5 Martial-Arts Pioneer

Chapter 4 Martial-Arts Pioneer When Bruce played Kato on The Green Hornet, he introduced millions of television viewers to the martial arts. Because of him, the popularity of kung fu soared in the United States. Bruce went back to teaching kung fu when the show was cancelled. He had a family to support, after all. He and Linda were busy raising Brandon, who liked to practice kung fu moves just like his dad. Then, in 1969, Bruce and Linda had their second child, a girl they named Shannon.

When Bruce went back to teaching, stars

lined up at his door. Actor James Coburn wanted to learn from Bruce. So did actor Steve McQueen. One famous director paid for Bruce to fly to Switzerland to teach him there! Even seven-foot two-inch basketball legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar wanted Bruce to teach him. (Bruce and Abdul- Jabbar became good friends, and Bruce eventually got to cast him as his opponent in a movie.) Bruce choreographed the martial-arts scenes in some movies. That means he helped set up the fights called for in the script and showed the actors what to do. One of those movies was

called The Wrecking Crew. In it, actor Dean Martin plays a spy. Bruce taught Martin how to use kung fu. People in the movie business wanted to learn from the best, and Bruce was the best. Not everyone was happy about Bruce teaching martial arts. There were two reasons for that. The first reason was who Bruce was teaching. Some people thought it was a bad idea for Bruce to teach the martial arts to Westerners. (Westerners, or the Western world, is a term to describe cultures, not geography. For example, people from Europe and North America are considered Westerners. People from China,

Japan, and the Middle East are considered Easterners, or from the Eastern world.) For hundreds of years, martial arts, such as kung fu, had been taught only by Chinese masters to Chinese students. Many traditional Chinese people thought it was wrong for Bruce to share kung fu secrets with people who were not Chinese. In fact, when Bruce first started teaching kung fu in Oakland, California, a group of traditional Chinese teachers challenged him to a fight. If their representative beat Bruce, he would have to stop teaching non-Chinese people. Bruce took the challenge and easily won the fight. His studio stayed open, and he continued teaching whomever he wanted.

The second problem some people had with Bruce was over what he was teaching. He wasn't sticking to the old ways of teaching martial arts. Bruce didn't believe that any particular martial art was best in all circumstances. After all, he had learned in street fights that opponents are