Songmookwan the Pine Tree School: Korea's Shotokan

The history of Songmookwan begins with the history of Ro Byung-jik trained who trained in Japan in the traditional Okinawan martial art of Tote-Jitsu under the tutelage of Master Gishin Funakoshi and was a classmate of Lee Won-kuk the founder of Chungdokwan .

Master Funakoshi's "pen name" was Shoto which means pine tree. His students in Japan started to call his teachings Shotokan-ryu. As a loyal student of Master Funakoshi, Master Ro founded the Songmookwan which is the Korean translation of Shotokan out of his respect for his Master, Gishin Funakoshi. The school was founded in Kae Song, Korea in 1946.

Like Funakoshi, Grandmaster Ro put an important emphasis of weight training and talyuntae (the traditional forging post unique to Okinawa-Te and Karate, a.k.a. the makiwara board). Master Ro required that each Songmookwan student punch the talyuntae at least one hundred times before class started. He did not allow students to spar until 4th gup (this means 4th grade, it means there are only 4 more grades until black belt). Kyukpa, board breaking was reserved for only for black belt and higher.

Click here to read the entire article about Grandmaster Ro Byung-jik and the pine tree style, Songmookwan or to learn more about Taekwondo-4self-mastery.com

Yours in the Spirit of Wisdom

Childan Sam Naples
Grandmaster Chun Taekwondo Jidokwan
http://www.taekwondo-4self-mastery.com