Thai Boxing Association of the U.S.A.
Articles
Remembering
Terry Gibson
by Mrs. Terry Gibson
On
September 26, 1997 the martial arts world lost one of the finest men they ever
knew. Terry Gibson, who had been
battling a brain tumor for 12 years, passed away at 2:50 p.m. that day.
Terry
was an inspiration to us, as a martial artist and a person.
Martial arts were his passion and in 1986 he did what few people have
the guts to do. He gave up his
law practice of 7 years; with it’s monetary advantages and prestige, to
follow his dreams and opened his first, full time martial arts academy.
As many of Terry’s friends knew, Terry suffered from seizures.
Although these bouts left him tired, weak and sometimes disoriented, he
would pick himself up and continue as best he could.
I cannot count the times he would be teaching class and would have to
leave the floor to have a seizure, sometimes 2 or 3 a night, just to return to
his class 5 or 10 minutes later to finish it up.
Terry
told one of his students once that because of the effects from the cancer he
would never be able to be the best fighter but he wanted to be the best
instructor that he could be. I
believe that anyone who was lucky enough to train under Terry realized the
amount of effort he put into perfecting his teaching skills.
But even more than teaching, Terry loved to train.
He had a thirst for knowledge that few of us can understand, it was all
consuming. For that reason, Terry
took several trips a year to Los Angeles, CA. to train with his instructors,
Guro Dan Inosanto, Ajarn Chai Sirisute and Pak Herman Suwanda.
When his instructors were giving seminars within driving distance from
his home in Tulsa, Terry would make the trip to see them and even traveled to
Indonesia to participate in training camp with Pak Herman.
Terry kept up his training through seizures and 2 years of
chemotherapy, he was totally dedicated and it showed in his many
accomplishments and certifications. He
was a Full Instructor in the Filipino Martial Arts and Jun Fun Gung Fu under
Guro Dan Inosanto. He had his
beginning certificate under Ajarn Chai Sirisute and was the director for the
South Central Region in the Thai Boxing Association of the USA.
He had recently acquired his teaching certificate under Pak Herman
Suwanda in Mande Muda Pencak Silat.
Those
of us who were lucky enough to call Terry our friend know what an exceptional
person he was. Always open,
willing to make new friends and the first person to give you a big hug. Terry
will be greatly missed in a world where he stood for the things he believed
in, the things we all want to believe in.
Loyalty, honesty, friendship, hard work, being true to yourself,
kindness, generosity and love.
“If
people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break
them, so of course it kills them...It kills the very good and the very gentle
and the very brave impartially. If
you are none of these you can be sure that it will kill you too but there will
be no special hurry.”
—Ernest
Hemingway
A
Farewell to Arms
Ajarn Chai takes a break between
training sessions at the Oregon Camp to go hiking
with some of his senior students, (from left):
Rob Kelley, Dickie Harrell,
Ajarn Chai,
Terry Gibson, Greg Nelson