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 Michael
Thomas Ganci was born in 1945 in Brooklyn, N.Y. He was introduced to the
fighting arts by his father, who had been an amateur boxer, and began
his karate instruction in his early teens at New York's Chinatown Dojo.
This school, one of the first American Goju-kai style dojo, was
run by Peter Urban, a pioneer in bringing the Japanese art of Gogen Yamaguchi
across the waters. In 1967 Ganci moved from New York to Connecticut and
was lucky in finding one of the few branch dojo of the Kyokushin
that existed at that time.
The Goju and Kyokushin styles were similar and Mas
Oyama had an affiliation with Yamaguchi early in his career. This
school was run by Ralph Gigliotti, an early sponsor of Mas Oyama's U.S.
promotional and training missions. His son, Michael, was the youngest
American Kyokushin black belt, and had appeared with the founder on the
Tonight Show, and in other promotional outings.
Ganci continued his training here and in 1969 was awarded the Shodan
by Tadashi Nakamura and
Shigeru Oyama, at the time the two highest ranking
U.S. based Kyokushin yudansha. After having continued training
and advancement under these Shihan and from the Sosai himself,
Ganci was granted Branch Chief instructor's status and began teaching
in satellite programs throughout Connecticut, and as of this writing,
operates one of the longest continual programs of karate instruction in
the Northeastern U.S.
He pioneered one of the first accredited college level courses in traditonal
karate in the U.S. About the same time as the departure of Nakamura who
formed the Seido School and Shigeru Oyama who formed the U.S. Oyama School,
Ganci, too, withdrew from the Kyokushin to form the Mushin
School.
This school is affiliated with Japan's Renmei-Budo Kai, the International
Martial Arts Federation, a prestigious and conservative group overseen
by some of Japan's foremost martial arts meijin. Through this affiliation,
the Mushin accepts and certifies many people from a wide range of traditional
martial arts backgrounds. He estimates that about 10,000 people have received
some training directly under him. In addition to his karate, Ganci holds
advanced degrees in education and has been a teacher as well as a multimedia
consultant and developer.
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