Tokujiro Namikoshi

Tokujiro Namikoshi (Japanese: 浪越 徳治郎, Hepburn: Namikoshi Tokujirō, 1905 – 2000) is the founder of Shiatsu therapy.

He was born on the island of Shikoku. As a young boy of seven, he discovered his hands-on therapy pressure method while treating his mother’s rheumatoid arthritis. He named this method "Shiatsu".

In 1940, he established the Japan Shiatsu College in Tokyo. Many of his graduates now practice in Japan and overseas. Some of these graduates have popularized their own styles, called Derivative Shiatsu, such as Tadashi Izawa of Meridian Shiatsu and Shizuto Masunaga of Zen Shiatsu. Also Hiroshi Nozaki who began the Hiron Shiatsu branch which a holistic school of shiatsu popular in Switzerland, France and Italy. Namikoshi also established the Japan Shiatsu Association in 1947. He died at age 95 in 2000.