Original masters of taekwondo

[3] The group came under the leadership of Choi Hong-hi (1918–2002),[1][2][3][4] inaugural president of the KTA and later founder of the International Taekwon-Do Federation (ITF), and Nam Tae-hi (1929–2013),[7][8][9][10] known as the Father of Vietnamese Taekwondo.

C. K. Choi, J. C. Kim, Y. I. Kong, J. S. Park, and K. H. Rhee have maintained the strongest links with the ITF.

He began his martial arts training in the South Korean army in 1956, studying taekwondo and karate.

[36] His martial art training began when he was still a child, learning kwon bup.

[29][30] Choi moved to the United States of America in 1970 to seek medical treatment for injuries sustained from martial arts training.

[24][54] He trained under three martial art masters: Tae-hi Nam, Duk-sung Son, and Woon-kyu Um.

[23][24] Han was the first of the original masters of taekwondo to demonstrate overseas, participating in the March 1959 tour of Taiwan and Vietnam.

[1][2][11][12] Following a career in the South Korean military, he emigrated to the United States of America in 1971, settling in Chicago.

[57] 1953 Began studying martial arts with Kim Bong-gil 1955 General Choi announced and created the name TAEKWON-DO on 11 April.

1960 Promoted to 2nd Dan Black Belt in Tae Kwon-Do 1962 Appointed as Head Instructor of the Oh Do Kwan Headquarters school in Seoul.

Organized the world's first TAEKWON-DO Championships, held in Wonju, Korea, where CK Choi became free sparring and patterns champion 1963 Promoted to Tae Soo Do (Karate) 3rd Degree Black Belt 1964 Trained directly under General Choi for four months, where the 24 Tae-Kwon Do patterns were formed.

1965 Organized TAEKWON-DO as primary martial art trained in the Korean military.

Appointed as the first Tae Kwon Do Chief Instructor to the Korean National Police Force, by the Minister of Homeland Affairs 1967 Developed the first International Instructors course for the ITF, where the minimum student entrant would possess a 4th Dan black belt.

1971 Organized with Han Cha-kyo, the first Asian TAEKWON-DO Championships, held in Hong Kong.

1975 Invented the stretching machine “the Stretchersizer” 1976 Invited as the Instructor, of the European Instructors course held in Glasgow U K. 1977 Studied Bio Physical Education at Concordia University 1978 Moved to New Westminster BC 1979 Trained 21 TAEKWON-DO instructors in Argentina including Dr Hector Marano and Pablo Trajtenberg, and with an unprecedented move, promoted several of them directly from 2nd Dan to 4th Dan Black Belts.

As chairman of the merging committee, negotiated the merging agreement between the ITF and the WT, that was submitted to the International Olympic Committee by Un-yong Kim, in order to have Tae Kwon- Do accepted as an Olympic sport.

[39] A letter by Kim published in the July 1985 issue of Black Belt magazine lists his title at the time as president of the 'World Tukido Council.

[49] He began training in the martial arts as a child in 1952, starting with Shotokan karate.

[2][11][14][37] Following a career in the South Korean military, Kong emigrated to the United States of America just before or in 1968.

[62] In 1965, he was invited to be the coach of the German Taekwon-Do Association, and moved from South Korea to West Germany.

[63][64] He began training in the martial arts as a child, starting with boxing before moving on to judo and then taekwondo.

[65] He founded his own organisation, the Global Taekwon-Do Federation (GTF), on 14 June 1990—the year after his departure from the ITF due to North–South Korean political issues.

[71] In 2002, he was a member of the arbitration board for the WT's World Cup Taekwondo championship in Tokyo.

As a youth, he trained in martial arts, basketball, boxing, gymnastics, and weights.

[21] Rhee helped introduce the art of taekwondo to Southeast Asia—most notably in Malaysia and Singapore, but also in Hong Kong, Indonesia, and Brunei.

[14] His martial arts training began when he was around 7 or 8 years of age, learning judo from his father.

[13] When Rhee served in the South Korean military forces, he came into contact with H. H. Choi and learned taekwondo in the 35th Infantry Division.

[13] From February 1964, he taught taekwondo to Royal Air Force personnel in Singapore.