Anton Geesink - Honors

Honors

Geesink was awarded the Order of the Sacred Treasure by the Japanese government in 1997.

His home town of Utrecht has a street named after him — which is the street he lived on for some time up until his death in August 2010.

On January 29, 2000, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by Kokushikan University, a Japanese university known for its sport education and of which four alumni are Olympic gold medalists in judo, with the following praise:

ヘーシンク氏は、一九六四年東京オリンピックにおいて、柔道無差別級で外国人選手として初めて金メダルを獲得し、その後、武道精神をもって国際平和に貢献するとともにオランダ・日本両国民の文化交流・友好関係の促進に努め、また柔道を教育学や生体学的角度から研究し、その普及発展のために尽力された。 武道の精神を重視する本大学は、柔道の国際的普及における同氏の功績を讃え、国士舘大学名誉博士の学位を贈呈した。

At the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, Mr. Geesink won the gold medal in the open class as the first non-Japanese. Since then, with the spirit of budō, he has contributed to the international peace and promoted the cultural exchange and friendship between the people of the Netherlands and of Japan. Furthermore, he explored judo in light of education and somatology and has been devoted to its diffusion and development. To honor his contribution to the worldwide diffusion of judo, this university, as a body which prizes the spirit of budō, awarded him an honorary doctorate of Kokushikan University.