Professor Wally Jay (1917 – 2011)
Professor Wally Jay
Born in Honolulu, Hawaii in 1917 and of Chinese descent, Prof. Wally Jay was a student of Seishiro Okazaki from whom he received a Certificate of Mastery in 1948. He trained under Juan Gomez, and Ken Kawachi (Hawaiian judo champion) in the early 40s. Kawachi stressed the use of the wrist action to gain superior leverage. Wrist action is the key to Small Circle Jujitsu, the system created by Prof. Jay. Over the years he made radical changes in the jujitsu techniques he acquired, believing that this was what his teacher, Professor Okazaki would have wanted.
Prof. Jay came to the mainland in 1950 to teach Jujitsu .Through his experience, he developed his own system called Small Circle Jujitsu and produced many national, state, and regional judo champions from his dojo, Island Jujitsu in Alameda, CA.
Among his many accomplishments, Jay is noted for being Bruce Lee’s trainer (“the best martial artist I have ever seen”). Prof. Jay and his wife Bernice have been long-time mentors and supporters of Dr. Feng and Wu Tao Kuan.
Prof. Jay has published two books; Dynamic Ju Jitsu and Small Circle JuJitsu and numerous instructional videos. Inside Kung Fu magazine named him as one of the 100 most influential martial arts personalities of all time. He has been inducted twice in the Black Belt magazine Hall of Fame and holds a 10th Degree Black Belt in Jujitsu and a 6th Degree Black Belt in Judo. Dr. Alex Feng received his third degree Black Belt from Prof. Wally Jay.