A Little History

I was looking through some old news papers, and found the advertisement for my 1 week Free Tae Kwon Do class - back in 1977-78 (I was 15 year old). I believe that classes back then costed $30.00 per month which allowed you to attend as many classes as you want (and I did).  

My first school was part of the United Tae Kwon Do Federation which is part of the large International Tae kwon Do Federation.  My rank in the UTF was a greenbelt as of June 6th, 1979.  
I was part of this school until the owner sold the school to another martial arts owner that taught multiple martial art disciplines including Tae Kwon Do.   This owner name was Jami Betha Epstein, and claimed the rank of 3rd degree black belt, and a national heavy-weight champion.  Here is an ad that was place in the paper during a grace period when the two were merging. 

At that time I did not know what Tae Kwon Do Style Karate was - but I found out three years later in Sept 1980, which I was a Bo-Dan (black belt candidate) .  I was told by a ex-student that Sahbom-nim Jami was not recognized in the Tae Kwon Do world, and that he would never promote me to a black belt.  That I should leave and go to Master Kim's school in West Orange.  After some serious thought, I decided to leave and join the West Orange School, which was part of the World TaeKwonDo Federation in Oct 1980 and stayed until 1981 at the rank of green belt. The reason I stopped was due to a lack of money, and a lack of transportation to the school.  But the biggest reason was that I was heart broken that I trusted my instructor, only to find out he was a fake (at least in TKD).  

My story is a cautionary tale, which I hope encourages you to ensure that you don't get involved with martial art instructors that don't have clear affiliation with a larger organization.   There are three large  TKD organizations.  WT, ITF and ATA.   I personal preference is the WT (or Kukkiwon curriculum) school.   This is the organization that is involved with the Olympic Games.   

 

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