Maeda was born in Funazawa Village , Hirosaki City , Aomori Prefecture , Japan , on November 18 , 1878 . He attended Kenritsu Itiu high school ( currently Hirokou — a Hirosaki school ) . As a child , he was known as Hideyo . He practiced sumo as a teenager , but lacked the ideal build for the sport . Because of the interest generated by stories about the success of judo at contests between judo and jujutsued that was occurring at the time , he changed from sumo to judo . In 1894 , at seventeen years of age , his parents sent him to Tokyo to enroll in Waseda University . He took up Kodokan judo the following year .