The Deadliest Man Alive: Searching for Count Dante

Over the past few years, I have had some experience with deja vu, a few premonitions and what some consider precognition. I try to rationalize these strange occurrences by telling myself that it is all coincidence. After all, we’re all connected by six degrees of separation or something like that. In the back of my mind I know there is something else involved, an unseen force guiding us and bringing us together.

A few weeks ago, while working on an article covering Marvel Comics’ “Deadly Hands of Kung Fu,” I took time to review and appreciate the retro advertisements that frequented the pages. There were ads for books and manuals to make you a fighting master in karate or kung fu. The majority of the ads were generic and I paid them no mind.

However, one ad stood out. It was an ad by some guy who claimed to be “The Deadliest Man Alive.” The ad said that he was the “Supreme Grand Master of the Black Dragon Fighting Society,” and he sold a book that taught Dim Mak, The Deadly Touch.

Dim Mak struck a chord with me. A few weeks earlier, while speaking to a local martial arts master, Bruce Lee’s name came up and suggestion that he was actually killed by the strike known as “Dim Mak.”

The fearsome man in the ad had his hands fixed in a foreboding position. He called himself Count Dante and the ad said that in 1967, he was crowned The World’s Deadliest Fighting Master by the World Federation of Fighting Arts.

There was something that attracted me to the ad. Unlike the others, there was nothing comical about it. There was a sense of mysticism to it. I had a feeling about it. I couldn’t put my finger on it and I moved forward, working on the “Deadly Hands of Kung Fu” article.

While still preparing the article I received an email from the insightful reader known to the kung fu fandom community as “jiujitsu77.” He sent me an email asking a question that would send me on a journalistic journey that would enlighten me about the city that had made unappreciated and unacknowledged contribution to martial arts culture in the United States.

“Have you heard of the Count Dante documentary coming out of Chicago,” he asked?

I thought the name was eerily familiar but I couldn’t connect it. I Googled Count Dante and was led to a web site where a filmmaker named Floyd Webb was working on a documentary entitled THE SEARCH FOR COUNT DANTE.

Things didn’t register but while watching the film’s trailer I realized who Dante was. He was that same guy I had seen in the comic book ads. I couldn’t believe it. I was still working on the “Deadly Hands” article and I coincidently received an email suggesting I check into the very character who roamed its pages. Only Mark Pollard and a few Marvel folks knew I was putting the article together. It wasn’t deja vu but it was definitely in the eerie six degrees of separation space.

THE SEARCH FOR COUNT DANTE trailer introduced me to John Keehan, the man who would become Count Dante. He was one of the most controversial martial artists in America whose story must be told, a skilled fighter whose legacy was dominated by colorful and bizarre exploits ranging from inciting violent encounters between rival dojos and the alleged masterminding of a mob-related bank heist to promoting a man vs. bull fight and working as a hairdresser to pick up Playboy bunnies.

In speaking to the documentary maker by phone, I was introduced to the myth of Count Dante and the figures who were involved in its creation. As Webb dropped science, my notepad became saturated with names of legendary martial arts masters who warranted their own stories and documentaries. All of whom had a hand in the formation of “The Deadliest Man Alive,” who by some account pass on in 1975 but whose legend refuses to die.

To tell Count Dante’s story is to tell Floyd Webb’s story. Both men have been linked by some unseen force, six degrees if you will.

Webb grew up in the South Side of Chicago. After his father went off to Vietnam, he found himself getting beat up from time to time. “I was a geek, a bookworm, I was tired of getting my butt kicked so I decided to learn martial arts” said Webb.

From the age of eleven his interest in martial arts would lead him to the second annual World Karate Tournament in 1964 where he would come face to face with the redheaded kingpin himself, John Keehan.

Webb recalled the routine of cleaning up at restaurants in Chicago’s Chinatown for pocket money. One particular evening after work he and his friends bought tickets to the 1964 World Karate Tournament.

“It was huge. Imagine like 4000 people in this location,” Webb recalled. “I remember the Black Muslims fighting the U.S. Marines. This was the kind of tournament where teeth went flying all over the place.”

It wasn’t enough to keep Webb and his friends occupied. “We were just like any other group of kids. We started running around tearing shit up,” said Webb.

He described how they were subsequently approached by, “a cool, no-nonsense white boy,” who told them to settle down, that he would take care of them and get them good seats. That man was John Keehan. Although Webb would never train with him, he would frequently run into him while growing up in Chicago.

It wasn’t until Webb was an adult when he was prompted, guided if you will, by some unseen force, causing him to start work on a documentary that covered the life of John Keehan.

Webb was originally working on an unrelated project when he ran into an old competitor. “Yo, man. I just had dinner with Count Dante,” said the former combatant.

Webb dismissed the comment initially because he described a great number of people in Chicago as punch drunk. Yet he could no longer ignore these comments when four people in a week’s time claimed to have seen Count Dante. Finally a friend mentioned to Floyd that Dante’s story would be great material for a movie.

These words would be the beginning of a search for the truth about Dante, his alleged death and what had really happened to him.

When I spoke to Floyd about the creation and molding of Dante, he led me on a historical journey, introducing me to martial arts and fighting powerhouses who created the scene in Chicago and inadvertently Count Dante.

John Keehan was born in 1939 and while he was in high school he boxed at a South Side Chicago gym. He trained with former champion boxer Johnny Coulon and was a close friend of heavyweight boxing champ Jack Johnson.

After high school Keehan joined the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves and later transferred to the U.S. Army. During this period, from 1958 through 1961 he was stationed on the West Coast and trained with Shaolin kung fu master Wong Tim-yuen and Ed Parker, one of the earliest pioneers of American karate. He also trained with James Yimm Lee, the successful author of a self-published instructional series titled “Modern Kung-Fu Karate: Iron, Poison Hand Training.” Keehan claimed to have met Bruce Lee during this time.

Somewhere during all of this, Keehan suggested that he was involved in a covert operation to train Raul Castro and Che Guevara in support of their rebellion in Cuba.

In 1962, John Keehan returned to Chicago to continue training and teaching fighting arts. He briefly traveled to Phoenix to study under karate master Robert Trias, founder of the United States Karate Association. He earned his second-degree black belt and subsequently fought Gary Alexander for the North American Karate Championship at Madison Square Garden. According to Webb’s sources, Keehan was disqualified for being too rough. It’s also been said that Keehan simply got knocked out.

Keehan studied with Charles Gruzanski who has an interesting story of his own. After entering the military in 1950, Gruzanski became a special military police investigator. He was stationed in Japan where occupying U.S. military forces had outlawed martial arts following the end of World War II. Gruzanski had access to files on suspected trainers of martial arts. Under the pretense of investigating illegal activity, he sought out Japanese martial arts instructors to learn their arts, not to arrest them.

After his discharge, Gruzanski returned to Chicago with a Japanese wife and became a civilian police officer. He taught martial arts in the South Side at various locations including the projects where one of his students would be John Keehan.

In addition to karate, John Keehan studied judo under Masato Tamura, a 4th Dan instructor who taught at the Jiu-Jitsu Institute in Chicago. Tamura achieved legendary fighting status in Chicago when he defeated European champion professional wrestler Karl Pojello in 1943 in what would now be considered a mixed martial arts match. This was achieved despite the fact that Tamura had lost three fingers on his left hand in a previous accident. Tamura, who beat the professional wrestler in one minute and twenty seconds, was the kind of guy whose skill was such that another fighter by the name of “Judo” Gene Lebelle would steal rides on trains between Los Angeles and Chicago just so he could train with the judo master.

Aside from skill, Keehan would learn to place value in people regardless of skin color, avoiding the prevalent discrimination that was in vogue at that time.

Webb recalled a terse meeting with Keehan’s instructor Mas Tamura. In the 1950s or ’60s, Blacks and other minorities were not allowed to learn martial arts. “I remember going to the [Jiu-Jitsu Institute] and meeting Mas. He introduced himself and politely blew me off.” Yet at the time, Webb had Tamura all wrong.

Legendary street fighter, martial artist and teacher Gregory Jaco, who was also the father of rapper Lupe Fiasco, told Webb that Tamura did in fact train Blacks but in a clandestine manner. Webb described it as “underground railroad training,” where he was told that Black men would arrive to the school late in the evening and night, dressed and acting as though they were cleaning the facility, when in fact, they were actually taking lessons inside. Tamura had to teach them this way because he was fearful of loosing his license.

Taking this acceptance of racially diverse students further, John Keehan became one of the first martial arts teachers in the U.S. to openly teach Blacks and Latinos. Not only did he teach Blacks but he also trained members of the Black Muslims and one of Chicago’s most notorious gangs, The Blackstone Rangers. This was to form the beginning of rivalries Keehan developed with many martial arts schools.

One rumor suggests Keehan’s decision to teach Blacks led to his expulsion from the U.S. Karate Association in 1964 by founder Robert Trias. Speaking on the subject to “Black Belt” magazine in 1969 Keehan said, “the USKA didn’t have any Negroes in the organization [in 1964], except for mine, and Trias didn’t like it one bit. It’s the truth. Of course, now he has no qualms about it but at the time, that’s the way it was.”

Keehan’s open door policy made him popular among Blacks in Chicago. Webb explained that while conducting research and interviews with former students, he didn’t find any Blacks in Chicago with anything bad to say about Keehan because he took a stand and trained them openly when most would not.

In 1965, Keehan encountered his first trouble with the law while engaged in mounting conflict with a rival school. Keehan and his friend Doug Dwyer were arrested after trying to blow out a window at Gene Wyka’s school with a dynamite cap. They were caught by the police before they had a chance to blow up the school. Keehan received two years probation.

One source claims that in 1967, Keehan put on an exhibition at the Medina Temple where a bull would be killed by a single blow. Keehan bought a bull and drove it around town on a flatbed truck with signs promoting the event. He picked one of his students to perform the act but Keehan had to cancel because the event had been shut down by an animal protection agency. Even though he wasn’t able to pull off the staged event, you get a sense of his appreciation for colorful promotion and theatrics.

Another strange event occurred the same year. Keehan organized a martial arts tournament and then allegedly stole the funds from the tournament. According to Webb’s research, Keehan was owed funds from someone he was working with which led him to take money from the tournament that he organized.

Also in 1967, Keehan changed his name to Juan Raphael Dante. His reason was to reclaim the royal title that was lost by his parents when they migrated to this country.

The newly minted Count Dante then opened “The House of Dante,” a hair saloon. Webb recalled that Keehan had several reasons for doing hair. “It allowed him to make an income and meet women,” said Webb. There was no stopping Keehan during this period. He also owned a used car lot, a gift shop and even a porn shop.

In 1968, Keehan published his first book, “World’s Deadliest Fighting Secrets.” The first half included a number of practical poison hand techniques. The second half was dedicated to “The Dance of Death,” which was a series of steps where a practitioner fought their opponent to the ground to stomp on them. Keehan chose to cap the book with a picture of him and a Playboy bunny sitting in a chair, a hint of the lifestyle he led. According to Webb, “World’s Deadliest Fighting Secrets” sold well enough for Keehan to collect a million dollars.

Two years later, Keehan published an article called “Karate is For Sissies” where he attacked the tradition and ceremony of karate, kung fu and judo by stating that these arts were not practical in a street fight. Being a controversial attack on traditionalists, this was likely an attention getting scheme to promote his own system, Kata Dante, AKA The Dance of Death.

Keehan’s five-year rivalry with other Chicago-area martial arts schools finally came to a head in one of the most infamous martial arts battles in Chicago history. On April 24th, 1970 John Keehan led four men to the Green Dragon Society’s Black Cobra Hall of Kung Fu. During this battle, Keehan forcibly removed an opponent’s eye and his good friend Jim Koncevic was fatally stabbed with a Chinese sword.

In the trial that followed the incident, the judge held Keehan partially responsible for the death of Koncevic for inciting his friend to fight and he was charged with aggravated battery.

To handle his case, Keehan hired mob lawyer Robert Cooley. In his book, “When Corruption Was King: How I Helped the Mob Rule Chicago,” Cooley described Keehan as a sex maniac and explained how Keehan had been living an extravagant lifestyle with several Playboy bunnies before the trial.

According to Webb who interviewed the former mob lawyer, Cooley stated that Keehan had subsequently masterminded the $4 million heist of the Purolator Security headquarters in connection with the mob. In his book, Cooley linked Keehan to the crime and explains how he ended up getting involved. Yet Keehan was never found to be directly connected to the crime and after questioning by investigators was released.

After a failed attempt to revive his martial arts career by hosting a poorly received event in Massachusetts, Keehan died in his sleep on May 25th, 1975 due to bleeding ulcers. It is said that the ulcers were brought on by self-induced stress Keehan suffered in his later years.

Webb confirmed that Keehan was buried in an unmarked grave which is puzzling to the director given his background. In addition to his notoriety in later years, Keehan was a military veteran. He also came from a well-off family. Cooley described Keehan’s background in his book. “His father was a doctor and he lived in a wealthy neighborhood, where Tommy Dugan and I would pick fights with the rich kids.”

Supposedly, in 1967 John Keehan legally changed his name to Juan Raphael Dante. Webb found no record of this name change in county records. Cooley wrote about Keehan as though the name change was not legit. “His real name was John Keehan. ‘Dante’ was the name of a street near where we grew up.” If John had really changed his name, then it’s likely that Cooley would have mentioned this in his book. Put these pieces together and one wonders if “The Most Dangerous Man Alive” actually died in 1975 or is still walking among us.

I don’t know where Dante is myself. While researching this article someone told me that he lives in Gary, Indiana and plays drums for this band called the Wanderers. Another source spotted him on a Caribbean island with D.B. Cooper.

Four years ago, I had a feeling, a premonition, that I was Floyd Webb, and a friend of mine told me that he had dinner with Count Dante, and thus began my search for “The Most Dangerous Man Alive.

Floyd Webb is hoping to release THE SEARCH FOR COUNT DANTE, his documentary on the life of John Keehan, AKA Count Dante, in December pending the resolution of a legal dispute over rights to use select archival footage of John Keehan. For a quality trailer visit Cinelan.com and for more information about the film visit thesearchforcountedante.com.

Tags: Counte Dante, Genre: Kung Fu, judo, karate