Gozo Shioda

Quick Facts

Date of Birth9/9/1915

Date of Death7/17/1994

Country of OriginJapan

Biography

Gozo Shioda was a Japanese aikido master and the founder of the Yoshinkan style. He was born on 9 September 1915 in Tokyo, the official Yoshinkan website gives the Yotsuya district, Wikipedia gives Shinjuku. He died on 17 July 1994 aged 78. His father Seiichi Shioda was a physician and built a dojo on his land, which he named Yoshinkan.

At secondary school he practised judo and kendo. On 23 May 1932, aged seventeen, he visited the dojo of Morihei Ueshiba, ended up on his back after a failed attempt at a kick, and then joined as a student. According to Yoshinkan he trained under Ueshiba for eight years. In 1941 he graduated from Takushoku University, and during the war he served in China as secretary to General Shunroku Hata and was also sent to Taiwan and Borneo.

In 1950 he began guarding the Nihon Kokan Steel plant in Tsurumi and from 1952 he taught there regularly. In 1954 he gave a display at a martial arts demonstration in Tokyo for which, according to Yoshinkan, he received the highest prize. In 1955 the dojo in Shinjuku opened, where Yoshinkan began to operate. In 1957 he created the Senshusei training course for the Tokyo Metropolitan Police. In 1961 he received the 9th dan from Ueshiba and in 1985, according to Yoshinkan, the 10th dan from the International Budo Federation. He wrote the book Dynamic Aikido (1968) and the autobiography Aikido Jinsei (1985).

In 1990 he founded the International Yoshinkan Aikido Federation with his son Yasuhisa. His students included Kyoichi Inoue, Takashi Kushida, Tsutomu Chida and Jacques Payet.

Early life

Gozo Shioda was born on 9 September 1915 in Tokyo as the second son of the physician Seiichi Shioda. The official Yoshinkan website gives the Yotsuya district, Wikipedia gives Shinjuku. He was a small and sickly child and attributed his survival to the medical skills of his father. His father built a dojo on his land, and according to a text written by Shioda himself in 1986, the name Yoshinkan was chosen for it by his maternal grandfather Todo Kato after the book Saikontan.

At secondary school he learned judo and kendo. According to Stanley Pranin, the headmaster of his school, Munetaka Abe, persuaded his father to enrol the son in the dojo of Ueshiba. On 23 May 1932 the seventeen-year-old Gozo visited it and then joined with the guarantee of his father and of the headmaster Abe.

Training and teachers

According to Yoshinkan he trained under Morihei Ueshiba for eight years from 1932. About twenty live-in students lived in the dojo at the time, and the day lasted from five in the morning to nine in the evening. He interrupted school for two years to be able to train fully, and then continued at Takushoku University, which he completed in 1941. In the same year he served as partner to Tsutomu Yukawa during a demonstration by Ueshiba before the imperial family and taught aiki budo at the military schools in Nakano and Toyama.

From March 1941 he served in the army, in Beijing as secretary to General Shunroku Hata, and was also sent to Taiwan and Borneo. After demobilization in the autumn of 1946 he trained and worked on the farm of Ueshiba in Iwama, for several weeks according to Pranin, for about two months according to an interview from 2003.

Contribution and innovations

In 1950 he began guarding the Nihon Kokan Steel plant in Tsurumi and recruited about fifty-five athletes from Takushoku clubs, and from 1952 he taught there regularly. In 1954, at a Tokyo demonstration before about fifteen thousand spectators, he gave a performance that according to Pranin was received best of all. In 1955, with the support of Shoshiro Kudo of the Tomin bank, the dojo in Shinjuku opened, where Yoshinkan began to operate.

From November 1955 Kyoichi Inoue trained with him, and techniques were taught in parts with commands and fixed basic forms. In 1957, according to Yoshinkan, he created the Senshusei course for the Tokyo Metropolitan Police, while Inoue states that the riot police began to practise aikido in 1960. In 1961 he received the 9th dan from Ueshiba, in 1983 the title hanshi and in 1985 the 10th dan from the International Budo Federation. He published Dynamic Aikido (1968) and the autobiography Aikido Jinsei (1985).

Philosophy and principles

In his own text An Aikido Life from 1986, Shioda stresses that aikido without correct basics is not aikido and that stance, techniques and the alertness called zanshin rest on the basics. According to him aikido knows no competition, because budo is a fight in which either you overcome the opponent or he overcomes you, and rules belong to sport. In an interview published by Aikido Journal in 2003 he said that the spirit of aikido is to seek harmony.

Legends and documented facts

It is often written that Yoshinkan broke away from Aikikai. According to Stanley Pranin there was never a formal split and the two groups developed independently, and Wikipedia quotes Shioda as saying that he never truly broke away from the mainstream.

The story from 1932, in which he ended up on the ground after a kick, rests only on narration. Pranin describes a fall on his back, not a crash into a wall, and entry into the dojo with the guarantee of his father and the headmaster, not on the same day. We have not been able to verify independently the narration of Shioda about an incident in Shanghai in 1941. The claim that in a real fight atemi strikes make up 70 percent and throws 30 percent, and also the six basic movements kihon dosa as his saying, we have not found in the sources. The alleged schooling together with Masahiko Kimura and Masutatsu Oyama is given only by Wikipedia and according to the dates of graduation it is improbable.

Legacy

In 1990 he founded the International Yoshinkan Aikido Federation and the international Senshusei program with his son Yasuhisa. He died in 1994 at the age of 78, and the date 17 July is given by the table of the official Yoshinkan website. According to Wikipedia his students included Kyoichi Inoue, Tsutomu Chida and Jacques Payet.

Takashi Kushida went to the USA in 1973 at the invitation of a group from Detroit and in 1991 founded Aikido Yoshokai. Kyoichi Inoue left Yoshinkan in March 2006 and founded Aikido Shinwakan, and other senior instructors also founded independent organizations.

Teachers, students and family

Associated Martial Arts

Ranks and titles

• 9th danAikido · 1961
• 10th danYoshinkan Aikido · 1985

Quotes