Yokoyama Sakujiro

Yokoyama Sakujirō (横山 作次郎, 1864 – September 23, 1912), was one of the earliest disciples of Kanō Jigorō.

Yokoyama was born in Saginomiya, Tokyo, Japan in 1864. He was a student of Tenjin Shin'yō-ryū jujutsu under Inoue Keitaro (井上 敬太郎) in the Yushima Tenjin (湯島 天神) dojo, but also trained in Kitō-ryū. He joined the police in Yamagata prefecture and became a student of Daitō-ryū Aiki-jūjutsu in the dojo of Takeda Sokaku (武田 惣角). Yokoyama was 22 when he entered the Kōdōkan dojo in April, 1886. He is believed to have come originally to the Kodokan as a challenger, pledging himself to Kano's teachings after being bested by Saigō Shirō. Yokoyama further assisted Kano in establishing the Kōdōkan. He was considered the most formidable of all judo experts of his time, which reflected in his nickname of "Demon Yokoyama" (鬼横山, Oni Yokoyama).

Yokoyama fought on behalf of the Kodokan for the first time in 1884, when three fighters of the Yoshin-ryu jujutsu school named Matsugoro Okuda, Daihachi Ichikawa and Morikichi Otake came to challenge their members. As Kano was out at the moment, they only found Yokoyama training with Saigo and Tsunejiro Tomita, but those decided to answer the challenge by themselves. The three Kodokan members defeated their opponents in respective matches, with Yokoyama pinning his opponent on the ground and choking him out. Kano was not pleased with their behavior when he found out, thinking they had shown themselves too eager to fight, but anyway their victories helped to increase Kodokan's renown in Japan.

In 1886, Yokoyama was a part of the Kodokan team which fough the school Yoshin-ryu in the second meeting between the two factions, at Yayoi shrine in Shiba, Tokyo. His opponent, however, was not a member of Yoshin-ryu, but the Ryoi Shinto-Ryu jujutsuka Hansuke Nakamura, who had been called up by them as a reinforcement. Nicknamed the "Demon Slayer" and considered the toughest martial artist in Japan, Nakamura was as tall and heavy as Sakujiro himself, and had subjected himself to a hard training in order to avenge a defeat suffered to Tomita's hands in 1884.

The match, refereed by Tetsutaro Hisatomi from Sekiguchi-ryu, lasted a total of 55 minutes. After half a hour of struggling on their feet, Yokoyama managed to throw Nakamura down with deashi barai and pin him with kami-shiho-gatame, but Nakamura immediately reversed and pinned Yokoyama with his own kami-shiho-gatame. Although Sakujiro was able to escape with great effort and score a defensive harai goshi that floored the jujutsuka, he did not follow him to the ground, as he now knew Hansuke was dangerous at ne-waza. Similarly, Hansuke remained on the ground challenging him to grapple, knowing Sakujiro was superior on the stand-up. Yokoyama eventually accepted the challenge and they grappled during the last 25 minutes, gripping each other so hard that the referee had to forcefully pry their numb fingers apart to separate them when the match ended. Sakujiro later wrote that he thought he was going to die during the bout.

After Sakujiro was awarded the 4º dan in 1888, he competed in a similar match against Senjuro Kanaya from the Takenouchi-ryū school. The match, happened around 1890, was distinctly brutal. Although the judoka blocked a tomoe nage attempt, his opponent's specialty, he got his neck scissored by Kanaya's legs and was unable to pin him. Feeling pressure on his neck, and seeing he couldn't break the hold, Yokoyama opted to push forward and smash Kanaya's head against the main pillar of the dojo, preventing him from completing the choke. 20 minutes passed, and given that none of them could finish the other, the match was declared a draw.

Yokoyama was awarded the seventh grade in October, 1904, which was the highest dan in judo at the time.

When Kanō Jigorō began developing judo from jujutsu, practitioners of jujutsu opposed his efforts. However, Kano drew a loyal following that included exceptional fighters. Hence the term "Four Guardians of the Kōdōkan" came into existence referring to Yokoyama Sakujirō along with Yamashita Yoshiaki, Tsunejirō Tomita, and Saigō Shirō.