Anyway, this is what happens when a country goes belly up. We keep them in the game.
http://foreignpolicy.com/2008/09/15/the-list-the-worlds-biggest-bailouts/
No one legit wants the US or China to go belly up. Lots of consumers . Understand ?
I don’t even consider idiots that want to go back to biblical historical times. I eat pork. Hey, something I share in common with my Chinese brothers.
I recently saw a video that made me decide to revisit this topic.
https://www.facebook.com/Wataaaah/videos/1727000127581421/
In the video Linda Lee Cadwell recalls the fight between Bruce Lee and Wong Jack Man. She tells the same story she has been telling for years but this video seems to be a rebuttal to Rick Wing’s book “Showdown in Oakland” because she specifically mentions that people have written about the fight and that she was an eye witness to what happened (which is disputed in the book). She also insists that she can remember the fight clearly in her head and repeats the Chinese words that Bruce Lee said to Wong Jack Man asking him, “Do you give up?”
Does anyone here know Cantonese? I tried to determine whether what Linda says Bruce Lee said in the video was accurately translated by her. Looking back in the book Rick Wing does say that when Wong Jack Man slipped on the floor Bruce Lee went in to attack and demanded that he admit defeat saying in Cantonese, “Admit you lost! Say it! Admit you lost!” but rather than Wong admitting defeat the book says they were promptly separated by Wong’s associates who felt the fight was getting out of hand. Wing’s book is very well researched, full of sources and for the most part reasonable. I felt that his account of why the fight happened (Bruce Lee challenged any Martial Artist in Chinatown to fight him and Wong Jack Man accepted to test himself) far more credible that Linda’s claim that Bruce Lee angered the Chinese masters in the area who insisted that he not teach Westerners Kung Fu. This position is especially credible considering there is documentation of non-Chinese including Whites learning from Chinese Martial Artists in the area. However the account of the fight in the book is less credible to me. The length they say the fight lasted, 20-25 minutes, is absurd as is the idea that Wong Jack Man treated it like a sparring match and Bruce Lee treated it like a real fight with no rules in which he could fight all out and as dirty as he wanted. The fight was that long and they only grazed each other. Wong Jack Man’s claim to estimate the number of strikes Bruce Lee threw and claiming he avoided using kicks because he felt they were too deadly was laughable. The description of the fight also reads like a something out of a Kung Fu novel with graceful dodging and parrying by Wong Jack Man who fought defensively against a Bruce Lee that attacked like a ferocious beast, Wong Jack Man being generous enough to let Bruce Lee out of dominant positions, Wong Jack Man landing the absolute best shot of the fight that staggered Bruce (Bruce didn’t land anything damaging in 20-25 minutes? Mind you these are accounts by Wong Jack Man associates being promoted by his students) and Wong Jack Man slipping on a raised portion of the floor which is coincidentally similar to Linda’s account of Wong being taken down to the floor by Bruce and pounded in to a state of demoralization prompting him to verbally submit.
On the other hand Linda’s account seems much more credible which is also consistent with what Bruce Lee said. The fight lasted 3 minutes, there was a brief exchange, Wong started running around the room to evade Bruce and Bruce exhausted himself by first chasing Wong then nearly punching himself out hitting him on the ground along the head and back which hurt his fists. The length of time is short enough for the fight to be realistic but long enough for a fighter to tire himself out if he over exerted himself. I also point out that in Bruce Lee’s account he wasn’t happy at all with his performance and committed himself to extreme physical fitness which people who trained with him state that he was fanatical about to the point of obsession (and over training) as well as learning new techniques to improve his skills as he felt Wing Chun was inherently flawed and impractical in a real fight as are many classical Martial Arts disciplines (which is fully recognized now by much of the Martial Arts community due to observing fights in full-contact competition with limited rules).
The contrast between the accounts of the fight are striking…
1. Bruce Lee and Linda Lee Cadwell’s account: They describe a fight with a realistic length and outcome in which Bruce Lee while the clear victor is critical of his own performance for being sloppy, exhausted and hurting his hands prompting him to be a more efficient and conditioned Martial Artist.
2. Wong Jack Man and his associates’ account: The fight has an unrealistic length and bizarre description in which Wong Jack Man is passive and restrictive in his approach to the fight and somehow doesn’t understand the nature of the fight until he is attacked with cheap shots (finger jabs to the eyes before joining hands and groin kicks from Bruce Lee who was so aggressive Wong contemplated killing him in self-defense yet still held back). There is no self-reflection on the part of Wong Jack Man. He simply fought a graceful and controlled fight against a violent opponent until he slipped and his associates interfered because they believed it was supposed to be a sparring match that was getting out of hand.
The aftermath of the fight with the newspaper wars is even more bizarre (e.g. false accounts of the fight being over a girl with demands that statements be retracted and calls for a public rematch). Interestingly there is a video by Leo Fong recounting the fight which is consistent with Jesse Glover’s claim that Bruce Lee tracked Wong Jack Man down and confronted him at the restaurant where he worked as a waiter which caused Wong to spill the tea he was pouring:
Jesse Glover and Leo Fong are friends of Bruce Lee who admit they didn’t see the fight but only heard it from Bruce Lee but the consistency of their story is interesting. The only major differences are that Fong says Bruce Lee and a friend went to the restaurant and I didn’t hear him say anything about Wong Jack Man running to hide in the kitchen but the testimony is interesting nonetheless.
Comparing the different accounts of this fight are interesting. I was provided Rick Wing’s email by someone at his school through Facebook and emailed him to ask questions but didn’t get a reply. I don’t expect a reply but I may try to contact Linda Lee Cadwell.
By the way has anyone seen the movie Birth of the Dragon? I heard it got bad reviews. I tried to find it online but could not.
Pretty sure your skin colour has nothing to do with whether or not you practice a skill and have any talent at it.
Just saying. Take it easy with the “race” horsesh1t fellas. It’s unbecoming of a kung fu man to limit himself with such petty observations.
y’all bleed the same colour and your bones make the same sound when they snap. 
Holy smokes, this thread is still going on?:eek:
Immortal thread
[QUOTE=rogue;1302664]Holy smokes, this thread is still going on?:eek::D[/QUOTE]
This thread will never die. :rolleyes:
That being said, I should mention that this topic comes up yet again in my interview article ‘Uncle’ Allen Joe Remembers Bruce Lee in our March+April 2017 issue.
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Wong jak min won mentally.
you are all very stupid. Wong Jack Man had Bruce killed. Bruce and his son are DEAD. Wong Jack Man is still alive. 'Nough said
Who else has seen Birth of the Dragon? I know the Bruce Lee family disapproved of it however I thought that it was great as a Martial Arts film. All of the talk of White-washing and racist stereotypes about Asians are false. The movie was entertaining and provided a good portrayal of Eastern philosophy. I could tell that the story was heavily inspired by the book Showdown in Oakland. I hear that Shannon Lee is working on another Bruce Lee biopic. The portrayal of Bruce Lee in Birth of the Dragon is understandably controversial however I recommend this film for fans of Martial Arts movies.
seen
[QUOTE=MysticNinjaJay;1305898]Who else has seen Birth of the Dragon? [/QUOTE] I saw it and reviewed it on our Birth of the Dragon thread, as is my modus operendi. 
Did you just see it on VOD? I heard it was just released there.
[QUOTE=GeneChing;1305901]I saw it and reviewed it on our Birth of the Dragon thread, as is my modus operendi.
Did you just see it on VOD? I heard it was just released there.[/QUOTE]
Someone told me on Youtube that it was available on Amazon Prime. I found it in high quality on a torrent site yesterday. I will buy it on Bluray from Amazon when it comes out.
Not involving Wong Jack-Man, but I thought this might be of interest to some following this thread. About a rumored fight in 1972 in HK involving Bruce Lee, against a supposed boxer and Cha Kuen (Cha Chuan) stylist named Lau Tat-Chuen:
Newsweek Special Edition: Bruce Lee
BRUCE LEE’S FIGHT TO SPREAD THE ART OF KUNG FU IN AMERICA
BY NEWSWEEK SPECIAL EDITION ON 12/14/17 AT 7:10 AM
This article, along with others on the magnificent life and iconic career of actor and martial arts master Bruce Lee, is featured in Newsweek’s Special Edition: Bruce Lee.
"Mere technical knowledge is only the beginning of kung fu; to master it, one must enter into the spirit of it,” explained Bruce Lee.
As an instructor of this sacred Chinese practice, his initiative was to teach anyone that demonstrated skill, as well as the commitment to learn the art, regardless of their heritage or background. When Bruce opened his studio in Oakland, California, in 1964, he hoped it could be a place free of animosity, with students bonding together over a common dedication to kung fu. To sustain this sanctuary, he put a regulation in place within his institute, which implored students to keep the techniques they learned from Bruce to themselves. His hope was by keeping his school under the radar, he could avoid raising the ire of rival schools.
Despite Bruce’s efforts to avoid any tension with nearby kung fu studios, trouble arose in December 1964. The traditional martial arts community objected to him teaching Westerners, whom they considered to already have a natural upper hand in terms of size and strength. They also did not approve of him sharing the “secrets” of their esteemed art to those who were not of Chinese descent. In order to stop Bruce from giving away what they saw as their culture’s sacred secrets, they issued the young upstart a challenge: If a kung fu master of their choosing could defeat Bruce in battle, he would have to stop teaching kung fu to non-Chinese. Their champion was another kung fu master called Wong Jack Man.
Wong had recently arrived from Hong Kong and was teaching across the bay from Bruce in San Francisco. This formidable master enjoyed a greater reputation than the young Bruce as a practitioner of kung fu, and he was looking to make a name for himself in the U.S. Wong boldly marched into Bruce’s own school and presented him with a written challenge to fight.
The duel took place in a small Oakland studio. The small number of eyewitnesses on hand has helped contribute to the mystery surrounding the exact, blow-by-blow details of the battle, but most agree it was an all-out exchange that left both combatants exhausted. Near the end of the fight, Wong reportedly turned to run but was intercepted, and Lee took the opportunity to begin punching him on the back of his head. In a 1976 issue of Black Belt magazine a friend of Bruce’s quoted him as saying, “I chased him and, like a fool, kept punching his head and back; my fists were already swelling from his hard head. Then, I did something I’d never done before: I put my arm round his neck and knocked him on his ass. I kept whacking him as he lay on the floor—until he gave up.”
Bruce’s victory ensured the continuation of his teaching kung fu to all worthy enough to accept his lessons, and it helped solidify his place as one of the art form’s greatest champions.
This article written by Editorial Assistant Amber Blossman was excerpted from Newsweek Special Edition: Bruce Lee. For more on the life and legacy of the timeless legend pick up a copy today.
Bruce Lee vs. Wong Jack Man fight :rolleyes:
Newsweak.
Sad what can be passed off as journalism.
Really Late to the Party…
I know I am really late to the party…and my comments below may have already been expressed in some form (haven’t read all of the prior replies)…
It is truly difficult to know exactly what did happen that night…we do not have video or even pictures - and the best evidence, credible eyewitnesses, gets tricky quite quickly. I also admit that my bias is positive toward Wong Jack Man and rather negative toward Bruce Lee. I appreciate Lee for his athelticism and his promotion of martial arts in the “spotlight” of flim…but I don’t have much appreciatation for him as purely a martial artist.
Overall, I recommend this (biased, of course) work regarding the fight: https://www.amazon.com/Showdown-Oakland-Story-Behind-Bruce-ebook/dp/B00AR0KE1I/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1513618824&sr=8-1&keywords=Showdown+in+Oakland%3A+The+Story+Behind+the+Wong+Jack+Man+-+Bruce+Lee+Fight
With that preface, a few considerations…
Of the two, who (seems completely) changed their approach to martial arts and their training? That would be Lee.. (You don’t typically change what works).
Which one became a GM at the age of 25? That would be Wong…
Who did not complete their formal training? That’s Lee…(As far as I know, all he had to go on was some amount of Wing Chun from Ip Man and street brawl experience)
My understanding is that Lee wanted the fight kept quiet but then spoke out boldly after the fight. Wong, who is still alive, has remained relatively quiet about the fight over the years. Is this due to Wong’s fear or humility?
It is also my understanding, based on the testimony of GM Ming Lum (a friend of Lee’s) that Wong came to work the day after the night of the fight - and only one cut near his eyes (From an opening pear hand from Lee?). But Lee supposedly beat Wong into submission?
Who expressed that, if there was another fight between them, that it would need to be public? I think that would be Wong…
If Wong lost to Lee in the way some describe, then why didn’t this event become big news in Chinatown at the time?
I recall that Lee’s wife observed that after the fight Bruce was sitting on the back porch all depressed with his head in his hands.
From the testimony of George Lee, it may be that Linda was not even in the room for the fight, but peeked in some.
Intersting page: http://www.jadedragonalaska.com/bruce-lees-lost-fight.php
[QUOTE=ChungQuanMan;1306466]I know I am really late to the party…and my comments below may have already been expressed in some form (haven’t read all of the prior replies)…[/QUOTE]
Having read the book Showdown in Oakland as well as other sources I would like to address your points. You can see my views on the fight from previous posts.
With that preface, a few considerations…
Based on Bruce Lee’s description as I mentioned previously he seemed to have the mind of a perfectionist. He says he won the fight but that he was exhausted chasing Wong Jack Man around the room and that his attacks weren’t efficient despite winning. If you’re going to consider the implications of details like this you need to analyze the narrative of the person telling the story. If find it very believable that a young Martial Artist that was used to ending fights quickly got a wake up call to the sloppiness and inefficiency of his Martial Art from a real fight that didn’t go the way he planned. In real fights you can be the winner and not come out unscathed. If Bruce Lee’s narrative is the truth then it is a credit to him that he learned from his mistakes and the limitations of Wing Chun to improve as a Martial Artist.
- Which one became a GM at the age of 25? That would be Wong…
We know today that that many Traditional Martial Artists including Masters and Grandmasters are not great fighters. Many of them have few to no full-contact fights and it is actually a shock to them when they fight for real. I’m not aware of Wong Jack Man competing in any Martial Arts tournaments or getting in to any street fights outside of his fight with Bruce Lee. Holding the rank of Grandmaster speaks to his dedication as a Martial Artist but not necessarily his efficiency as a fighter.
- Who did not complete their formal training? That’s Lee…(As far as I know, all he had to go on was some amount of Wing Chun from Ip Man and street brawl experience)
From what I’ve read Bruce Lee started Wing Chun at the age of 13 and left Hong Kong at the age of 18. So he had 5 years of formal training with Yip Man and his senior students. I’ve heard that Yip Man saw Bruce Lee as an exceptional talent among his students and decided to have him trained privately after some jealous students demanded he be kicked out of the school when they found out he wasn’t pure Chinese. By the time he fought Wong Jack Man in 1964 at the age of 24 Bruce Lee had about 11 years of Martial Arts experience, was running his own school and training with Martial Artists of different disciplines. Bruce Lee’s school was called Jun Fan Gung Fu and he was already trying to promote his own approach to Martial Arts with Wing Chun as his base. After the Wong Jack Man fight Bruce Lee says he became more fanatical to improving as a Martial Artist and developing Jeet Kune Do. Based on this information it is entirely feasible that by the time they fought Bruce Lee had more street fighting experience and more skill as a Martial Artist while still needing to learn a thing or two to become a better fighter. Completing a system won’t make you a great fighter if there are weaknesses in that system.
- My understanding is that Lee wanted the fight kept quiet but then spoke out boldly after the fight. Wong, who is still alive, has remained relatively quiet about the fight over the years. Is this due to Wong’s fear or humility
In the book Showdown in Oakland it is stated that the fight was publicly discussed in Chinese newspapers over the course of weeks before Bruce Lee got his part as Kato in The Green Hornet TV series. Two years after that Bruce Lee told Black Belt Magazine that he won the fight referring to Wong Jack Man as a Kung Fu Cat he fought in San Franciso who ran like a coward during the fight until Bruce beat him in to verbal submission on the ground. Even though he admitted that he was unsatisfied with the performance Bruce Lee claims a clear victory for himself. If I were Wong Jack Man I would have demanded a rematch at that point to protect my reputation. I’m not saying he feared Bruce Lee but if he cared enough about his reputation to talk about it in the newspapers and say that he was open to a rematch at a public exhibition why would he let Bruce Lee bad mouth him in a major magazine like that and allow his narrative to be accepted as the truth for years? Bruce Lee became famous and had a successful acting career years after this fight. Wong Jack Man had a lot of time to set up a rematch. He could have talked to Black Belt Magazine or any papers and pushed for a public rematch if he wanted to.
Also Bruce Lee clearly did not respect the skills of Wong Jack Man as he could be heard in a phone recording years later calling Wong Jack Man a bullsh*t artist (Start at 5:30):
- It is also my understanding, based on the testimony of GM Ming Lum (a friend of Lee’s) that Wong came to work the day after the night of the fight - and only one cut near his eyes (From an opening pear hand from Lee?). But Lee supposedly beat Wong into submission?
According to Bruce Lee himself he punched Wong Jack Man in the back of the head and a long his back on the ground. That would not leave facial damage especially considering that the rest of the time Bruce Lee says that Wong Jack Man was running away from him. His wife Linda acknowledged as finger jab strike to the face at the beginning of the fight so the testimony of Ming Lum actually does not contradict that Bruce Lee narrative of the outcome of the fight.
- Who expressed that, if there was another fight between them, that it would need to be public? I think that would be Wong…
That’s mentioned in the book but doesn’t say anything about the outcome of the fight. Wong Jack Man could have lost the fight badly and wanted a rematch to redeem himself. Rick Wing actually acknowledged in the book that Bruce Lee had a lot going on in his life at the time. Less than 10 days after Wong Jack Man’s comment in Chinese Pacific Weekly proposing a rematch Bruce Lee’s son Brandon was born so he had responsibilities to a newborn baby and his wife to consider. A few days later he went to Hollywood for an audition which led to him getting the part of Kato in The Green Hornet and after that he father died on unexpectedly and he flew to Hong Kong to honor his father at his funeral and support family. Then he came back to the United States to pursue a life changing acting career. As far as I can tell a rematch with Wong Jack Man would and should have been the furthest thing from his mind. Remember that the whole point of challenges with Martial Artists with Wong Jack Man was to make a name for himself in the Martial Arts community. With a job as an actor on TV and eventually movies there was simply no need to fight anyone. If anyone could benefit from another fight at that point it was Wong Jack Man.
- If Wong lost to Lee in the way some describe, then why didn’t this event become big news in Chinatown at the time?
It was. They argued about the outcome of the fight in local Chinese newspapers for weeks. Rick Wing provided pictures with English translation of these newspaper articles in his book. The fight was held behind closed doors in Bruce Lee’s Martial Arts studio. If there was a verbal agreement not to talk about the fight clearly it got leaked to the press. Bruce Lee told Jesse Glover, Leo Fong and others that Wong Jack Man was the one who talked to the press and after demanding a newspaper editor tell him his source for the story that Bruce Lee lost the fight and was hospitalized, which turned out to be from Wong Jack Man he went to the restaurant where Wong Jack Man worked as a waiter. According to Bruce Lee when Wong Jack Man saw him he spilled the tea he was pouring ran away and hid in the kitchen. That is Bruce Lee’s narrative of the aftermath of the fight. Rick Wing says that Wong Jack Man came to Jackson Cafe to make peace with Wong Jack Man, tell him he was only trying to promote his school and pointed out that they actually shared a Martial Arts lineage.
- I recall that Lee’s wife observed that after the fight Bruce was sitting on the back porch all depressed with his head in his hands.
Yes, because according to Linda Bruce Lee was very unsatisfied with the fight. Jesse Glover’s description in his book recalls that Bruce Lee told him that Wong Jack Man began backpedaling and running during the fight after a brief exchange and that Bruce Lee had trouble closing distance because of his speed and footwork. He said that Bruce Lee was chasing him and punching at him before eventually throwing him to the ground and pounding him on the ground which hurt his fists. According to Linda the fight lasted about 3 minutes. Assuming this is true this actually makes sense in a lot of ways. 3 minutes is long enough to get tired if you are overexerting yourself. What Bruce Lee described is chasing and opponent and nearly punching himself out which we see all the time in combat sports such as MMA. Wing Chun also teaches chain punching on the ground which is actually not an efficient way to strike someone on the ground and hitting the back of the skull as Bruce Lee described can actually break your hand. Based on the description a lone I think Bruce Lee’s narrative actually very believable. Wong Jack Man’s narrative is few less believable for the reasons I outlined in the previous post. The fight Wong Jack Man described is unrealistically long with a lot of nonsense put in that sounds like someone making up a story who doesn’t have a lot of real fighting experience. Wong Jack Man doesn’t say he won but some times people make less of themselves in a story to make the story sound more believable e.g. “I didn’t win. The fight was a draw but I got the better of him and held back a bit.”
- From the testimony of George Lee, it may be that Linda was not even in the room for the fight, but peeked in some.
This is an interesting detail but problematic as Linda insists that she saw the fight. She made a video which was clearly a rebuttal to the book Showdown in Oakland where she says that despite being pregnant she was a witness to the fight, saw the entire thing and stands by her account of the details of the fight which were consistent with what Bruce Lee stated. So we have a case of “He said, She said.”
For me the main problem with Wong Jack Man’s narrative is simply the details of the fight according to him. Bruce Lee and Linda Lee Cadwell could be lying or exaggerating but their account is at least plausible. Can anyone make a serious case that Wong Jack Man’s narrative described in the book Showdown in Oakland is a realistic account of a fight?
The chapter in Matt Polly’s new book that everyone wants to read…
Yesterdays Crimes: The Brawl That Almost Broke Bruce Lee
American Shaolin author Matthew Polly sorts through the fact and fiction surrounding Bruce Lee’s Bay Area grudge match in his new book, Bruce Lee: A Life.
Bob Calhoun Mon Jun 11th, 2018 10:01amYesterday’s Crimes
Bruce Lee punishing a young Jackie Chan in Enter the Dragon. (Courtesy Image)
Bruce Lee was born into a performing family; His mother gave birth to him in the year of the dragon on Nov. 27, 1940 in San Franciscos Chinatown, while his parents were on tour with a Chinese opera company. His Chinese name, Li Jun Fan (), included the Chinese character for San Francisco (Fan), and can be translated roughly to Shake Up and Excite San Francisco. When Lee finally returned to the city of his birth in his early 20s, the future martial arts superstar did just what his name had prophesized.
Lee took the stage of the Sun Sing Theatre on Grant Avenue between Jackson and Pacific in August 1964. What started with Lee doing the cha-cha with Diana Chang Chung-Wen, The Mandarin Marilyn Monroe, soon became one of Chinatowns most enduring controversies. It all began during a demonstration of the Wing Chun kung fu techniques Lee had honed on the streets of Hong Kong.
In China, 80 percent of what they teach is nonsense, Lee proclaimed during his show. Here in America, it is 90 percent.
These old tigers, he continued, criticizing San Franciscos traditional kung fu masters, they have no teeth.
Thats not kung fu! a man in the back of the theater shouted, while the Chinatown audience flung lit cigarettes onto the stage to show their disapproval of this young upstart.
Before Lee left the stage, he told the hostile crowd that if they wanted to research his Wing Chun, they could find him at his school in Oakland. To everyone at the Sun Sing that night, it sounded like the Little Dragon had just issued an open challenge to all of Chinatown.
(Lee) was 24, Matthew Polly, author of the hard-to-put-down new biography Bruce Lee: A Life, explains. He was trying to make a name for himself, and he was going out there, poking people in the eye trying to get them to change their minds.
Polly wrote about his experiences studying kung fu at the Shaolin Temple in Henan, China for his first book, American Shaolin (Penguin, 2007). He then trained in mixed martial arts for his follow-up, Tapped Out (Gotham, 2011).
After writing Tapped Out, I was looking for a project that didnt involve me getting punched in the face, Polly says, but he couldnt stay away from martial arts. When Polly realized the only Bruce Lee biography still in print was from 25 years ago, he was personally offended.
The most important Asian American to ever live, and the most famous, couldnt get his one biography when Steve McQueen has a half a dozen, Polly says.
Polly spent seven years researching Bruce Lee: A Life, which had him untangling fact from the urban legends surrounding Lees rise to stardom, his mysterious death, and the challenge match that emerged from that appearance at the Sun Sing Theatre.
Bruce lived a life that was a lot like his kung fu movies, Polly says, pointing out that Lee accepted challenge matches well into his 30s. And so whenever somebody wants to tell the story of Bruce, they want to tell it as if it was a kung fu movie, and of course they immediately go to the Wong Jack Man fight.
Wong Jack Man was not at the Sun Sing on the night of Lees performance, but Lees critique of the high kicks of Northern Shaolin kung fu got back to him. Like Lee, Wong was a skilled martial artist in his early 20s who had come to America from Hong Kong. Unlike Lee, Wong venerated martial arts traditions.
In the fight between Bruce and Wong Jack Man you have modernity versus tradition, Polly says.
After weeks of negotiations, Wong arrived at Bruce Lees Jun Fan Gung Fu Institute at 4175 Broadway in Oaklands auto row on a weeknight in early November 1964. Wongs pal, David Chin, who had egged on this fight, attempted to negotiate some ground rules, but Lee wasnt having it.
Youve already got your friend killed, Lee spat in Cantonese.
James Lee, one of Lees students, locked the dojo door from the inside and took a seat close to where he kept a loaded revolver in case any more of Wongs friends showed up. Bruce Lees pregnant wife Linda was the only other person there on his side, while Wong and Chin had brought four others with them.
When Wong reached out to shake hands, the tense Bruce Lee threw a powerful shot that crashed into Wongs orbital bone.
He really wanted to kill me, Wong later recalled.
Lee followed up with a blistering series of Wing Chun chain punches. Wong backpedaled, blocking Lees shots. Lee kept coming. Wong struck Lee in the neck and drew blood with a studded wrist bracelet he concealed in his long sleeve.
When Bruce felt the blood on his neck and realized the deception, he went berserk, Polly writes.
Wong turned around and started to run. Wong stumbled on a raised platform in Lees studio leftover from when it was an upholstery shop. Lee got on top of Wong and pounded him. Chin and the others pulled Lee off of their fallen champion.
The fight in Oakland only enhanced the reputations of both men. Lee became a Hong Kong-to-Hollywood tragedy who died right before the release of Enter the Dragon (1973), his greatest triumph. Wong earned the title of grandmaster teaching Tai Chi Chuan and Northern Shaolin at Fort Mason Center until 2005. Wongs subsequent students have claimed their beloved sifu vanquished the arrogant movie star.
The tiebreaker for Polly in determining just what happened that night in 1964 was that David Chins account jibed with Linda Lees.
I took that as a pretty good guarantee of the truth if Wong Jack Mans friend thought a certain thing happened, Polly says.
One advantage I have in writing this book over other biographers is that I was actually in a challenge match in China and fought another kung fu master, Polly adds, recalling an incident he covered in American Shaolin.
So certain things rang true to me just based on my own experience, he says. Ive watched challenge matches where one guy freaks out and panics and starts running.
Unsatisfied with how ugly the Wong Jack Man fight was, Lee committed to developing his own style, called Jeet Kune Do, and transformed martial arts in the process.
Whats amazing with MMA is this is what its become, Polly reflects. The way (Lee) was teaching is the way a significant portion of the martial arts community now practices.
THREADS
Bruce Lee: A Life by Matt Polly
Bruce Lee vs. Wong Jack Man fight
American Shaolin by Matt Polly
is it bad if I dont give a sheet about Cantonese Chinatown squabbles in 2018? I mean the canto community is basically dead man
The Bruce Lee Fight in Oakland That Became Martial Arts Legend
Bruce Lee was born in San Francisco, but found his people in the East Bay. His legendary 1964 Oakland fight reshaped his martial arts philosophy and stoked rumors about race and kung fu.
Jul 23, 2026
Updated 4:50 pm PT
Greglon Lee holds up boxing gloves signed by both Bruce Lee and his father James Lee at the apartment complex he lives at in Berkeley on June 1, 2026. Greglon Lee is the son of James Lee, a martial artist who once was Bruce Lee’s training partner. (Tâm Vũ/KQED)
Greglon Lee peered through the gaps in a black, wrought-iron fence enclosing an empty corner lot on Oakland’s Auto Row. More than half a century ago, the martial arts legend Bruce Lee — then still unknown — ran a kung fu studio here with Greglon’s father.
Though they were peers and close friends, Greglon’s father was one of Bruce’s most fervent disciples.
“The main teacher was Bruce,” Greglon said. “My dad was 20 years older, and had just as much experience, but he let Bruce run things. Because Bruce knew what he was doing and it was obvious that Bruce had it.”
Greglon Lee stores James Lee’s old Mook Jong, a training tool in martial arts, in the garage of the apartment complex he lives at in Berkeley on June 1, 2026. Greglon Lee is the son of James Lee, a martial artist who once was Bruce Lee’s training partner. (Tâm Vũ/KQED)
The studio served as the ring of what may have been one of the most important fights of Bruce Lee’s life: the Showdown in Oakland.
“This is the school where Bruce fought Wong Jack-man,” Greglon said. “Bruce took it personally.”
Bruce Lee was born in San Francisco when his parents were on tour with an opera company from Hong Kong. He returned to the Bay Area as a young man to study and train, making a name for himself as a martial artist. But only recently has California made an effort to recognize and celebrate the Hollywood star’s early roots here.
Earlier this summer, San Francisco officials and Chinatown community members, along with Bruce’s daughter, Shannon, led the effort to commemorate May 17 — the day Bruce moved back to the city from Hong Kong as a teen — as Bruce Lee Day — becoming the first Chinese American to be honored with a namesake day in state history.
Though the Hollywood icon and martial artist’s time here in the Bay Area was brief, it was formative. Among the best-known chapters is the Showdown in Oakland, when he exchanged blows with a martial artist from San Francisco. The fight has become lore in the martial arts world, the subject of books, magazine articles and films, and is well-known to Bruce Lee fans around the world. More than 60 years after it happened, it remains controversial and hotly debated within dojos and on online forums.
“It’s the story of how gung fu — let’s call it by its English name — how kung fu becomes American,” said Berkeley-based historian and cultural critic Jeff Chang, who wrote the recent biography Water, Mirror, Echo: Bruce Lee and the Making of Asian-America, of the fight.
Like the classic Akira Kurosawa film Rashomon, which explores truth and self-interest among characters who give contradictory accounts of an event they witness, the story of the fight reads like a case study in selective human memory. Countless retellings, each drawing from legend and third-hand accounts, have inevitably added a bit to the hero’s journey, turning the story into its own myth. Here’s what really happened:
Moving back to the heart of the martial arts scene
In 1964, Bruce was a student at the University of Washington, but spent more time fighting than studying. Through his work as a cha-cha instructor, which would occasionally bring him to the Bay Area to make money, he met an Oakland resident named James Yimm Lee — Greglon’s dad.
James, who grew up in Oakland, came from the world of blue-collar bodybuilding and weightlifting. But he was also a skilled martial artist who wanted to modernize and popularize the sport. When he met Bruce, James realized he “was the real deal,” Greglon said, “kind of like the [martial arts] Michael Jordan.”
Bruce Lee in long-sleeved shirt, smiling in a family portrait. His wife, Linda Lee Caldwell, holds her daughter, Shannon, with Brandon on the left. (Courtesy of the Bruce Lee Family Archive)
Despite sharing a surname, the men weren’t related but became fast friends and instant collaborators. So, James convinced Bruce to move, along with his wife Linda Lee Caldwell — who was then eight months pregnant — to the Bay Area, to live with James and his two children. James’ wife had just died of cancer, so Linda helped care for Greglon and his sister.
“The Bay Area, at that point,” said Chang, is “the heart of the U.S. martial arts movement. You have like all of these folks who are working class fighters … security guards or policemen or military. And they’re all mixing up into a martial arts scene that now is desegregating — and it’s created a lot of ferment. Bruce wanted to be down there.”
Bruce and James spent countless hours together, training and dissecting their craft. The two articulated a shared vision of martial arts: one that fluidly changed between styles and forms, and drew upon Daoism as a philosophy for how to live. To practice these ideas, they set up a kung fu school together in Oakland, which at first they ran out of James’ garage. When they started to pick up more students, they opened up the storefront at 4157 Broadway Street.
The two shared a belief that martial arts should be more adaptable, not as fixed in style or form. And they both chafed at what they perceived as rigidity among other martial arts teachers — particularly in San Francisco.
As a young man, Bruce had run afoul of some of the San Francisco Chinatown koons — or kung fu schools. The community, at that time, was extremely wary of outsiders, and, due to decades of anti-Chinese racism, protective of their schools, Chang said. Exclusionary policies had heavily restricted Chinese immigration, siloing off the community from newer waves of Chinese from the mainland and surrounding territories. San Francisco residents didn’t know what to make of Bruce, Chang said — “a loud, brash immigrant from Hong Kong.”
The Sun Sing Theater demonstration
Tensions came to a head in August 1964, when Bruce gave a martial arts demonstration at San Francisco Chinatown’s Sun Sing Theater at 1021 Grant Ave. — one of San Francisco’s oldest opera houses, and where his father had performed opera nearly two decades earlier (though the building’s gorgeous facade remains, it’s boarded up today).
Bruce had been there on tour with Diana Chang, known as the “Mandarin Marilyn Monroe,” to dance the cha-cha. But after they finished their performance, Bruce had a surprise for the crowd: he took to the stage to demonstrate his style of martial arts for the packed house.
A fight nearly broke out on stage, and the crowd hurled cigarette butts and insults at Bruce, then only 24 years old. As Chang describes it, Bruce scrambled to get the situation back under control.
Bruce Lee in a yellow jumpsuit in action while directing Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on the set of “Game of Death.” (Courtesy of the Bruce Lee Family Archive)
“I would like to let everybody know that any time my Chinatown brothers want to try out my Wing Chun,” Bruce said, as retold in Chang’s book, “they are welcomed to come find me at my school in Oakland.”
To the riled-up crowd, this sounded like a challenge.
To the San Francisco martial artists, a fight seemed inevitable. And they chose a promising young fighter, a jing wu star named Wong Jack-man, to challenge the “young dissident,” as the elders in the city called him.
Wong was known for being stoic, polished — a picture of grace and power — in comparison with Bruce’s more back-alley style of brawling. To this day, it’s not clear why he agreed to the proposal when his Chinatown friends came to the Jackson Cafe, at 633 Battery, where he worked as a waiter, and asked him to represent the big city in the challenge against Bruce Lee.
The ‘Showdown in Oakland’
The match-up — wrote Charles Russo, San Francisco journalist and author of Striking Distance: Bruce Lee and the Dawn of Martial Arts in America — was “spectacular,” pitting two talented young martial artists with a uniquely yin-yang-like symmetry together.
“Bruce’s style was compact and economical. Wong’s expansive and acrobatic,” Russo said. “Collectively, it had all the characteristics of a fight promoter’s dream.”
At the end of a cold day in November 1964, Wong Jack-man and his friends piled into a crimson Pontiac Tempest and drove to the Broadway studio in Oakland.
Bruce Lee’s old home on Monticello Avenue in East Oakland on June 1, 2026. (Tâm Vũ/KQED)
Waiting inside were a “very pregnant Linda,” James, and Bruce, Chang said.
Wong was dressed formally, in a dark, high-collared, long-sleeved uniform with lacing down the middle. Bruce wore white jeans and a white tank top.
There were a total of nine people in the studio, only one of whom is alive today, Bruce’s wife Linda. And she did not speak Cantonese, the lingua franca of the fight, so undoubtedly some context was lost.
However, everyone can agree on what happened next: David Chin, one of Wong’s friends and an instigator of the fight, began enumerating rules. Bruce “kept the tone harsh,” martial arts journalist Russo said: “You came to my school to challenge me, and now you want to set the rules?”
When Wong reached out to shake hands, the tense Bruce Lee threw out a feint that crashed right above Wong’s eye — immediately setting the tone for the rest of the fight.
Bruce Lee during the Hall of Mirrors scene on the set of “Enter the Dragon.” (Courtesy of the Bruce Lee Family Archive)
At one point, wrote Rick Wing, one of Wong’s students and another chronicler of the fight, Wong got Bruce into a headlock, though eventually, he let go.
“Wong considered Lee to be a sparring opponent only, and not a mortal enemy,” Wing said.
Wong later told Wing about Bruce: “He would never say he lost until you killed him.”
A final detail of the fight that everyone agrees with: once Bruce got out of the headlock, he lunged after Wong, who turned and tried to evade the attack. Then, he tripped on a floorboard.
The two scuffled on the edge of the studio, with Bruce pummeling Wong with punches and yelling, “Admit it, you lost!”
Whether Wong actually surrendered is up for debate. However, multiple kung fu students of San Francisco Chinatown have relayed third-hand that if Wong had won, the neighborhood would have been celebrating. Instead, it was silent the next day, like a funeral.
The aftermath of the fight
The details are somewhat unremarkable — a messy fight in a small Oakland studio with a murky victory — but rumors of the fight, and what caused it, would spread like wildfire through the martial arts community and ultimately reach Hong Kong.
The rumor mill claimed over and over — in tabloids, martial arts magazines and even major Hollywood films — that Chinatown’s old guard took issue with Bruce teaching kung fu to non-Chinese people.
Greglon Lee poses for a portrait at the apartment complex he lives at in Berkeley on June 1, 2026. Greglon Lee is the son of James Lee, a martial artist who once was Bruce Lee’s training partner. (Tâm Vũ/KQED)
Those who peddle this narrative often point to discrimination Bruce may have faced growing up in Hong Kong, due to his own background as a quarter-Dutch on his mom’s side.
But Chang questioned whether this narrative holds up to scrutiny.
“Very famously, the fight has been portrayed as this thing where Bruce was defending his right to teach non-Chinese people,” Chang said. “I just think that’s not true at all. The record shows that the koons in San Francisco had already opened themselves to non-Chinese for a long time.”
But the fight did have a big effect on Bruce’s life and career.
For all of his bluster, the fight against Wong Jack-man was a huge reality check for Bruce, who realized his technique and conditioning came up short of his own expectations. His sloppy “victory” would forever alter his approach to martial arts, his biographers have said, and came at the right time, just as his Hollywood star was about to rise.
“Iron sharpens iron,” Greglon said. “You always have to have an adversary, an opponent in fighting to get better. [After] the fight with Wong Jack-man, Bruce changed his training completely. It helped Bruce go to another level.”
Just months after The Showdown in Oakland, Bruce Lee got a call from a Hollywood producer asking him to audition for a part. It was his first big break and the beginning of a distinguished film career that ultimately led to Bruce starring in his most famous film, Enter the Dragon.
Whether or not the story bears the weight of the facts, “there’s a great mythology here,” Chang said, that may represent its power to this day. In the showdown, Bruce Lee’s fans found a battle over culture and change, one that matched the upheaval of the times, and wider shifts within Asian America.
Although that context was real, the more meaningful transformation was within Bruce himself. He went on to dedicate his life to becoming one of the best that ever lived. As an actor, he challenged stereotypes in Hollywood, refusing roles that typecast him. In his short life, he paved the way for future generations and set an example that continues to inspire and comfort fans to this day.
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