Seigo Murakami Inducted 1993 Seigoro Murakami established the first dojo in the San Fernando Valley of Southern Calfornia in 1921. source: Wikipedia In 2002 the fiftieth anniversary was celebrated with a book of USJF history. In it were a number of biographies....

Toshiaki Inouye Inducted 1994 Inouye Sensei was born on March 9, 1925, in Hilo, Hawaii. His lifelong pursuit of Judo began at the age of 9 in 1934. He received the rank of Shodan on November 10, 1941 at the age 16. On April 5, 1994, he was inducted into the US Judo...

Yasuyuki Sakabe Inducted 1993 from the archive – a program from 1978 PROFESSOR YASUYUKI SAKABE The Judo Black Belt Association of Hawaii dedicates the 1978 National Championships to PROFESSOR YASUYUKI SAKABE. A distinguished international judoka, Professor Yasuyuki...

Sam Hamai Inducted 1994 On January 27, 1994, the Judo community lost one of its leaders when Isamu (Sam) Hamai passed away at the age of 72 at his home in Palo Alto, California. Hamai Sensei was survived his wife Emiko, son Harold and wife Laura, and his two...

Mits Kimura Inducted 1993 Mitsuho Kimura was born in San Francisco in 1916. He was oldest of 8 children. About 1931, the family moved to the San Gabriel valley, in Southern California, and a few years later, Kimura graduated from El Monte High School, where he...

Takahiko Ishikawa Inducted 1993 Memories of My Sensei Takahiko Ishikawa, 9th Dan by Harold (Hal) E. Sharp I would like to share some of my experiences with you about my Sensei and dear friend, Takahiko Ishikawa, 9th Dan, who passed away at the age of 91 in June, 2008....

Vince Tamura Inducted 1994 Vince Tamura was born in Fife, Washington, one of eleven children. It was there in a Japanese-American community, that he first became interested in Judo. At the age of five, Vince stepped on Judo mat for the first time. After residing...

James Bregman Inducted 1993 James Steven (“Jim”) Bregman (born November 17, 1941, in Arlington, Virginia) was a member of the first American team to compete in judo in the Summer Olympics. Jim Bregman started his judo career when only 12 but he quickly became very...

Joey Wanag Inducted 2010 As a 1992 Olympian, he won a Silver Medal at the 1991 World Champion and Gold Medals at the 1990 World University Games and the 1991 Pan-Am Games. Joseph Paul Wanag (born August 2, 1966) is an American judoka. He trained under Kiyoshi Shiina....

Henry Stone Inducted 1993 The governance of U.S. Judo started in 1952, through the efforts of Dr. Henry A. Stone, Major Donn Draeger (USMC), and others. At that time there was no national authority to give guidance to local judo communities and insure the logical and...