Baruch Harold Wood

[Andy Burnett]

Dear Andy, Pardon me for misunderstanding you. I am afraid that I am ignorant concerning the meaning of the symbol that you used! I am afraid that I am not equipped with even the basic elements of tec speak and could probably do with something like a Ladybird (remember them!) book of computer terms. I hope no offence has been taken

Adrian

None whatsoever Adrian I have a bad habit of jumping on the little mistakes when I have nothing to add to the wider debate at hand
Andy Burnett

[Leonard Barden]

http://www.chessedinburgh.co.uk/chandle ... handID=391



You will also see my time going through those CHESS's was put to another good use.

That was the first BUCA championship, staged in excellent conditions at a Cambridge college. First prize was decided when I rashly ventured the Albin Counter against Oliver Penrose, the subject of your article/'poser, and he just ground me down with the extra pawn. At the end of the event there was the first BUCA AGM which voted on a captain for the tour of Holland that autumn. Oliver and I were the nominated candidates and, perhaps partly influenced by the tournament result, Oliver won the vote.

Our Dutch tour was brilliantly organised by our hosts and during it we were taken to watch the final round of the Amsterdam 1950 GM tournament.
Proceeding along a corridor towards the playing hall, we approached a telephone at which Hans Kmoch was dictating the final round pairings to his newspaper. He boomed them out in an authoritative tone and I recall his emphasis on the word endings in van den Berg-Stahlberg. At that moment I decided I wanted to become a chess journalist.

Our final match was a couple of days later against Dutch universities. Oliver put me on top board and I managed to score 1-1 with Donner, who crushed me as White in a Nimzo-Indian Samisch. For the return game I had spotted his use of the McCutcheon French at Venice a few months earlier and thought I had found an improvement which I duly played and won. Later theury showed that my innovation was fairly useless.

That evening after the match the Dutch students provided copious food and drink and their captain made a polished speech in excellent English. Then he invited the British captain to reply. For some reason poor Oliver was tongue-tied and retired embarrassed after a few sentences. I reckoned I wouldn't have done any better and thanked my lucky stars for playing that dodgy Albin in Cambridge. Then the Dutch chorused a rousing student song and again asked the British to respond. Another silence from our group, until Alan Truscott (the later bridge correspondent of the New York Times and the man who scooped the Reese-Shapiro hand signals cheating scandal) launched into the Foggy Foggy Dew followed by Ten Green Bottles.....

[Geoff Chandler]

Hi Mr. Barden

I'm glad that one picture brought back all those memories.
A very interesting tale, especially your career inspiration.
Thank you for sharing.

That picture captured a very talented set of chess players.

(I've always used 'set' as a collective term for chess players for obvious reasons.
Can anyone think of a better 'more exciting' one. A Gambit of chess players?)

Oliver won the 2009 Lothian Championship and is still just as modest.

http://www.chessedinburgh.co.uk/chandle ... handID=310

He still plays in the Edinburgh Chess league and when we first met I set him
a trap in the Three Knights. He ignored it and simply picked me off.
I was dreading the return match (he does not blunder and is rarley
involved in messy positions). I scrounged a draw.

He is a bit of legend of up here and is very much respected
by players of all strengths.

[Leonard Barden]

Oliver was a stronger player than me when we were in our late teens and would have reached IM strength but that he put his academic career first. I was scared playing him then, and in the 1947 London U18 championship, which he won, he gave me a put-down which I've always remembered and have on occasion recommended to my readers I was the exchange down in an ending, but hoping to hold it. So I offered a draw, and when he declined, offered again a few moves later. This time Oliver retorted " I'LL say when it's a draw!" which shut me up, though I did eventually salvage the half point.

[Roger de Coverly]

Finished another Corner.

http://www.chessedinburgh.co.uk/chandle ... handID=391

That's rather a neat trick from BH to catch his opponent in the French Fort Knox. I would have said that proves the greater preparation strength of modern players were it not that according to the databases the variation still gets about one person a year!

[Simon Spivack]

I have a bad habit of jumping on the little mistakes when I have nothing to add to the wider debate at hand

Adjectives are the rodents of literature. If allowed to breed they can be destructive beasts.

There have been several factual errors in recent weeks in this forum. If you read the Stalin Constitution of 1936, contrast it with the reality and then recall a certain post; you will see that the uncalled for addition of an adjective could provide the chance to jump on a mistake, whether it is a little one is another question.

Correcting all the serious errors I have seen would give me apoplexy. Life's too short for chess and pedantry, one of them must be abandoned.

[Geoff Chandler]

Hi Roger and all.

A few coincidence's have popped up.

First I've been emailed by Walter Burnett (Andy's brother) cursing me for
showing this trap as he gets at least one person a year with it. (small chess world).

The letters page in CHESS, March 1952, page 114, covers recent topics on this Forum.

Kathleen Newton from Kirby wants a Women's Only Page (female players 4NCL).

BH replies this would be 'buisness suicide' as there are not enough women players.

:

A Mr Siegham from Johannesburg has a correction to a previous article about J.H.Blackburne(!),

:

L.Kidd from Liverppool wants Chess on the television.
(recent post advising us it was on again).

:

S.Davison wants a page in Chess dedicated to Scottish Chess. (Edinburgh/England mix up).

BH replies if pages were designated to countires per subscribers then it would run.
12 pages for England, 1 page each for Ireland & Scotland and ½ a page for Wales.

All those on the same page!

But on page 115 there is a letter from Fred Woolmer, Newbury, that must have
had BH collapsed at his desk in helpless laughter.

Mr Woolmer thinks postal chess is dying because of opening theory (this is 1952).

His solution is to award 2 pts for a win and 1 point (win or lose) for the
first player to take the game 'out of the book.'

He has thought it through because he adds:

"....the point would be forfeit if the player reverts to 'book' within say 5 moves."

He adds: "...there are masses of snags but some trial and error might be worth while."

Brilliant. Someone second this idea for the British OTB Championship.
I want to see the conrollers consulting MCO, NCO, ECO and all other CO's.
before awarding the points.

[Geoff Chandler]

Hi Guys

Sorry to tag a bit more on but...Coincidences part 2

Last night took CHESS's back to club and watched Oliver playing
Andrew Green (who scored a creditable 5½ at the 2009 British) in a league match.

Andrew too played the Three Knights and lost.

Oliver said he was going to log on to read Mr Barden's enjoyable
stroll down memory lane. I asked him if he could recall the opening?
"..an Albin Counter...?"

Not bad after 60 years. Not bad at all. (amazing is more like it).

[Dr Adrian Harvey]

Dear Mr Spivack, I read your recent communication with some surprise and wondered if your attack on pedantry was an attempt to pull my leg. If you forgive me saying so, the intensity of your response towards my errors, typos and such like, seems quite disproportionate and embodying someone who is a pedant. While naturally I have no idea how much research you have carried out, my response to the request of Mr Mendiz for information, was well intentioned and aimed at assisting him and did not warrant your response that my 'reading skills leave much to be desired'. Although I would suggest that in many ways you are a pedant, despite this on at least one occasion you are most certainly not accurate. In my entry of 10:43 16 January I wrote 'it was not until Keene and Hartston that anyone made a real effort to earn a living from chess (I believe Kottnauer used to teach the game along with his bureaucratic work).' From this you draw the following conclusion (1 Feb) - 'it is utterly bizarre to use this as indicative that Kottnauer was a professional'. Where, pray, am I claiming that Kottnauer was a professional? The only people in the sentence who are endeavouring to be professionals are Keene and Hartston. As far as the sentence was concerned Kottnauer earned his living from a mixture of chess and non chess-related work. Quite how you reach the conclusions that you do from the sentence is a puzzle to me and prompts me to declare that 'your reading skills leave much to be desired'. I find the hostility that you obviously feel for me a bit bizarre. On the 30 January I posted a request for the scores of some games from the 1974 Olympiad, along with offering the scores of two games that were not available in the bulletins from the 1986 and 1994 Olympiads. The kindness of other people had meant that these scores were available to me and I was quite happy to disseminate them amongst the general public. Your response to my request for information was quite different. Noting that you have been familiar with one of the individuals whose games I was endeavouring to obtain you state 'it is precisely because of your inability to read, probably through casualness. That I have made no attempt to contact him on your account'.

Very grown up.

I had assumed that the website would be a friendly community of people who enjoy this wonderful game but your prevailing attitude appears to me to be one of acute hostility. I am unaware if you have had any material published on chess history. I have had five articles appear in the German periodical Kaissiber, essentially on Victorian chess. Two of them deal with individuals, George Spreckley (vol 29 2007), Howard Staunton (vol 17 2001), two with themes, professionals (vool 14 2000), press and peridicals (vol 36 2010), and one with developments in chess theory between 1735 and 1901 (vol 21 2005).

[Simon Spivack]

Dear Mr Spivack, I read your recent communication with some surprise and wondered if your attack on pedantry was an attempt to pull my leg.

Adrian, I wasn't thinking about you at all when making that post. My comment about the Stalin Constitution was to do with a message written by someone else on another thread.

If you forgive me saying so, the intensity of your response towards my errors, typos and such like, seems quite disproportionate and embodying someone who is a pedant.

It depends upon the subject. My view is that chess history calls for assiduity. Some things warrant more care and attention than others. I make plenty of mistakes myself. The intensity of a remark is to some extent a perception of the reader.

While naturally I have no idea how much research you have carried out, my response to the request of Mr Mendiz

Despite my miserably poor vision, one thing I attempt to get right is a person's name. Méndez or Mendez would be better here. Ordinarily, I use a person's first name when posting in these fora. However, Mr. Méndez is from a different culture. I do not know his age or attitudes, so have opted for the formal when mentioning him.

for information, was well intentioned and aimed at assisting him and did not warrant your response that my 'reading skills leave much to be desired'.

It is a matter of regret that you are much more hurt by this comment than was intended. My objection was that you had previously asked for information, yet did not read correctly what you had been given; in such circumstances, why should anyone make the effort? As for the request from Mr. Méndez, there was no need to introduce an assumption about foreign travel. I had actually looked at his web site. It seemed to me to be highly unlikely that he had a plan to visit the UK. Furthermore, had he such, he would probably have mentioned it. In his shoes, I'd rather look at the magazines than depend upon someone I do not know or who has not been recommended to me by someone I trust.

Although I would suggest that in many ways you are a pedant, despite this on at least one occasion you are most certainly not accurate. In my entry of 10:43 16 January I wrote 'it was not until Keene and Hartston that anyone made a real effort to earn a living from chess (I believe Kottnauer used to teach the game along with his bureaucratic work).' From this you draw the following conclusion (1 Feb) - 'it is utterly bizarre to use this as indicative that Kottnauer was a professional'. Where, pray, am I claiming that Kottnauer was a professional? The only people in the sentence who are endeavouring to be professionals are Keene and Hartston. As far as the sentence was concerned Kottnauer earned his living from a mixture of chess and non chess-related work. Quite how you reach the conclusions that you do from the sentence is a puzzle to me and prompts me to declare that 'your reading skills leave much to be desired'.

It's quite simple.

The thread can be found on http://www.ecforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php ... 80&start=0 . Its title is "Professional chess players in Britain". Thus, unless you explicitly write otherwise, the assumption is that those discussed were, or are, professionals, or, at least, candidates. The strong impression you created on me, and not only me, was that you broadened the definition of professional chess player to include activities other than over the board play.

I found it odd that you included Kottnauer parenthetically in the sentence discussing Keene and Hartston. Kottnauer was from a different generation. I chose not to raise it.

I find the hostility that you obviously feel for me a bit bizarre.

I have no feelings of hostility towards you. Some things I take seriously, other I do not. I am much more conscientious when posting to this history forum than elsewhere on this site, even though it costs me some effort.

On the 30 January I posted a request for the scores of some games from the 1974 Olympiad, along with offering the scores of two games that were not available in the bulletins from the 1986 and 1994 Olympiads. The kindness of other people had meant that these scores were available to me and I was quite happy to disseminate them amongst the general public. Your response to my request for information was quite different. Noting that you have been familiar with one of the individuals whose games I was endeavouring to obtain you state 'it is precisely because of your inability to read, probably through casualness. That I have made no attempt to contact him on your account'.

Very grown up.

At the cost of repetition. My position was and is that there is no point supplying something when the evidence points to an inability to assimilate. It is a waste of time. It may not have been a diplomatic or prudent observation, but what has been done cannot always be undone.

Before a county match on the Saturday just past, some friends of mine said they thought I had been a bit harsh towards you. I told them that I had already made up my mind to make an approach this Wednesday. My object being to put all this player's games on Britbase, assuming both he and John Saunders, who maintains Britbase, are willing to cooperate. This exercise is a lot harder for me than for most people, because I cannot easily see. This would take some time. You seem to consider the acquisition of these games urgent, why? The player may not even have these games.

[Dr Adrian Harvey]

Dear Mr Spivack, Thank you for your reply, though I cannot say that I found the vast majority of your statements remotely convincing. An example of this relates to the reply you make to a statement in a letter from Andy Burnett to me. Naturally I assumed that your comments related to me, though according to you they belong to another thread. As I am not psychic I have no way of knowing these things. You have a habit of peppering your letters to me with abusive remarks that add nothing to the content and while you maintain that this is basically my fault for being so sensitive, at least one person has e mailed me agreeing that you have behaved badly. I am afraid that I do not find your explanations convincing but nonetheless I am grateful to you for endeavouring to obtain the missing Olympiad games for me (though where you derive the strange notion that I was in desperate need for them leaves me puzzled - a word that often crops up in my dealings with you). I sympathise with your problems concerning your eyesight and suggest that if you have not done so already you try laser eye surgery. I suffered badly from cataracts and had two unsuccessful operations in an effort to cure this problem. However, last year I had laser treatment and things have improved substantially.

[Simon Spivack]

Dear Mr Spivack, Thank you for your reply, though I cannot say that I found the vast majority of your statements remotely convincing. An example of this relates to the reply you make to a statement in a letter from Andy Burnett to me. Naturally I assumed that your comments related to me, though according to you they belong to another thread. As I am not psychic I have no way of knowing these things.

"Naturally"? Only if one is solipsistic. The reader can look at my message earlier in this thread for himself. Note the sentence: "There have been several factual errors in recent weeks in this forum." I wrote "forum", not "thread". Furthermore, the instance I hinted at involved a mention by me of the Stalin Constitution of 1936. I expect few, if any, readers understood that allusion. It was not to a message of yours, I am not aware of any writing by you about Soviet chess in this forum.

You have a habit of peppering your letters to me with abusive remarks that add nothing to the content

This is palpable nonsense. When pepper is put to work as a verb it conveys the sense that something has been scattered liberally; you may, for instance, try to reread my previous post in this thread.

and while you maintain that this is basically my fault for being so sensitive, at least one person has e mailed me agreeing that you have behaved badly.

"At least one person?" How many is that? I hope he managed to work out that what I have written is correct. Does he consider what you have posted censurable? Of the half dozen people I have discussed this with, every single one of them agreed that your standard of reading is not what it should be for someone of your background. Some have thought I was tactless. However, those queried have accepted that when information is asked for, the recipient should make the effort to properly understand what they have been given: it is rather rude not to, don't you know?

I am afraid that I do not find your explanations convincing but nonetheless I am grateful to you for endeavouring to obtain the missing Olympiad games for me (though where you derive the strange notion that I was in desperate need for them leaves me puzzled - a word that often crops up in my dealings with you).

This is the fourth time, by my reckoning, that you have mentioned a wish for these games. When something is raised this often, a lot of people will come to the conclusion that there appears to be more than a nodding desire.

No, I did not write that I was obtaining the games for you. This player is sufficiently prominent, as a former international, to merit a place in Britbase and have his games made available to everyone. I am actually jumping the gun, he may not want his games put in the public domain. He may not even have them, although I suspect he does.

I sympathise with your problems concerning your eyesight and suggest that if you have not done so already you try laser eye surgery.

Wandering into a high street laser surgery would be foolish indeed: they might operate.

I suffered badly from cataracts and had two unsuccessful operations in an effort to cure this problem. However, last year I had laser treatment and things have improved substantially.

I know what it is like to be operated on. Cataracts constitute only one eye problem for me. As one consultant remarked: "your case is interesting, it is always a bad sign when doctors say something is interesting." I have had every doctor from two clinics within the hospital look at my eyes, mainly out of curiosity. At one time the consultant who has seen me the most often thought he was never going to discharge me. There is one technically difficult operation that will not be undergone because it is considered too risky. I am hopeful that my next operation will make a meaningful difference, having been moved to a third clinic within the hospital, although I shall never see well again, not unless there is a miracle.

We are going round in circles. I believe you do not read as well as you should. You believe I am rude. Let us leave it at that.

[Mike Truran]

Come on guys! Surely PMs are a more suitable vehicle for this sort of exchange?

[Carl Hibbard]

Come on guys! Surely PMs are a more suitable vehicle for this sort of exchange?

I don't think either medium is perhaps suitable although I am trying my best to remain in the background on this one

I am ready with my finger on the button though

[Dr Adrian Harvey]

Dear Mr Spivack, With regard to your eyes, do not despair. I suffer from multiple sclerosis and when I noticed that my eyesight had declined assumed it was due to this. As you are doubtless aware, MS is an incurable illness and consequently I assumed that nothing could be done about my eyesight. However, the optitian told me that I was suffering problems with cataracts and that with surgery the problem could be easily sorted out (evidently they have a 95% succeess rate). Alas, I had two cataract operations and they both failed. However, another optician suggested that I have laser treatment. Given my previous failures and my additional health problems I was quite sceptical and some people even advised me against it. However, I had the surgery and my eyesight has improved substantially. Consequently do not write your eyes off and hopefully the next lot of surgery will help repair things.

Good luck

Adrian