National Clothesline

It was back in 1969 when a 17-year old George Thanos found himself in the ring face-to-face with Joe Lewis, a man who would eventually become a 10th degree black belt (the highest honor in all of martial arts) and would twice be voted as the greatest karate fighter of all time.

Certainly, there were several million safer places he could have been at that moment, but George was exactly

where he wanted to be.

As the crowd gathered around at the DC Armory to witness the final round bout between the two warriors, onlookers could plainly see that George was not even remotely intimidated by the highly-praised champ.

In fact, those who watched the fight, including a writer from Black Belt magazine, believed the young challenger fought fearlessly.

“Thanos opened the action with a hard side kick that landed on Lewis’s arm and followed up with a round kick that Lewis also blocked,” wrote Robert W. Bassman. “Again, Thanos attacked with a reverse punch and followed up with a front snap kick, both of which Lewis avoided by running out of the ring. Thanos was clearly the aggressor and he again drove Lewis from the ring with round kicks and punches. Lewis, once the terror of the karate world, seemed to have almost no offense. It appeared that Thanos was ‘The Man’ and Lewis was the challenger.”

Unfortunately for George, he eventually lost the battle in overtime by a single point. It was a highly controversial match and the young man could have legitimately protested the final result, but he felt that it simply wasn’t the right path for him to follow.

“You have to take it sometimes. That’s life,” George said after reliving the memory. Then, he drew a parallel between his long career as a martial arts fighter and his longer career at the helm of his family’s drycleaning business in Washington, DC.

“That can even be like business, too,” he said. “You pay the claim. You have to do it, even if you know you’re right.”

The Thanos family has undoubtedly paid a few claims in their time, but not because they haven’t paid close attention to detail. It’s more due to the fact that their drycleaning roots date back a long, long time ago... over 70 years, in fact.

After George’s grandfather initially arrived in America from Greece, his daughter married in 1936 into a family that owned a shoe repair/cleaning plant named Imperial Valet.

By the early 1940s, he took over the business. Later on, it was owned and operated by George’s father, Spiro, thus George naturally spent an inordinate amount of time on the premises as a boy. Even at a very young age, he always knew it would be his someday.

“I grew up in the business so I always knew what I wanted to do,” he recalled. “When I was five, six years old, I knew I was going to take over the business. It was on my mind when I was going to school. What am I going to do? After I go to school, I am going to take the business over. I knew that.”

To prepare himself properly, George took it upon himself to learn every aspect of the operation.

“I worked through elementary school all the way through high school, from mopping floors to shoe repair,” he said. “I also had to learn how to fix all of the machines.”

Learning about drycleaning was a big passion for the adolescent George, but it was hardly his primary interest. There was something else he preferred to do a little more.

“When I was eight years old, I saw, on television, a karate man breaking cinder blocks or Japanese tiles, or whatever it was, and it just stuck in my mind.”

George wanted to learn karate ever since that day, but despite his desperate pleas his father made him wait until he was a teenager to start training. Fortunately for George, he had two big factors in his favor when he finally started.

First off, he began learning martial arts right at the time it was becoming of major interest to Americans. Secondly, he happened to live five miles away from a teaching legend known as Master Ki Whang Kim.

“He was my master. He was my second father because I was at that studio almost every day. It was part of me growing up. It kept me off the streets,” George explained.

In addition to learning fighting skills, he also soaked up lessons of respect, moderation and humility. After all, Master Ki Whang Kim was a strict mentor who taught with a demanding, disciplined style.

“He would come out with a bamboo stick and line us up as we’d train,” George noted. “He’d hit us with the stick to keep our guards up or our kicks high. That was part of training. It was yes or no, nothing in-between. There was no grey area with us.”

It wasn’t long before George started competing. In fact, he placed second in his first tournament at the age of 13. From that point on, there were a lot of trophies and first place finishes.

“I had to win or my father would put me to work,” he said. “I had pressure. I used to bring the trophies home and put them around his chair in the corner. I loved it. It was part of my life, but he enjoyed the trophies more. I didn’t think it was a big deal. I competed. I won. I remember very seldom did I lose. If I did lose, I would never go that night with my buddies to watch the tournament. It didn’t impress me to see anybody else.”

Throughout his karate career, George’s accomplishments have been more than enough to impress many others.

He won both the North American Championships and the Top Ten Nationals. He also became the Grand Champion at the All American Open Championships at Madison Square Garden in 1975. Incidentally, that is the same event that martial artist legend Chuck Norris won in 1967 and 1968.

Since then, Norris has become the American face of karate after acting in numerous martial arts films and TV shows. There is even a web site (www.chucknorrisfacts.com) devoted to offering wry observations on his incredible fighting skills, i.e.: “Chuck Norris destroyed the periodic table because he only recognizes the element of surprise.”

Yet, looking back, George recalls never being afraid of Norris or any other fighter, even when they were in their prime and he was still approaching his.

“Remember now, Chuck Norris is ten years older than myself,” he said. “We were young teenagers fighting grown men who were in their 20s and beating them. My guy Mitchell Bobrow fought Norris in an exhibition fight and beat him.”

Overall, George has spent 43 years training in martial arts and he has earned the respected title of “Master.” He still works out about an hour daily.

In 1975, he officially became a pro fighter when he was chosen as one of the original 50 athletes invited into the Professional Karate Association.

Sixteen years later, he was awarded a 7th degree black belt from Master Ki Whang Kim.

“My master only awarded two 7th degree black belts... one to Mitchell Bobrow and one to myself,” he said.

More recently, he was bestowed with the high accolade of being inducted into the Taekwondo Hall of Fame. During the ceremony earlier this year, he was recognized as one of the best fighters of the 1970s. When he fought back then, he never relied too heavily on any one style of fighting. He preferred to have an array of attacks in his arsenal.

“I could score with all of my techniques — sweeping, punching, round kicking, back kicking,” he said.

Mastering numerous fighting styles was the key to surviving and thriving in the ring. The same philosophy is true when it comes to managing Imperial Valet. George took over the family business in 1980 after retiring from professional fighting and has mostly relied on hard work, discipline and diversification to keep it running smoothly.

“We give a personalized service. We do drycleaning, shoe repair, tailoring, laundry, shoe shining...” he said.

As an owner, George advocates learning how to do everything in the plant to increase the odds of success.

“I try to tell people that, in business, I have to be about 98 percent right,” he said. “If I’m not right 98 percent, then I’m out of business. In this time of life, now that we’re in a recession, if you’re off by a percentage, you can go under. Every little bit, every technical detail counts.”

It’s an important lesson he gleaned under the tutelage of his father, even if he didn’t appreciate the knowledge as much at the time it was given.

“When I was a teenager, I walked past a button on the floor and my father hollered at me, ‘Why don’t you pick that button up?’” he recalled. “He realized that button was worth money to the customer. When I took the business over, it stuck in my mind. I would see buttons on the floor that people would drop and I’d let them know... that’s the same as money.”

Now that George has a four-year-old daughter of his own, he’s learned a new appreciation for what his father passed down to him. Already he can see some of his own early ambitions echo in some of her actions at the plant.

“The other day she was playing with her little girlfriend in the alterations department, both of them were in the dressing room. A customer comes in to see the tailor and tries to get into the dressing room. She turns around and says, ‘No, no, no. You can dress in the bathroom because I’m playing here.’ She’s acting like the boss already,” he laughed.