I got in touch with a guy who posted something interesting on Karateforums.com about Richard Lee. I wrote to him later and asked about it. This is what he wrote back to me:
"Happy to hear from you. I studied under a first generation black belt named John Hein back in the late 70’s and early 80’s. He came here to Louisiana to work at the time when the oil business was booming.He opened a school where I taught for him and called the school East West. He has since departed and his whereabouts are unknown. He trained directly under Lee and John Simmons who has since sold the Castro Valley school to someone else. At that time Lee was associated with Lee Kwo Wong and Fun Yun* Shu. In fact Wong is the other man in that famous photo of Lee’s flyingside kick.
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"The history of Bok Fu is not easy to trace or verify. I attempted on several occasions to contact Richard Lee and got a cold reception. I have verifed that Lee studied under Al Tracy in the early 1960’s at the Tracys school in San Jose. Al told me that Lee was a phoenomenal athlete and became very good at Kenpo. Some time after earning his black belt fromAl Tracy, Lee went on to develope an art that he named Bok Fu Do meaning the Way of the White Tiger.Lee took the Kenpo techniques and several of the kenpo forms up to brown belt and then added more chinese forms from other systems. Being wealthy Lee has the luxury of traveling throughout the world to learn martial arts and was one of the first americans to enter China after the fall of the iron curtain in the early 70’s.
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"At one time Lee had a large chain of school throught the San Francisco bay area and northern California. In fact my teacher studied at the Castro valley school and the Dublin school. Since that time the system has split severaltimes with black belts leaving and opening their own schools and teaching their own versions of the system. To my knowledge West Wind is one of those branches as is East Wind and neither are associated with Richard Lee’s East West school.
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"Today there are many versions of the art each calling itself Bok Fu Do. Some use Kenpo forms, others use chinese, japanese Okinawan forms andsome even teach TaeKwonDo forms. The art is essentially still Kenpo but the newer advanced forms are very flamboyant and impressive especially for competition uses. When I studied the system everything was based on self defense soobviously Lee seen themoney to be made insport martial arts as he later became the secretary general of the World Kousho Association. He also coached the US team forcompetition in Tiawan and China. I do know that the system that is taught today in the East West school is much smaller in scope than what I learned alll those years ago. There are more belts and fewer techniques to learn today.
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"On the personal side I have talked with several people including my teacher who had little good to say about Lee himself. Based on everything I have been told he seems to be very attracted and influenced by money. Al Tracy once told me that Lee was a millionaire who’s last divorce cost himseveral million dollars.I have also heard that Leeis a sociopathic liar who will say anything to influence people. For instance, I often wondered why he changed his name from Couvillier to Lee and was told by Huk Planas that back in the late 60’s Huk worked for Lee at one of the Tracy schools and that Lee would tell everyone (especially prospective students) that he was Bruce Lee’s half brother…LOL…It is also my understanding that Lee is a notorious womanizer who has a history of sleeping with his school instructors wives and girlfriends. I understandthis is part of the reason for several of the splits within Lee’s group.
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"Ther are places on the net that claim that BFD is developed from Bak Fu Pai Kung Fu but this is not true. When BFD was developed back in the late 60’s the art of Bak Fu Pai was a secret family art that was not taught to anyone outside the Doo family. It was not until the early 70’s that Bak Fu Pai was introduced to anyone outside fo the immediate family and wasbrought to theUS. Furthermore Bak Fu Pai is an internal art that looksnothing like,uses totally different principles and could never be confused with Kenpo or Bak Fu Do. If you study the Tracys kenpo system you will see most of the techniques and forms up to brown belt are common to both Kenpo and Bak Fu Do.
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"If you are interested in the history of the Kenpo forms and and Kenpo systemI can share that with you as well.
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“Sorry for the babbling but I hope this helps. If you have anymore questions please feel free to ask. I enjoy talking about the arts.”
I wrote him back, thanking him, and got the following response:
"I understand your concerns and questions and agree one hundred percent. These schools are very commercial and will milk every student for every cent they can. The sales methodogy comes from the Arthur Murray dance Studios when theyusually begina student with a 4 or 5 lesson introductory program and then they tie themup with a non refundable deposit and a contract. Several things I have noticed is that they seldom discuss fee’s and contracts over the telephone. Its a lot easier to blowthem off on the telephone so they want to get you in person where they can coerce you into a sale. Most of the lessons are not taught by real instructors but actually lower belts sometimes as low as orange belt. They simply give the wannbe instructor a reduced rate of free classes if they agree to teach at the school. They then book them with students who are paying a premium rate for private lessons. Imagine a schoolthat charges 200 dollars a month or more for a few private lessons a month. If they have 10 to 20 or even more instructors each teaching 10 to 20 private lessons a week that means a lot of money coming into the school andinstructors to pay. Its almost pure profit but the student loses in the long run because they often do not have the quality of instruction that they are paying for. BTW, most instructors wear red belts. In East West schools instructors that are not black belts wear the red belts.* This is to distort the truth and fool the student into believing that the so called instructor is qualified but in reality they may be as low ranked as orange belt.
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"Most schools will say that bok fu do is a hybrid system of* different arts. The arts each school claims are dependent on whats popular at the time. I have seen school claim Kenpo, Taekwondo and Brazillian Jujitsu…or Kenpo,Wing Chun Kung Fu and Aikido…orany other artthat is popular and would sell at any paticular time. Theyhave often taken offense when I inform them that the art is 90 poercent Tracys Kenpo instead of some exotic and ancient Kung Fu system that Lee learned in China.My teacher got offended when I found a Kenpo book that had many of the exact same techniques that he taught. He simplys said "Yes, our system does have some kenpond also has White Crane Kung Fu, Tae Kwon Do but its mostly White Tiger Kung Fu (Bak Fu Pai).
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"After my studies in Bok Fu ended I wanted to continue studying something similar so I went to a White Crane school…It was nothig like anything I had seen or learned in Bok Fu. I then went to a TKD school (actually two of different systems of TKD) and also found no similarity even after 5 years of training there I found nothing in common with Bok Fu. I later studied Bak Fu Pai and found it to be even more distant from Bok Fu than TKD and White Crane Kung Fu. When I went to a Tracys Kenpo school I was at home again with Bok Fu do. Everything I learned including some catch phrases used in teaching Bok FU was there. I knew at that point I found the true source of Bok Fu. Thats when I contacted Al Tracy and inquired if Richard Lee was legit. He explained how Lee simply reduced the styem and added some chinese forms and gave it a new name. The old brochure I still have form the original East West schools claims bok to do have been developed from some of the oldest and deadliest froms of self defense known to man but gives no specific systems. BTW, out of curiosity I contacted the grandmaster who brought Bak Fu Pai into this country and he never even heard of Richard Lee. think its just a coincidence that Lee took the name of Bok Fu (white tiger) and now some claims his system is based onBak Fu Pai…*
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"Incidently I had a great deal of difficulty in learning about the history of bok fu do. When I would ask my teacher he would often lie or change the subject. This could be because he himself did not know the answer or he was hiding something. I tried contactin the East West schools and they were less than cooperative once they discovered that I live in Louisiana and they could not sell me a sales contract. In fact, they were downright rude.I once found a website that featured a biography of Richard Lee. I think he wrote it himselfbecause itranted about what a awesome martial artist Lee is and gave details on all his accomplishments and honors he has recieved. I particulary loved the one where he was ASKED by a group of Korean TKD masters to assist themin a black belt testing. Supposedly after the testLee gave a demonstration and this board of korean masters were so impressed that they immedietly awarded Lee a 5th degree black belt in TKD…Thats pure fantasy as korean masters don’t like to give that rank to anyone, even a korean with thirty years of training… and yet they give it to a westerner who had no training inTKD and gave itFREE? NO WAY!
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"Concerning Ron Lee and Scott Flint I have no idea who they are of If they even exist outside of Lee’s mind. They could actually be ficticious characters…with these people I would not be a bit suprised. I have heard that the styles have split many times becauseof Lee’s business practices as well as him sleeping with his students andhis instructors wives. In fact, my own teacher once told me the reason he left Lee was because Lee had an affair with his wife. I know of anotherblack belt instructor who was asked to pick up Lee at the airport and dirve him home.While on the way home Lee propositioned the instructors wife. I have heard this frommultuiple sources over the years and several other similar stories as well. There use to be a joke where if a nice looking femalewanted a black belt in bok fu shehad to sleep with the grandmaster first. What class!
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"In any event I hope this helped. If I can answer anymore questions feel free to ask…
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I wrote him back, but after a month of no response, I wrote to him again. A while later he wrote back and said he had been busy. I am going to write to him again.
In the meantime, I am trying to establish the veracity of these claims.
Edit: I have no idea where those asterisks came from.
