Last weekend my wife was cleaning out a closet underneath the stairwell and handed me an old shoebox with the comment, “Do you want this old junk?” Well, it wasn’t junk. It contained long, lost scores of my chess games going back to 1957. Included was a spiral notebook of games I had played with friends when I was about 12 years old. It also included analysis of an opening I invented. Only it turned out to be the first few moves of the Colle, so I never got credit for it. Playing over the games gave me a good chuckle…man, were they bad! The funny thing is I can remember the circumstances under which a lot of them were played…like on my parent’s kitchen table or sitting on the front porch at Larry’s house or in the living room of Stewart’s house next to his brother’s drafting table. Incredible.

I did find a scrap of paper with the moves to an offhand game I played against GM Nicholas Rossolimo in his Rossolimo Chess Studio in New York City. It’s not dated, but it must have been played in 1965 or 1966. It’s not very good, but it’s amusing so I thought I’d share it.


[Event "Rossolimo Chess Studio"]
[Date "Unknown"]
[White "JWS"]
[Black "Rossolimo"]
[Result "0-1"]

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. Bg5 O-O 5. e3 d6 6. Bd3
Bxc3+ 7. bxc3 e5 8. Ne2 h6 9. Bh4
9. Bxf6 was best.

9... Qe7 10. O-O g5 11. Bg3 Bg4 12. f3 e4 13. fxe4 Nxe4
14. Qc2 Nxg3 15. Nxg3 Nd7
15... Nc6 was correct

16. e4
I don't remember if I saw16. h3. After 16…Bxh3 17. gxh3 Qxe3+ 18. Kg2 g4 Black doesn't have enough for the sac'd piece. If I did see it I probably thought it had to be good for him.

Anyway it was around here Rossolimo picked up a board that looked like it was made out of blue butterfly wings under glass and placed it on the end of the table where the sun was shining on it. Then he started grabbing pieces off our board and setting them up on the butterfly board with all the sun glare on it. He told me, "I want to play on this board." Honest. That's what happened.

16... Nb6 17. Nf5 Bxf5 18. Rxf5 Nd7 19. Raf1 c5 20. e5 dxe5 21. dxe5 Nxe5
22. Re1 Nf3+
Expletive deleted!

23. Rxf3 Qxe1+ 24. Rf1 Qe3+ 25. Kh1 Rad8 26. Bh7+ Kh8 27. Be4 Rd2 28. Qc1
Rf2 29. Bxb7 Qxc1 30. Rxc1 Rxa2 0-1

Ah the old board switcheroo trick. How many games do you have?

Maybe 50-60 including my first ever postal game which I lost in 9 moves when I played an early g4 in the Bird Opening. I also found my first ever otb tmt. game from the 1960 Ohio Junior Championship…a draw against an 1802.

Definitely priceless! Very Cool.

Oh man, I bet you were thrilled to see all this! That is a super cool find, and a nice way to kill a few hours! Right on!

So very cool! Reading your post made my day!