Marine Corps Demonstration

Unarmed Combat

At The

First Marine District Headquarters

Garden City, New York

Recently, Grand Master Ed McGrath, with the aid of one of his long time students, Steve DiLorenzo-Sixth Degree Black Belt and some of his Active Duty Marines, especially Major Tom Riley, a brown belt who has studied with Mr. McGrath for some three years. The demo was supported by the Headquarters Commanding Officer, Colonel Warren J. Foersch.

Hanshi McGrath gave a demo with a wide range of subjects, including a history of the art of Isshin-ryu, wherein he discussed Soke Tatsuo Shimabuku, the creator of this unique martial art and spoke of his relationship with his Sensei, Don Nagle and the manner in which he taught the art, as its preeminent proponent of the art, who had the first Isshin-ryu dojo in the United States. He even discussed the fact that Isshin-ryu came to Sensei Nagle’s aid, in his work a an undercover narcotics detective in the Jersey City Police Department, relating some of the daring incidents, which made him one of New Jersey’s most highly decorated officers.

He then explained why Isshin-ryu was perfect for adaptation to self-defense. When he finished that, he proved it, by showing his prowess, fighting in close quarter fighting with his black and brown belts, engaging them and demonstrating how quickly and easily, they could be put down and finished off. He had a very well built Marine in his Camos, come on the deck with him and asked the volunteer to try to strangle him. At first, the Marine was reluctant to squeeze hard enough to suit Master McGrath, who exhorted him to squeeze harder, then harder, until the Marine was doing his best to strangle him. Despite the fact that Hanshi McGrath is nearing his 70^th birthday, he stood there, with evident nonchalance and then, used a move that quickly broke the strangle hold. He then showed, several times, that by placing his hands on the aggressor’s wrists and pushing them together, while stepping back out of the hold. He made it look easy.

He then used several volunteers to demonstrate how quickly you could disable an assailant by briskly touching certain nerve spots upon the foe’s body. All of the volunteers agreed that they had to let go, because of the intensity of the discomfort. Following that, he demonstrated how easily he could remove a gun or knife from the opponent, then turning the weapon on them.

The demo later proved to get several new students for the class that Grand Master McGrath, gives at this Marine Base on Tuesday and Thursday, from 1600 hours to 1730 hours (4:00 PM to 5:30 PM) on both days.

At the invitation of Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Shusko, Commanding Officer of The Marine Corps Martial Arts Program, Grand Master McGrath will be visiting Raider Hall, Quantico, Va. for three days in March and will spend another day at the National Archives, to glean data on the Marine Raiders for a book he proposes to write about these ultimate warriors. He has also been invited to the Marine Raiders Annual Convention at Raider Hall, in August, to meet and speak with them, to gain more personal insight on their war against the best that the Japanese could throw at them. Mr. McGrath is back where he is the happiest, with his fellow Marines.

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