May 24, 1959 Chess Chats by George Koltanowski, Press-Democrat, Santa Rosa, California

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Chess Chats 24 May 1959, Sun The Press Democrat (Santa Rosa, California) Newspapers.com

Chess Chats by George Koltanowski
International Chess Master

BRILLIANCY PRIZE
The following game played in the recent New York State championship won the brilliancy prize. The winner was Harold M. Phillips, 84-year-old New Yorker.

Harold Meyer Phillips (white) vs. Edward Epp (black)

Unresolved Chess Game: Can you solve it?

Descriptive 1. P-K4 P-QB4 2. P-KB4 N-QB3 3. N-KB3 P-KN3 4. B-K2 B-N2 5. P-B3 P-Q4 6. P-Q3 P-K4 7. O-O KPxP 8. PxP QxP 9. BxP B-B4 10. N-R3 O-O-O 11. N-B4 N-B3 12. N-K1 Q-K3 13. Q-R4 QxB 14. QxP N-Q4 15. Q-R8ch K-Q2 16. QxPch K-K1 17. QxNch K-B1 18. B-Q6ch N-K2 19. QxP BxP 20. R-B3 B-N4 21. RxNch BxB 22. Q-K5 QxQ 23. NxQ R-Q4 24. P-Q4 Resigns

Algebraic 1. e4 c5 2. f4 Nc6 3. Nf3 g6 4. Be2 Bg7 5. c3 d5 6. d3 e5 7. 0-0 exf4 8. exd5 Qxd5 9. Bxf4 Bf5 10. Na3 0-0-0 11. Nc4 Nf6 12. Ne1 Qe6 13. Qa4 Qxe2 14. Qxa7 Nd5 15. Qa8+ Kd7 16. Qxb7+ Ke8 17. Qxc6+ Kf8 18. Bd6+ Ne7 19. Qxc5 Bxc3 20. Rf3 Bb4

(a) White goes his own way theory or not.
(b) If White won't come to him—Mohammed—sorry Black goes to White.
(c) With 6. PxP; 7. PxP QxQch; Black might have avoided a lot of trouble. But feeling that his opponent is avoiding conflict, Black tries to complicate matters.
(d) Better was QPxP.
(e) Not ll. BxP; 12. BxB QxB; 13. N-Q6ch RxN; 14. BxR etc.
(f) Falls into a neat trap. 13. N-Q4 was better.
(g) And Black resigned soon afterwards.

CURIOUS DILEMMA
In a recent tourney a player mated his opponent on the fortieth move, but just failed to stop his clock before the flag fell.
Clearly, the game ended (in mate) an instant before the time limit came into question, and on that reasoning it did not matter if the time limit was exceeded. But, it could be asked, can a player mate with an incomplete move? Here we must look at the wording of the rule itself: “When considering whether the prescribed number of moves has been made in the given time, the last move is not considered as made until after the player has stopped his clock.”

Game Ended
In other words, we are only to regard the move as incomplete when considering whether the time limit has been exceeded. But in this case we ought not to be considering such thing at all, since the game ended an instant before there was any such thing to consider.
However, the F.I.D.E. may decide otherwise, and if it does, its decision will be binding on affiliated nations for any such case in the future. The F.I.D.E. may say a case could arise where it was doubtful whether the mate did actually occur before the flag fell, and since the rule quoted is designed especially to prevent such arguments, it is better to rule that even in the case quoted the player should lose on the time limit.

CHESS QUOTE OF THE DAY
“A game which does the greatest honor to human faculties is incontestably the royal game of chess.” — Francois de Voltaire, 1750.

CHESS FESTIVAL
The Ninth Annual Sonoma Chess Festival will take place on Sunday, Aug. 9, and will be dedicated to George Koltanowski, International Chess Master and director of the Sonoma Chess Festivals. Main feature of the festival is the short tournaments played in groups of four players, with each group having its own prizes. There are also simultaneous exhibitions and problem solving competitions.
This festival is held outdoors on the Plaza and annually attracts hundreds of players and their families, who picnic and play chess under the trees. It is the only chess festival of its kind in the US where the merchants and city officials cooperate in giving numerous trophies, book prizes and, last but not least, bottles of wine galore.
For complete information, write to Mrs. Lois McVeigh, secretary manager, Sonoma Valley Chamber of Commerce, Sonoma, Calif. The yearly Sonoma Chess Festival is sponsored by the Sonoma Valley Chamber of Commerce.