the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

Finally, Wang remarks, without further explanation: "I had originally studied a Si-lian quan 'Four Connections boxing' form, whose hands and movements identical to Chen taiji." After coming to Taiwan, in 1951 Wang chanced to meet Chen Junfeng [i.e. Chen Panling] in Taizhong (where the provincial government was first based). Comparing notes, they experimented to create a 'Chen style' of taiji quan.

[n.b. Wang Shujin acknowledged to me that Chen Panling had taught him taiji quan and the 24 walking-stick; but claimed in return he had taught Xingyi (Hsing I) and Ba gua to Chen Panling. Wang appears to equate 'Chen style' from the 'Chen Village', (Henan) Chen Jiagou, with Chen Panling's own composite brand of taiji quan. Authentic Chen style taiji quan was virtually unknown in Taiwan then, and it is unlikely that Wang knew much about it. Robert Smith (Martial Musings 1999 p255) relates how even Rose Lee, who grew up under a famous master in Peking, told how she, while fleeing from Japanese c.1940, had observed Henan villagers practicing taiji quan, but seemed unaware of Chenjiagou's very existence. Indeed, Chenjiagou was not opened up to the world before the late 1980s. In 1983, when a Shaolin Temple visit still required a police permit, I was denied access there. My first trip to Chenjiagou, several years later, took eight hours on mud roads from Zhengzhou!]