English Chess Forum

I frequent the Crossword Help Forum where some posters know compilers. Apparently Qaos, Saturday's Guardian setter, said on Twitter that there are 18 chess related clues. Ah, that's interesting... I recounted and still only found 15. Then I decided to check Twitter and found the dialogue Paul refer...

"I suggest you have a look at today's (Saturday) Guaurdian cryptic crossword. The whole puzzle is chess themed." Your spelling of "Guardian" is fitting tribute to the paper's reputation! I'm obviously spending too much time on sudoku as I have been struggling with this one. Assuming I've got 18A ri...

Considering the era, is it possible that the reason his forename is so hard to find is that he wasn't inclined to reveal it? He would have been Mr Mackay to most, maybe DG to work colleagues and friends. If he was still around, as he might be, would he think this whole thread impertinent, and it's ...

Gerard, thanks for identifiying Solomon Adler - may I ask how you tracked that information down - was it in a newspaper clipping and is the game score extant? Adler must have been a good player to have defeated Alexander, unless there was a need to win because of the match situtation? I wrote a few...

Alan McGowan has kindly shared some of his researches with me. Having examined them, I'm about 90% convinced he's right in suggesting that the player in question was named Donald G Mackay and that his birth was registered in the 4th quarter of 1931 in Richmond, Surrey. Further to that (having done a...

I think Kevin already knew about Philip Coy's 1970 success as I mentioned it on Britbase last year when making available 74 of Coy's games...

https://www.saund.org.uk/britbase/pgn/c ... iewer.html

My source for games and info was Kevin.

According to Di Felice, it's DUNCAN G MACKAY - see for instance the index of his 1961-63 Volume and also the next one. There is some mention of Chess Magazine 60-61 as a possible source. Page 248, if anyone has it. Page 248 of CHESS, 22 April 1961 (Vol.26) has a crosstable of the 1961 Stevenson Mem...

B H Wood refers to Mackay as a professional boxer. The database https://boxrec.com/ does not list D G Mackay. Thanks for this, Gerard. I did wonder what evidence BH Wood had that DG Mackay was a professional boxer. It smacks of something which I'm sure we are all familiar with, when non-players, di...

"Here is a weird game won by D. G. Mackay, of Balham, an irrepressible character who could seriously claim to be the strongest player never to take part in the British Championship. He seems to alternate between the Civil Service and professional boxing, finding the latter both more enjoyable and m...

"He seems to alternate between the Civil Service and professional boxing, finding the latter both more enjoyable and more lucrative." I suspect many civil servants before and since would agree with him. :lol: :lol: :lol: Strictly speaking, I never left the civil service, it left me (privatisation) ...

Leonard met him over the board. Norwood News - Friday 14 October 1955...

I think I've found games played by DG Mackay as late as Islington 1973 but I'm slightly suspicious as it's such a common name and can be rendered at least three ways (Mackay, McKay, MacKay). He was obviously a very strong player, being listed at 3a, which equates to 209-216, in the late 1950s, early...

Here's a newspaper cutting from the Belfast News-Letter of 8 June 1905...
... I'm not sure this adds much to what Winter quoted from the Buckley article but might be of some interest.

We don't seem to any further forward here than we were back in 2019. The 1901 census record that Gerard has posted is the same one that I posted in 2019 . And the link to the Jim Hayes article is the same one I posted in 2019 . Perhaps it is worth quoting what Edward Winter had to say in Kings, Comm...