The Father of the Modern Martial Arts School Business Model

At last year’s Extreme Success Academy, Pat Burleson was presented with the 2009 NAPMA Lifetime Achievement Award for his pioneering contributions to the martial arts professional school instruction industry. Grand Master Burleson created many of the business systems that are now standard in the model used by most schools. He studied under Grand Master Jhoon Rhee and in Okinawa. He was also a Golden Gloves boxing champion. A documentary of his life story is in process covering the “Blood and Guts” era of martial arts. Read the full story inside.

Pat Burleson: Honoring a Martial Arts Business Pioneer

Many legendary martial artists have contributed to the development of martial arts school business systems— Alan Steen, Jhoon Rhee, Ed Parker, Al Tracy, Jeff Smith and Stephen Oliver—but one served as the catalyst, the person who first made those systems work successfully, and he is Grand Master Pat Burleson, the 2009 NAPMA Lifetime Achievement Award honoree.

Grand Master Burleson is a 10th-Degree Black Belt, who started in martial arts in 1958 with Grand Master Jhoon Rhee. He had previous studied in Okinawa, and was a Golden Gloves boxing champion.

There is an historical lineage of almost 50 years that starts with Burleson and then connects to all the names above and many others. In fact, it’s no exaggeration to state that Burleson’s pioneering effort is the foundation on which the successful careers and businesses of thousands of instructors and school owners have been built—including yours.

Without these business systems, there wouldn’t be so many schools today, exposing millions of students to the life-changing benefits of martial arts. Most schools would still be small, part-time and training only a few dozen hard-core enthusiasts.

During the 2009 NAPMA Extreme Success Academy, Stephen Oliver had an exclusive interview with Grand Master Burleson in which he tells his story, including his critical role in the evolution of the modern, commercial martial arts school. Stephen Oliver: It was a privilege to present Grand Master Pat Burleson with NAPMA’s 2009 Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2009 Extreme Success Academy.

Grand Master Burleson graciously agreed to speak with me and share his observations of the last 50 years of the martial arts industry. Grand Master Burleson, let’s return to the 1950s. How did you start in the martial arts?

Pat Burleson: Before I answer your question, I want to thank you for the award. I can’t tell you how impressed I am with NAPMA’s Extreme Success Academy and your leadership of the event.

I was in the U. S. Navy during the late 50s, stationed at a Marine air wing in Japan. I was already participating in boxing on the base. At that time, Judo was widely accepted, partially because Japan convinced the allied forces that Judo was not a violent art and could promote peace, following the war.

Karate, however, was still considered a more violent activity. Although the base was near a city of a halfmillion people, there wasn’t a formal Karate school in town. The local Judo instructor had to invite his friend, a Karate instructor, from another part of Japan to do an exhibition at a boxing competition in which I fought. It fascinated me when I saw the small Karate instructor kicking as high as my head. My hands were good for boxing, but I thought I needed someone to teach me some of the Karate basics. That wasn’t easy because it wasn’t taught commercially in Japan.

In addition, there weren’t many traditional instructors who wanted to teach an American, so I took a train to a seaside fishing village where there was a Karate club. I talked the instructor into allowing me to remain, so I could grab a few scraps of information. I don’t think he and his students ever embraced me, but they did let me learn a few things.

Stephen Oliver: What was the state of martial arts in the U.S. when you returned from Japan?

Pat Burleson: There was nothing here. Just to stay active, I started to teach my younger brother in our garage. Some of his friends became interested, so I taught all of them, but soon we outgrew the garage. I then rented a building for $45 month in 1960.

I ran an ad in the newspaper that offered Karate instructions. It wasn’t very sophisticated, but I received a large number of phone calls, and started teaching classes. I didn’t know what I was doing; I just loved the martial arts. I think that is indicative of many of the GIs who returned from Asia after World War II and the Korean War. They were the seeds of martial arts in America, which became the melting pot of martial arts.

My first sale is an interesting story: I had painted “Karate” on the storefront window. One day a couple entered the school and asked me where the kitchen was located; they thought it was a Chinese restaurant! Instead, I told them about Karate, and enrolled them.

Stephen Oliver: How would you rate your skill set as a school operator in 1960?

Pat Burleson: Slim to none. It was a labor of love totally, and it was a successful month when I paid the rent.

Stephen Oliver: How did you meet Alan Steen and Jhoon Rhee? Pat Burleson: I had heard that another martial artist was teaching in Dallas, so I drove there and met Allen Steen, and we became friends. He was teaching near a college, so he had a huge school, comparatively speaking, filled with college students.

Allen was training under Jhoon Rhee, who was a Korean Army officer,teaching a class at the college. Allen had graduated from there and had returned to teach. He told me about Jhoon Rhee and wanted to introduce me and ask if he would accept me as a student. Allen and I were both Brown Belts at the time. There probably weren’t three Black Belts in a six-state area.

When I met Grand Master Rhee, he was conducting a demo at the college; however, he was preparing to leave Texas and move to Washington D.C.

He was very kind and open, and accepted me as a student. He told Allen that he would teach him half of the Black Belt form, and then teach me the other half. He then told us to teach each other our halves of the form. Once we learned the complete form, we would then promote to Black Belt after the test. Allen tested for Black Belt first, and then I did three months later.

Stephen Oliver: When and how did you start to evolve your small school to a school business? Pat Burleson: It was during the mid 60s. I was working for my father, who owned a trucking company, and teaching part-time.

One day, some local businessmen came to my school and wanted to take private lessons. We developed a great rapport, working one-on-one. They were executives with the Fred Astaire Dance System, and were licensed for this part of Texas. They used a very effective sales system that taught students ballroom dancing as well as improving their confidence. They were very successful financially. They made me an offer, so I went into business with them. They taught me their system, which I then started to use in my martial arts school. The number of new students and dollars in the bank just exploded.

Stephen Oliver: What was your average monthly gross revenue?

Pat Burleson: In 1960, I was doing $5,000 a month, so I was rich. Stephen Oliver: That would probably translate to $25,000 or $30,000 today. How many active students did you have?

Pat Burleson: A couple hundred. I became financially successful very quickly. The word spread throughout the Karate community, so I showed many instructors what I had learned from those Fred Astaire executives.

There is a similarity of what I experienced then and what too many school owners still experience today. Those Fred Astaire executives taught me a business system that was like a fine-tuned 12-cylinder Ferrari. For some reason or other, however, I ran my schools on just two of those cylinders; and they were the two at the front end, generating leads and new students. My mistake, which many school owners still repeat, is not using those other six cylinders, or the back-end of the system. Stephen, you and NAPMA have done a beautiful job showing today’s school owners how to power their schools’ success with all eight cylinders.

Stephen Oliver: With whom did you share the system that you were using in your school?

Pat Burleson: I taught Jhoon Rhee the system; and it wasn’t easy with his limited understanding of English. I was also concerned that he might react negatively to the idea of making money. Having lived in Asia, I knew Asian instructors were a little sensitive about the commercialism of martial arts.

I also showed my system to Ed Parker in Los Angeles. He understood the possibilities immediately, and was not adverse to making real money. Eventually, he partnered with some people in LA and franchised the system, which led to a large chain of schools.

Stephen Oliver: That was Al Tracy. The business system you learned went from you to Jhoon Rhee and Ed Parker, and Ed Parker to Al Tracy. That’s quite a lineage that includes thousands of schools throughout the U.S. You also taught the system to Chuck Norris, Bob Wall and Joe Lewis.

Pat Burleson: I met them through tournaments. During those days, martial arts was predominately expressed through tournaments. If you wanted to know what was occurring in the Karate world and at Karate schools, then you had to go to tournaments.

The informality and camaraderie of those days made it easy to exchange ideas. A Comprehensive Biography of Pat Burleson [Editor’s Note: Burleson biography reprinted from www.usadojo.com] Pat Burleson, founder of the American Karate system, holds a 10th degree black belt. Pat began his study of the martial arts in Japan in 1957, a competition career in 1963. In addition to regional championships, he claimed the first US National Championship in Washington D.C. in 1964.

Pat started boxing as a youngster, eventually going to the golden gloves championships while still in high school. He joined the Navy in 1955 to “see the world,” and while stationed in Asia, this stocky seaman became a traveling boxing champion for the USN, fighting at bases throughout the Pacific basin. Being a fighter from the United States, he naturally came in contact with the fighting arts of the Orient. His original martial arts training came in the wado-ryu style in 1957 in Iwakuni, Japan. Burleson trained with several schools of karate and Chinese boxing in Japan and Hong Kong before he came back to the states in 1959.

Settling back into his hometown of Fort Worth, Texas, Burleson worked out with the few other ex-servicemen that he could find that had trained in Asia. He had already earned a red belt in Korean tang soo do when he was introduced to Dallas-ite Allen R. Steen. “Allen was a senior to me and I can definitely remember that his abilities were better than mine at the time,” says Burleson.

Steen was a brown belt under tae kwon do pioneer Jhoon Rhee, and was eager for his new friend to meet Mr. Rhee. “He [Rhee] was very open to letting me work out with his group,” recalls Burleson, “although he wanted me to change my red belt to brown belt for his system.” Steen made his black belt in the summer of 1963, and three months later Burleson himself was promoted to 1st- Degree Black Belt.

When Rhee moved to Washington D.C., Steen and Burleson took over the reigns as the “fathers of karate” in the Southwest. “In my opinion, the American system of martial arts really started in two places in this country,” says Burleson, “in Chicago and in Dallas/Ft. Worth. It spread quickly from there to place like Los Angeles and New York, but the real beginnings were in those two places. In 1963, the first World Karate Championship was held in Chicago, jointly sponsored by Robert Trias and the late John Keehan (aka “Count Dante”). “AlGene Caraulia won it as a brown belt,” Burleson states. “Allen was there, myself, Jim Harrison and a few others. In those days there were no belt division; in fact, no rules to speak of. That first time in Chicago you saw the marriage of kicking and punching. We went up there with only our kicks, but we dropped everyone we hit. After seeing the hand techniques on those guys, however, we went back to learn some punches. “Ed Parker is a good example of that type of thinking,” says Burleson. “He and his bunch [from California] were at Chicago and they couldn’t kick over knee high, but they went back and worked and six months later they were doing head kicks.” Burleson maintains that the birth of American martial arts came in 1963 in Chicago. “We started to integrate right there.”

There weren’t very many tournaments in those days. Fighters had to travel all over the country if they wanted to compete in the handful that were available. 1963 was the first year of the Southwest Karate Championships, sponsored by Steen, and later to be renamed the United States Karate Championships. Ed Parker held his first International Karate Championships in 1964. “The people to beat at those first few tournaments were  the Chicago/East coast fightersand the Dallas/Ft. Worth people,” remembers Burleson. Indeed, it was Burleson himself who won the first National Karate Championships in 1964 in Washington D. C., held by Jhoon Rhee. Burleson joined AlGene Caraulia, who later taught out of Cleveland, Ohio, as the first nationally recognized champions in “American Karate.” Burleson, in fact, gained the nickname “the granddaddy” of the early tournament fighters.

In spite of his own reputation, Burleson says that the three top fighters of that period were Allen Steen, Mike Stone and Jim Harrison. “They were totally awesome,” claims Burleson, “Because if you didn’t defend yourself against these three you could be seriously crippled for life. A lot of guys were intimidated by them and didn’t fight that kind of fight, but if you intended on beating them, then it turned into a life or death thing.”

“As I said, there were no rules in those days,” remembers Burleson “The rules in those days were kind of made up in those first few tournaments. And they were quasi-rules at that. That was the terrifying part— anything could happen.” This period of competition is justifiably called the “Blood-’n’- Guts Era” of American martial arts. Although the rules stated certain grounds for disqualification, most competitors and officials alike ignored them. Fighters were constantly kicked out of the rings. Broken bones and the drawing of blood were commonplace.

“I loved it when the hand and foot pads finally came out because I had something constantly broken on me.” says Burleson. “I always had hands and feet and toes on both sides broken while I was competing. When I fought without the equipment all those years, you wondered not only if you were going to be knocked out, but if your were going to be cut and scarred for life. Each punch and kick had the capability to do permanent damage to you. Today the worst that’s going to happen to you is you’re going to be knocked out.”

When comparing the competitors of today to the early karate fighters Burleson says it’s like asking if modern boxers could compete with the bare-knuckled brawlers of the past such as John L. Sullivan. “I think the people who fought bare-knuckled boxing were meaner and tougher than boxers of today,” says this old boxer. “And it’s the same way in karate. I consider the people I fought bare-knuckled much meaner than anyone I’ve seen lately, although techniquewise, I’ll admit there’s no comparison, these new fighters are far superior to us.”

“You know, I’ve been criticized, along with some other people, for teaching the fighting aspects of the martial art too harshly. And we did. But it’s easy for someone opening up a school today to say that someone like Allen Steen or myself were barbarous in our hard fighting methods. We created the respect for the martial arts in this country by proving that it worked,” says Burleson.

“Today most instructors don’t have to worry about some cowboy coming in and challenging them, saying ‘Let’s see if your karate really works, black belt!’ I’ve forgotten how many people I’ve literally kicked out of my school who’ve challenged me. We didn’t have any other option than to show the public that the martial arts worked.” maintains Burleson. “Americans had never heard of Karate. They only knew the mystical aspects of it. We took it out of that realm and made it an effective fighting method. That was part of martial art’s evolution in America. And that’s why we did what we did.” “But,” adds Burleson, “in doing that we neglected 90% of the character building aspects that go with it.

We were so busy fighting and showing that it worked that we neglected the emphasis the true martial spirit and the mental aspects that go with it. But I’m proud of what we’ve done in this country. We’ve pioneered a rugged art, one that’s respected anywhere in the world. I hope that we are now coming a full-circle and emphasizing the philosophies that should go along with any martial art, even an American one.”