James Yimm Lee was Bruce Lee's training partner, closest of friends, mentor, and co-instructor of the Oakland JKD school. After Bruce left to assume the role of "Kato" in the TV series, "Green Hornet" in 1966, James took over the instructor duties at the Oakland school, but Bruce was still the head instructor.

Before joining up with Bruce, James was already a well known and an established Sil Lum Gung Fu instructor and iron palm master in the Bay area. He was also a former weight lifter and amateur boxer. James was a welder by trade and made much of the JKD & Gung Fu training equipment for Bruce. He was a genius at developing martial arts equipment.

James was 20 years older than Bruce and was the elder of the JKD clan as well as being the "second in command" of the JKD group. James had converted his garage to a private martial arts studio, and conducted Jeet Kune Do & Gung Fu classes to a small exclusive group of ten or less students.

Bruce Lee, Jeet Kune Do, james demile, jeet kune do, jkd, doug palmer, jim demile, bruce lee, skip ellsworth, bob bremer, howard williams, taky kimura, jesse glover, leo fong, james lee jun fan gung fu, richard bustillo, jerry poteet, joe cowles, dan inosanto