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USSD.NET is proud to present an interview with Master Frank Ley, Regional Director for the San Francisco Bay Area. We discuss his passion for the martial arts, how he got started in martial arts and what made him want to teach martial arts.
USSD.NET: How did you get into martial arts? What influenced your decision to pursue martial arts?
MASTER LEY: I was born in Pennsylvania and grew up in Massachusetts. When I was a young boy, and even into my early teens, I got into shows like Kung Fu with David Carradine. That show had a major influence on me. What I liked most about that show was the flashbacks to when he was a little boy in the temple. This is when you saw the question and answer part of stuff, where he was learning the philosophy that is the underlying root of the martial arts. That stuff really intrigued me. I liked the action scenes too, but even back then not that much. The way the actors that portrayed the Shaolin monks spoke to him and asked him questions and made him think about what he was really being asked. That's the stuff that really got me, when they really talked about the philosophy. That's what really sparked my initial intrigue and interest. What got me interested in the physical aspects of martial arts was Bruce Lee movies and Kung Fu Theatre on Saturday afternoons. Even though these were movies and they were choreographed scenes, you still saw incredible skill and great discipline being exhibited. As a young man growing up in Massachusetts, it dawned on me at one point that I was kind of floating around directionless in life. I didn't really have a focus and I had no ambition or education in business or anything like that. So I had to make some serious and hard decisions about what I wanted to do with my life. I came up with two options; the military and martial arts training. A very good friend of mine, Steve, who I will never forget and who, coincidentally, just contacted me recently, is the one that made the initial fateful call to a studio in Melrose Massachusetts, which I understand now was Professor Mattera's first studio in Massachusetts when he was first a chief instructor. We went down, took a lesson, talked about what we liked about the philosophy that we had seen on shows like Kung Fu and talked about the physical aspects that we liked in Bruce Lee movies and Kung Fu movies. The instructor there convinced us that we would be able to learn all of that stuff we saw in the movies and we thought “This is it, let's try it, let's do it!” And I've never looked back since. The martial arts saved my life. It gave me a sense of discipline, purpose, direction, control…self-control, self-determination. It gave me an opportunity to really direct my energies in a positive way. It was one of the first things that I ever did that I felt I was good at. There were a couple of other things that I was kind of good at here and there, in school and in athletics, but it was the first thing that I felt really natural doing. You know the old cliche that you get out of things what you put into them? Martial arts was the first thing that I ever experienced that I got more out of it than I ever put into it. And it just seems to have been that way ever since I started it until today. It's about a deep passion and love for the martial arts.
USSD.NET: When did you know that you wanted to teach martial arts? What are some of the things that lead you to that decision?
MASTER LEY: It was at yellow belt when I decided I'm going to stick with this until I get at least a black belt for sure because I became so determined that I really wanted to improve myself. Then it was at about purple belt that I said “You know what? My goals have changed again. I want to teach this to other people. I want to be able to help other people benefit the way that I have and, I'm sure, in ways I can't even imagine right now” That was about purple belt when I made that decision. I've just pursued it ever since and never stopped. When Steve and I signed up for Karate at the Melrose studio we were about 20 or 21 then. That studio was Shaolin Kempo. The instructor, Frank Bognano, learned from Master Paul Taylor who in turn, of course, learned from Professor Charles Mattera so I was only three removed even when I started. Mister Bognano was a very good and talented martial artist. He was a good quality instructor who had good skills, good ability to read people and was definitely a positive mentor in my early training. He definitely sparked the interest in me into a passion, into a greater love. Then, after getting my black belt, which was about 6 months to a year after Mr. Bognano got his Nidan, his second degree black belt, I had the opportunity to train with Master Taylor directly in Everett, Massachusetts. This was a huge honor of course, but also a major eye opener. It made me understand what I had already been learning from Mr. Bognano to that point as well as took me to new levels because, now, as a black belt, we know that this is the real beginning of learning martial arts. I was now getting the advanced training from a more advanced instructor so it was very appropriate and really a major turning point as far as a re-commitment to higher levels of skill and knowledge and understanding and really wanting to be a teacher someday.
USSD.NET: Have you always been an instructor in San Francisco?
MASTER LEY: I started teaching in the Melrose, MA studio in late 1984 through mid 1985. Then I was given an opportunity by Master Taylor and Professor Mattera to move to Orange, California in 1985. I ran the Orange studio for almost a year. I ended up going back to New England in early 1986. I was going to run a studio in Salem, NH but I was only there for a couple of months and was back in Southern California almost right away and ran the Anaheim studio for just a couple of months. Then, late in 1986, I was given the opportunity to head up a very new area in San Francisco. There were only two schools, San Mateo and Foster City. I was running San Mateo at that time and we built up to 8 studios. I then moved back to Southern California at the beginning of 1990. I was in Orange for almost two years. In late 1991 I was given the opportunity to be a district manager for the first time. I moved down to San Diego. We had three studios down there at that time. Between 1991 and 1997 we built up to 20 locations in San Diego. I learned a tremendous amount during this time. Then, in 1997, I was given the opportunity to move back to Northern California. 1997 was also the year I was promoted to fifth dan. I've been in Northern California ever since. Right now morale in that area is at an all time high and we're beginning a growth process which I am very excited about. USSD is just exploding right now and I see that happening everywhere and I see that happening in the bay area as well.
USSD.NET: What are some of the most memorable milestones of your martial arts career?
MASTER LEY: The three China trips were very big milestones for me. During the first trip, watching Professor Mattera and Steve DeMasco get promoted to tenth degree. Being able to put on a demonstration for the abbot in front of them, especially Professor Mattera, my instructor and mentor. Seeing them both being adopted by the abbot – spiritually speaking of course – and also becoming disciples of the temple. Really unifying and making that connection with what I talked about earlier, the Shaolin temple, and that one of the reasons that I got into it, the philosophy that it espoused through the martial arts and the Shaolin temple. Then the following year, 2001, we did our first test in China for students, and to make it even more special the Professor decided at the same time that 6 of his upper degree black belts had developed to a point that he felt comfortable testing them for the next rank. So, we did our entire test exclusively inside the temple. That was Master Taylor getting his 8th degree, myself and Master Black being promoted to 6th dan, and then Master Eszlinger, Master Prosch and Master Clark all being promoted to 5th dan. What made that special, besides the obvious of testing for a high degree black belt in the Shaolin temple, was that I did it with five other guys that I consider brothers. They are my friends, my colleagues, my peer group and people that I consider like brothers to me. Then in 2004, what Professor Mattera considers to be the biggest honor of all, we had the monument stone erected in the temple. That's something that will be there permanently. Like Professor Mattera always says, we're just people, and in the grand scheme of things, in the whole universe, we are kind of small and insignificant in comparison to all of that stuff so having the monument stone there solidifies the relationship with the Shaolin temple that they have developed over the last several years. It brings a complete and full circle to what we have done because if you trace the Shaolin temple system from the temple through Okinawa and China and Hawaii and then eventually to the United States now you're all the way back to the Shaolin temple and reconnecting with that birthplace and that point of origin. It's a cool and really special thing to be a part of. I feel very fortunate that that happened during the time that I was coming through the ranks and a higher degree black belt in the system. |
