Centuries ago, the Ryukyu Kingdom on the island of Okinawa adapted the kempo of its Chinese trading partners to its native martial arts into a style called te.

Over time, each region – and sometimes even individual aristocratic families – began to develop their own signature styles. One such family was the Motobu clan, who adapted traditional Okinawan dance with their combat into their Motobu-ryu style.

After Okinawa became part of Japan, several of its traditional styles were further adapted by Japan and Korea, contributing to karate and taekwondo, respectively.

Born in Okinawa and trained in a foundation of Motobu-ryu, Ken Nagayama immigrated to southern California in 1976 and adapted boxing, taekwondo, and aikido to found his own dojo in 1988.

In 2021, David Chung, a 2nd dan student of master Nagayama, continued the tradition of adapting his own experiences both on and off the mat into a new kind of curriculum at Dragon and Crane Dojo.