Customer Reviews

How To Fight Tough

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I was extremely pleased to see the reprint of this previously hard-to-find book. I have, of late, renewed my interest in the martial arts as taught by the military during the 40's and 50's (don't ask what I paid for a used copy of Cosneck's "American Combat Judo"). This book presents excellent examples of the techniques of that era. The boxing/wrestling/jujutsu combo was easy to teach and mostly effective. The techniques in this book are, however, hardly unique. Virtually all of them may be found in other self-defense texts. This book shines, however, as a look back in history. The "Manassa Mauler" takes you through several lessons in basic hand-to-hand, drawing on his own boxing expertise as well as on the wrestling skills of the above-mentioned Mr.Cosneck. The photos are rather dark, and the page layout makes it difficult to get a sense of the "flow" of the techniques. Still, for all of its defects, I'm very pleased that Paladin chose to reprint this little classic. As a learning tool of self-defense, it may leave much to be desired, but if I had to rate it only on its value as a slice of American combative history, I would have given this book five stars.

I like the fact that I can't really find a bad technique in this book. The tone of the book is deadly serious, though the political overtones of WWII are imposable to ignore. The reason I don't rate this book higher is because it is simply a series of self-defense sequenses; there is no real "system" presented. The combinations shown herein are all valid, workable moves, taken from street boxing, catch wrestling, Japanese jujitsu, and WWII comando training. While one can learn practical self-defense from this book, the lack of organization makes other books on the subject far more useful. The aspect that suprised me was the ammount of catch wrestling techniques included, such as the toe hold and figure-four choke. Another thing that this book had that isn't found in too many other souces was the use of your opponent's clothing, in a non-judo manner, to execute a technique. Once again, the induvidual sequenses are good; it's just the lack of an organized system that I don't like. OK for some good self-defense "tricks", but most other books are better.

Interesting book from a period of modern history. However, it is devoted to basic locks and take downs. If you're looking for information on self defense based boxing techniques it is not here. Conversely, if you are looking for some quick to learn street techniques you would be satisfied.

People who don't review this book well do not understand its significance. Dempsey's lead jolt was the inspiration for Bruce Lee's straight lead which is the basis of Jeet Kune Do. Yes, its true that many of these techniques appear in other books, but they were innovated here by Dempsey. Read Dempsey and then read Bruce Lee and see if you can't find a direct lineage.

Ok, I didn't buy the book for any fighting skills I wished to acquire, I bought it as I am a huge Jack Dempsey fan. I found the book to be interesting, certainly a quick read if you aren't reading it for the defence skills taught but to see how books like this were written during war-time.
It is a good buy for the history buff, the boxing historian/completist or the person wanting to know simple (but seemingly good) self-defence moves.

Having been a long time fan of Championship Fighting I was looking forward to this book. Unfortunately it falls into the 'glad it wasn't expensive' category. It's a nice interest book to add to a collection given the name of the author, but I was expecting some fairly efficient self defense techniques. I found the ones in the book weren't that. In most cases if you could implement the technique shown there'd be a lot quicker ways to have got the same result.

Great WW2 CQB from the great Jack Dempsey! On a par with similar classics like Fairborn's GET TOUGH & Applegate's KILL OR GET KILLED. Basic,easy to teach & learn & most importantly,deadly effective over a range of conditions. A "must have" for any martial artist's library.

The service was great, but the book is a little out of date. It was ok,I liked it a little