to be more an urban legend than a reality. In the 80's, in Brooklyn - therer was channel 5 kung fu theater -on every Saturday -1pm to 3 pm. Go to work at BCF in the 80's on a SATURDAY? Someone was going to Kings County Hospital..every week...kung fu theater balls...and although there was an urban legend/mystique about the 52 blocks- I never saw it.

All I ever saw from any claimant was a mish mosh of bitchslapping/boxing/tv kungy fooey and pro wresting...with abit of biting and boxing mixed into the stew.
And a lil fast shanking, also.

I knew an older inmate that claimed to know the rock - and he also did like the Spofford kids do....blowing up like puffer fish...with no skllilz believing a myth to be true, unable to
fight to save his frosted flakes....ITS Simply not as claimed - end of story.

Although it is true that inmates will 'teach' each other every effective movement they know - there is no solid lexicon of a martial art...though the teachers attach 52 to their strange brew....they want to be seen as
wise..but its all lies. Lies so repeated that they begin to believe em.

YA KNOW, I really do wish there was jailhouse rock...and I looked for it...and found nothing special.....nothing but a dream and a bucket of steam. (Rikers Term....ALL the old dogs would 'get it").

Yeah there is a list cold cocking dirty trix...and thats not anything but being a street kid....but there never was an organized 52.....and I looked for chupacabre for almost 2 decades -- and openly invite any jailhouse rocker to meet with me..and vid it as we did it - from both camps , on Bullshido!

But I dont expect any real time reply....nobody else does, either.

Anybody gots the Rocks here?

Wanna do the 52?

Naw, maybe I should look for a unicorn..or a leprachaun.....ghosts or fairies?

There simply is no Nessy - nor big footy demon ..and anyone who claimes to be a 52'er?

My PM is set up.....and bring your camera!

Oh, bring your bluecross ID also.

Brooklyn born Flatbush and Vandervere projects here - and over 2 decades of looking for the jailhouse rock..on The Rock (Rikers Island). Never saw it....saw great cuttings and bustin grills - but absolutely no sort of formalized method of 52.

This is bullshido...at its worst - - an investigation into a form of urban/ethnic fallacy - and needs to be googled as the bullshido it is.

LOL - Curtis Jackson was a skinny ***** on Rikers - a 'maytag', in his youth. BUT 'get rich or die tryin" - just another inmate lying!

And 'fitty cent' can send his lawyers in (possible) damage control - but his conviction records and daily logbooks stand.

There never was anything as the jail house rock or the 52 blocks - other than a dream and a bucket steam...just a few from the Urban Goju school....a couple of convicts from Tong dojo....and even less numbers from Visitations classes...no real codified method....just some kids wishing to be killas.

Jailhouse nasty stuff....oh hell yeah...but nothing organized and codified - its really TRS

marketing a mix of urban legend......song from the Wu Tang CLAN.....and nothing more.

A sweet sweetbacks

badass song or a dolomite fantasy......Bruce Lee
or Segal
against
25 attackers/bullshido.

IF I am 'wrong' and someone wishes to prove it real time., posted here and recorded for all?

PM me.

End of rant!

PM me..lets rock.

(Why do I know there will never be a real deal PM?).


If it comes to pass that you do kick my ass....I will ask to train with 'you'.

There will be no takers - and maybe fakers....but my offer is true and blue.

Teach me....kick my ass, and teach me.


Elvis sang of the jailhouse rock....and we can go to the party - but there is simply bigfoot serving punch...the truth IS out there - but there is no 52 to find..and probably
never was...legends are often fairytails....if you wish to ride the tail of a fairy?
lotsa luck.