James Mitose moved from Japan to Hawaii in 1936.
He felt great respect and love for the United States and its people,
who had treated him very well. On December 8th, 1941, the day after the
Japanese bombed Pearl 
Harbor and the U. S. entered World War II, Mitose
was the first person in line to donate his blood for the cause. He also
promptly joined the Hawaii Territorial Guard, an outfit which was
formed to aid in the defense of the islands against what then seemed to
be an imminent invasion by the Japanese. He also began teaching basic
martial arts in early 1942. As such he opened the Official Self Defense Club- The fist kosho school in the US.
James Mitose left the Official Self Defense Club in the charge of Thomas Young (his first black belt) in 1946 when he stopped teaching there. Mitose moved to the mainland in 1954. From 1954 until 1977, Mitose taught only one student, Terry Lee, for a period of one year. During these twenty-three years, Mitose took many trips to Japan to further his martial studies. According to Thomas Young, he would often stop over to spend a few days with Young in Hawaii on his trips back and forth to Japan. Mitose and Young remained friends for many years.
Late in 1977, Bruce Juchnik was introduced to
Mitose by Juchnik's student George Santana. Juchnik studied with Mitose
until the latter's death in 1981. Before he died, Mitose awarded Bruce
Juchnik full mastery certification
(Menkyo Kaiden and Inka Shomei) and gave him the "... power to do
whatever (Juchnik Hanshi) thinks is good and right for God, for
(Mitose), and for Kosho Shorei, true self-defense, true and pure Karate
and Kempo" from that day forward, no other person received such
certification.