If you never heard of Count Dante go here.
http://www.countdante.com/countdante.html
If you do, here is a thread I found in Japanese Martial Arts Forum. Take it for what is worth.
http://www.e-budo.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=11300&perpage=15&pagenumber=1
The 1970’s black belt article is the same story as the one I got from my old Green Dragon Society gung fu teacher, who was a student through that whole period and beyond.
John Keehan may of been able to fight but he was a sure-fire nutcase. I remeber seeing an old conditioning flyer from that school which showed a method they did which consisted of breaking the bones of ones hand with a hammer so the bones would fuse and become strong. Talk about insane, what is more insane is that some of his students did it, at that time in Chicago during the late 60’s and 70’s it was a whole different world, I am talking Little Dragon here.
The only thing more dangerous than a nutcase, is a nutcase with training!
In thebook “Kung Fu: History, philosophy and technique” towards the back of the book there is a description of a Kung exercise wherein a practitioner breaks all the knuckles of his hand by striking a large stone.
When the hands heal, the stone is again continually struck until the hands are as hard as that stone.
These kinds of kungs are NOT widely practiced and probably are not suited to your average martial artist these days. But then, neither are some of the more “rigourous” exercises found in Shaolin Kungfu. People just don’t want to do that stuff anymore.
So, we can surmise that the masters of old were likely much more formidable than anyone alive today due to the archaic and tough measures they would take to be at the pinnacle of martial ability.
food for thought.
cheers
p.s Dante is a whole other bucket of peaches 
his ads in the back of comic books
and the funny photos of him grimacing, are strangely similar to the pictures on the covers of many current martial arts publications:)
Looks like he was one tuff guy.
not
Not that that there’s anything wrong with that!
Looks like he was one tuff guy.
Originally posted by Kung Lek
[B]In thebook “Kung Fu: History, philosophy and technique” towards the back of the book there is a description of a Kung exercise wherein a practitioner breaks all the knuckles of his hand by striking a large stone.
When the hands heal, the stone is again continually struck until the hands are as hard as that stone.
These kinds of kungs are NOT widely practiced and probably are not suited to your average martial artist these days. But then, neither are some of the more “rigourous” exercises found in Shaolin Kungfu. People just don’t want to do that stuff anymore.
So, we can surmise that the masters of old were likely much more formidable than anyone alive today due to the archaic and tough measures they would take to be at the pinnacle of martial ability.
food for thought.
cheers
p.s Dante is a whole other bucket of peaches [/B]
But how would we type so much here if all our hands were broken and fused together?!
Dunno about you Serp, but I wouldn’t have a problem … if you know what I mean
Wow. Such control! 
Trouble is, though I have the control, I’d always be pressing like, six keys at once.
I’d need a jumbo size keyboard.
And the dude had great hair!
Originally posted by Serpent
[B]Wow. Such control!
Trouble is, though I have the control, I’d always be pressing like, six keys at once.
I’d need a jumbo size keyboard. [/B]
I was talking about typing with my nose. What were you talking about?
Toes?
I got big feet?
Nah, you’re not falling for it, are ya…
So, we can surmise that the masters of old were likely much more formidable than anyone alive today due to the archaic and tough measures they would take to be at the pinnacle of martial ability.
Or we could surmise that our increased physiological knowledge, coupled with more advanced, less harmful, and more specific training methods, has produced more formidable fighters now than in archaic days.
Whichever.
Count Dante
I was going to put this on the Busted Teachers thread, but it’s just too juicy. It totally needs a fresh thread of its own.
Dantes inferno
A local documentarian finds himself in a fight over First Amendment rights.
Floyd Webb figured he had enough weirdness to contend with when he started making a documentary about Count Dante, a Chicago martial arts icon of the 1960s. After all, in addition to running a dojo (the Black Dragon Fighting Society) and writing a book called Worlds Deadliest Fighting Secrets, Dante worked as a hair stylist, kept a lion as a pet, supposedly had mob ties and is alleged by some to have been part of a covert operation that armed Che Guevara and Raul Castro in Cuba in 1959. He was involved in a rivalry with other Chicago martial artists that got so intense Keehan and his associates allegedly attempted to bomb a rival dojo. Born John Keehan to a Chicago Irish family, Dante fabricated a lineage tying him to Spanish nobility. He may have also been involved in the notorious 1974 Purolator Vault robbery, in which $4.3 million was stolen ($1.2 million of which was never recovered). Plenty of weirdness there.
Then the cease-and-desist letters started showing up. As part of his effort to unearth more Dante-related stories, Webb had put up a website (thesearchforcountdante.com) with images and some background information. William Aguiar III of the Fall River Black Dragon Fighting Society claimed that the website infringed on copyrights and trademarks that Aguiar controls. Finally, after some back-and-forth, Aguiar filed a lawsuit in federal court on September 7, charging copyright and trademark infringement. The claim regarding the trademarks has since been dropped, but Webb is still waiting for a judge to set a court date on the copyright question.
As Webb sees it, both his documentary and the website promoting it fall comfortably within the definition of fair use. Fair use is a key concept to anyone working in the arts, and especially to documentary filmmakers. To encourage creativity and to honor First Amendment protections, copyright law allows for the unlicensed use of copyrighted materials in certain circumstances, including educational endeavors, social and political commentary, and parody.
Im not trying to get into the martial arts business, Webb explained when we spoke to him in his production companys office in the Fine Arts Building. Im not trying to publish a martial arts book. Im not trying to open a dojo. Im trying to make a social critique of a character that has impinged on the popular culture.
Fortunately, Webb has some big guns on his side. He contacted Stanford Universitys Fair Use Project (the brainchild of fair use and public domain activist Lawrence Lessig), and its now part of his defense team. The project was established to defend the rights of documentarians and others who are often pestered with nuisance suits filed to wear them out. The latest twist has involved websites. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act was meant to clarify the situation, but suits like the one against Webb have actually proliferated.
Talking to Webb about the case and about Count Dante is rather like taking a trip down the rabbit hole. In the course of a half-hour conversation, he weaves a story that runs all the way from Teddy Roosevelts interest in judo to latter-day mob figures. Webb is trying to separate fact from fiction, but with a life based on lies, its a tough job. The word alleged comes up a lot in Webbs conversation; he knows that many of the stories he has heard are apocryphal, and the lawsuit has made him cautious, but the material is juicy enough to make Oliver Stone drool.
Each story leads down another strange path: [Mob attorney] Bob Cooley, who wore a wire and helped expose corruption, was one of the last people to see Dante alive, and he claims that Dante was poisoned as a result of his being involved in the Purolator robbery, Webb says. Suspicious details pile up like autumn leaves. Ive got Dantes FBI record, but it stops after the bombing. They have everything up until 1965. [The Purolator heist] was a $4 million robbery and the FBI found [some of] the money. But they dont have any records related to Dante at that time.
What makes the lawsuit so annoying to Webb is that he doesnt even believe Aguiar has a legitimate claim to the copyright. According to Webb, his proof in total is two letters. One is a letter written to a martial arts magazine by Count Dantes wife saying that he left the governance of the Black Dragon Fighting Society to Bill Aguiar Jr. [Aguiar IIIs father]. The second letter is from Christa [Keehans wife], addressed To Whom It May Concern, which grants [William Aguiar Jr.] the right to use text and images from the book for promotional purposes. There are no dates on the letters, theyre not notorized, there were no lawyers involved.
Webb is confident that a judge will throw the suit out, and hes eager to get the whole thing settled. Hes still chasing down leads on where Dante got that lion, and whether Dante really was in Cuba. And then there are those rumors that Dante faked his death
If you haven’t seen it, you gotta check out this site: www.thesearchforcountdante.com
Pretty crazy stuff there Gene.
If this story interests you check out;
Blood Brothers: The Criminal Underworld of Asia ~ Bertil Lintner
Very interesting read.
I wonder who will play Dante in a movie…My money is on Benecio DelToro !
I posted that link a couple of years ago…
I’ve met Floyd Web through a kungfu brother of mine. Floyd is planing to film the “dojo war” between Dant and the “green dragons” in which a death resulted during a sword fight (no Joke)at our school www.leekungfu.com
I can’t wait for the movie here is a trailer