E. J Harrison

Ernest John Harrison was an English journalist, author and judoka. Harrison was born in Manchester, England, on 22 August 1873. He wrote many books about the practice of judo. He died in London, on 23 April 1961. As a young man, Harrison was a journalist who worked for newspapers in England, British Columbia, and Japan. He enjoyed wrestling. In 1897, while working for Yokohama newspaper called Japan Herald, he began training in Tenjin shinyo-ryu jujutsu. After moving to Tokyo, he began training in Kodokan judo. In 1911, he was the first foreign-born person to achieve shodan in Kodokan judo. In 1912, his Fighting Arts of Japan was among the first English-language books to describe the Japanese martial arts from the perspective of a foreign-born practitioner of those arts. In 1916, Harrison was commissioned a lieutenant in the British Army. He served until 1919. Countries he served in included China, France, Latvia, and Estonia. In 1921, Harrison left Lithuania to London and started to work as official press attaché and ELTA correspondent in the Lithuanian legation to the United Kingdom. Most of his professional writings from 1921 to 1940 focused on Lithuanian topics.