- Originally published on the Bartitsu.org site on Wednesday, 24th April 2013
Text from “The Official Report of the Japan British Exhibition 1910 at the Great White City, Shepherd’s Bush, London”. The heavyweight wrestler standing in the top two pictures has been identified as Akitaro Ono, a 4th-dan judo black belt and one of the Japanese athletes who toured internationally, “taking on all comers” in wrestling competitions during the early 1900s.
The Kano system of Ju-Jitsu … is demonstrated by the leading experts in this Japanese method of self-defence. The lessons given will be found both valuable and entertaining. How a weak person may master a stronger by the knowledge of a few of the more simpler tricks will be shown. Physical culture by the Ju-Jitsu system will no doubt interest many. The more skilled professors in this art will hold wrestling contests, principally to show that the practice of Ju-Jitsu is not dangerous as many Westerners seem to suppose.
The Kuatsu system of restoring “disabled” and unconscious persons will be fully demonstrated. This restorative science is worthy the attention of the physician and layman alike. The Japanese claim a knowledge of this science would be the means of saving many lives. The methods of Kuatsu are efficacious in cases of sunstroke and drowning where ordinary medical means fail.