Hugh Myers
Encyclopedia
Hugh Edward Myers was an American chess
master and author. He won or tied for first in the state chess championships of Illinois
(1951), Wisconsin
(1955), Missouri
(1962), and Iowa
(1983), as well as the USCF
Region VIII (Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, and Nebraska
) championship (1983). He played first board for the Dominican Republic
in the 1968 and 1976 Chess Olympiad
s.
Myers is best known for his writings on unusual chess opening
s such as the Nimzovich Defense (1.e4 Nc6). The eccentric opening 1.c4 g5!? is known as Myers' Defense because of his advocacy of it in his writings and games. Myers wrote numerous editions of his book on the Nimzovich Defense, as well as three other books on the openings. He edited and published the Myers Openings Bulletin from 1979–88 and the New Myers Openings Bulletin in 1992–96.
Myers also involved himself in the controversy over FIDE President Florencio Campomanes
' termination of the 1984–85 World Championship
match between Karpov
and Kasparov
, and was instrumental in helping Campomanes secure reelection in 1986.
on January 23, 1930. At age 10, he learned to play chess from Lasker's Manual of Chess
, a famous treatise
by former World Champion
Emanuel Lasker
. The book had a lasting influence on him, including Lasker's "encouragement regarding the openings, 'the ground trodden above is yet rather new, and you may explore it as well as anyone else.' " After his father brought home the December 1943 issue of Chess Review
, Myers began visiting the Decatur Chess Club weekly. In 1946, he played in his first chess tournament
, finishing second in the Decatur high school championship.
Myers majored in history and political science
at Millikin University
, graduating in 1951. While in college, he became obsessed with chess. In 1950–52, he won the Decatur city championship thrice consecutively by lopsided scores, scoring 14.5 out of 16 possible points, 15 out of 16, and a perfect 14 out of 14, respectively.
In 1951, Myers tied for first in the Illinois championship with Kimball Nedved and John Tums, each scoring 6 out of 7 possible points in the Swiss system tournament, but Nedved won on Sonneborn-Berger tiebreaking points. Myers then challenged Nedved to a match, which Myers won in 1952 with 3.5 out of 4. Myers won the 1955 Wisconsin state championship with 6.5 out of 7, drawing in the last round with Arpad Elo
. In 1962, Myers won the Missouri Open championship on tiebreak over J. Theodorovich of Toronto
, each scoring 5 out of 6.
From 1965 to 1968, Myers was the top-rated player in the Dominican Republic. He played first board for its national chess team at the Chess Olympiad
s at Lugano
1968 (scoring 4 wins, 5 draws
, and 6 losses) and Haifa
1976 (scoring 3 wins, 3 draws, and 5 losses).
In 1983, Myers tied for first with Mitch Weiss in the Iowa State Championship, a round robin
, each scoring 3.5 out of 4. Later that year, Myers and Weiss also tied for first in the USCF
Region VIII (Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, and Nebraska) championship, each scoring 4.5 points in the 5-round Swiss. In 1994, Myers played third board for "Fear Itself", the team that won the U.S. Amateur Team Championship.
Myers died in Davenport, Iowa
on December 22, 2008.
level) in 1983 and kept it over 2200 for ten years. Between 1993 and 2003, his rating fell from 2219 to 2054. According to Chessmetrics
, at his peak in December 1969 Myers' play was equivalent to an Elo rating of 2322, and he was ranked number 667 in the world. Today FIDE, the World Chess Federation, awards the FIDE Master title to players who achieve published Elo ratings of at least 2300.
.jpg)
Myers is best known for his writings on unorthodox chess opening
s. He published the books New Strategy in the Chess Openings (1968), The Nimzovich Defense (1973; French edition 1979; revised editions 1986, 1993, and 1995), Reversed King Pawns, Mengarini's Opening (1977), and Exploring the Chess Openings (1978). His most important opening work was on the Nimzowitsch Defense, on which he was considered the foremost authority. Myers' autobiography
, A Chess Explorer, was issued in 2002.
From 1979–88, Myers edited and published 38 issues of the Myers Openings Bulletin. Nine double-sized issues, called the New Myers Openings Bulletin, came out in 1992–96. The ChessBase.com obituary
of Myers observes that in the Myers Openings Bulletin, Myers offered:
"...a remarkable diet of deeply-researched openings articles (no opening seemed too abstruse for consideration), historical features, book reviews and topical commentary. He included contributions from many writers who later gained prominence in their own right, and the Bulletin built up a loyal, affectionate readership throughout the world."
FIDE Master Allan Savage observes that the Bulletin "became a cause celebre for practitioners of unusual openings, a forum for airing of opinions of diverse chess writers, and a target for those conformists who would malign the very existence of offbeat ideas." Savage calls Myers "a trailblazer, iconoclast, original thinker, curmudgeon, and at his peak, a strong master".
Probably Myers' best-known contribution to opening theory is the eccentric line 1.c4 g5!?, a sort of Grob's Attack
(1.g4) with colors reversed. It has become known as Myers' Defense because of his advocacy of it. When Myers discussed it in New Strategy in the Chess Openings his publisher, without consulting him, inserted in the book the remark, "I can't believe that 1.c4 g5 is good for Black. There is no need to even give the reasons for my opinion; the move 1.-- g5 violates chess principles as I learned them." International Master John L. Watson
, an authority on the English Opening
, wrote that this variation "has become the theoretical
property of Hugh Myers, who has both played it and published proposed improvements." Watson opined that the line "seems playable", but it is largely ignored in general opening manuals. It is not mentioned at all in the current edition of Modern Chess Openings
(2008), the Encyclopedia of Chess Openings (1996), or Batsford Chess Openings 2 (1989), and it receives only a brief footnote in Nunn's Chess Openings (1999). In the first edition of Batsford Chess Openings (1982), future World Champion Garry Kasparov
famously dismissed 1...g5 with the remark that, "Chess is not skittles."
' controversial decision to terminate the 1984–85 Karpov
–Kasparov World Championship
match after 48 games, and schedule a new match later in 1985. Myers argued that the decision to stop the match and start afresh was in Kasparov's interest, since he had been trailing and would have needed three more victories to win the match, while Karpov needed only one. Chess historian
Edward Winter
later wrote, "This reasoning, originally voiced by hardly anyone except ... Myers, is now gaining ground." Myers also asserted that Kasparov’s statements, which suggested that Campomanes had terminated the match at Karpov’s behest and over Kasparov’s opposition, were duplicitous.
In 1986, Campomanes hired Myers to write the bulletins at the Chess Olympiad later that year in Dubai
, and to work for Campomanes' reelection as FIDE President. Campomanes' opponent was Lincoln Lucena, whose running mate
was Raymond Keene
, a candidate for General Secretary of FIDE. Myers wrote a series of ten bulletins for distribution to national chess federations, entitled F.I.D.E. Facts, that criticized Keene, as well as Lucena supporters such as Kasparov and David Levy
. The November 1986 issue of CHESS magazine
contained a written response, drafted by Myers and signed by Campomanes, to Keene's charges against Campomanes. Myers also created a cartoon that portrayed Lucena as a marionette
controlled by Keene and Levy. Just before the election, Lucena withdrew, ensuring Campomanes' victory. Myers took credit for Campomanes' reelection, writing, "It could be reasonably argued that Campomanes was either a good guy or a bad guy, but I'm proud that discovering the truth and telling it proved that his opponents were worse."
later the same year with the only perfect score in its history and was awarded the Grandmaster title by FIDE in 1960. Hans Kmoch
annotated it in Chess Review. Myers included the decisive moment of the game on the cover of his autobiography A Chess Explorer.
Myers–William Lombardy
, Manhattan Chess Club
championship semifinal, New York
, 1957:
1.g3 Nf6 2.Bg2 d5 3.Nf3 Bf5 4.c4 c6 5.cxd5 cxd5 6.Qb3 Bc8 7.O-O e6 8.Nc3 Nc6 9.d4 Bd6 Here and on his next few moves Black plays strangely, initiating complications before having castled. Normal was 8...Be7 9.Rd1 0-0. 10.Rd1 h6 11.a3 Na5 12.Qc2 Bd7 13.b4 Nc4 14.e4! dxe4 15.Nxe4 Rc8 16.Ne5! Bxe5 17.dxe5 Nd5 18.Qe2 O-O 19.Qh5 Qc7 (diagram at right) 20.Rxd5!! exd5 21.Nf6+!! gxf6 Black must capture, since 21...Kh8 22.Bxh6! is even worse. 22.exf6 Nd6 23.Bxh6 Bf5 24.Bxd5 Qc2 25.Bxf8 Rxf8 26.Qh6 Ne8 27.Re1 Bg6 28.Rxe8 Qd1+ 29.Kg2 Qxd5+ 30.f3 Qd2+ 31.Qxd2 Rxe8 32.Qh6 1–0
Myers considered the following game one of his best. It shows his unconventional approach to the openings, with both of his rook pawns moved by move six. This game was also annotated by Kmoch, in Chess Life & Review.
Myers–Juan Leon, San Juan, Puerto Rico
Championship, 1969:
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 g6 3.h4 Bg7 3...h5 is better. 4.h5 d6 5.Bb5+ Bd7 6.a4 gxh5? 6...Nf6. 7.Rxh5 a6 8.Bxd7+ Qxd7 9.d3 Nf6 10.Rh4 Nc6 11.Nc3 0-0-0 12.a5 d5 13.Na4! Kb8? 14...Qd6. 14.Bf4+ Ka7 15.Nxc5 Qe8 16.Bc7 Rc8 17.Bb6+ Ka8 18.Qe2 dxe4 19.dxe4 Nd7 20.Nxa6! bxa6 21.Qxa6+ Kb8 22.e5! Threatening 23.Rb4. Rc7 23.Bxc7+ Kxc7 24.e6! fxe6 25.Ng5 Qg6 26.Rc4 Ndb8 27.Qb6+ Kd7 28.Rd1+ Ke8 (diagram at left) 29.Qxb8+! 1–0 If 29...Nxb8, 30.Rc8#
.
Chess
Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...
master and author. He won or tied for first in the state chess championships of Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
(1951), Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...
(1955), Missouri
Missouri
Missouri is a US state located in the Midwestern United States, bordered by Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska. With a 2010 population of 5,988,927, Missouri is the 18th most populous state in the nation and the fifth most populous in the Midwest. It...
(1962), and Iowa
Iowa
Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New...
(1983), as well as the USCF
United States Chess Federation
The United States Chess Federation is a non-profit organization, the governing chess organization within the United States, and one of the federations of the FIDE. The USCF was founded in 1939 from the merger of two regional chess organizations, and grew gradually until 1972, when membership...
Region VIII (Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, and Nebraska
Nebraska
Nebraska is a state on the Great Plains of the Midwestern United States. The state's capital is Lincoln and its largest city is Omaha, on the Missouri River....
) championship (1983). He played first board for the Dominican Republic
Dominican Republic
The Dominican Republic is a nation on the island of La Hispaniola, part of the Greater Antilles archipelago in the Caribbean region. The western third of the island is occupied by the nation of Haiti, making Hispaniola one of two Caribbean islands that are shared by two countries...
in the 1968 and 1976 Chess Olympiad
Chess Olympiad
The Chess Olympiad is a biennial chess tournament in which teams from all over the world compete against each other. The event is organised by FIDE, which selects the host nation.-Birth of the Olympiad:The first Olympiad was unofficial...
s.
Myers is best known for his writings on unusual chess opening
Chess opening
A chess opening is the group of initial moves of a chess game. Recognized sequences of opening moves are referred to as openings as initiated by White or defenses, as created in reply by Black. There are many dozens of different openings, and hundreds of named variants. The Oxford Companion to...
s such as the Nimzovich Defense (1.e4 Nc6). The eccentric opening 1.c4 g5!? is known as Myers' Defense because of his advocacy of it in his writings and games. Myers wrote numerous editions of his book on the Nimzovich Defense, as well as three other books on the openings. He edited and published the Myers Openings Bulletin from 1979–88 and the New Myers Openings Bulletin in 1992–96.
Myers also involved himself in the controversy over FIDE President Florencio Campomanes
Florencio Campomanes
Florencio Campomanes was a Filipino political scientist, chess player, and chess organizer.- Education :...
' termination of the 1984–85 World Championship
World Chess Championship
The World Chess Championship is played to determine the World Champion in the board game chess. Men and women of any age are eligible to contest this title....
match between Karpov
Anatoly Karpov
Anatoly Yevgenyevich Karpov is a Russian chess grandmaster and former World Champion. He was the official world champion from 1975 to 1985 when he was defeated by Garry Kasparov. He played three matches against Kasparov for the title from 1986 to 1990, before becoming FIDE World Champion once...
and Kasparov
Garry Kasparov
Garry Kimovich Kasparov is a Russian chess grandmaster, a former World Chess Champion, writer, political activist, and one of the greatest chess players of all time....
, and was instrumental in helping Campomanes secure reelection in 1986.
Chess career
Myers was born in Decatur, IllinoisDecatur, Illinois
Decatur is the largest city and the county seat of Macon County in the U.S. state of Illinois. The city, sometimes called "the Soybean Capital of the World", was founded in 1823 and is located along the Sangamon River and Lake Decatur in Central Illinois. In 2000 the city population was 81,500,...
on January 23, 1930. At age 10, he learned to play chess from Lasker's Manual of Chess
Lasker's Manual of Chess
Lasker's Manual of Chess is a book on the game of chess written in 1925 by former World Chess Champion Emanuel Lasker. The content of the book, as Lasker himself writes, is most influenced by the theories put forth by Steinitz, as well as Staunton's The Chess-Player's Handbook.-Contents:The book...
, a famous treatise
Treatise
A treatise is a formal and systematic written discourse on some subject, generally longer and treating it in greater depth than an essay, and more concerned with investigating or exposing the principles of the subject.-Noteworthy treatises:...
by former World Champion
World Chess Championship
The World Chess Championship is played to determine the World Champion in the board game chess. Men and women of any age are eligible to contest this title....
Emanuel Lasker
Emanuel Lasker
Emanuel Lasker was a German chess player, mathematician, and philosopher who was World Chess Champion for 27 years...
. The book had a lasting influence on him, including Lasker's "encouragement regarding the openings, 'the ground trodden above is yet rather new, and you may explore it as well as anyone else.' " After his father brought home the December 1943 issue of Chess Review
Chess Review
Chess Review is a U.S. chess magazine that was published from January 1933 until October 1969 . Until April 1941 it was called The Chess Review. Published in New York, it began on a schedule of at least ten issues a year but later became a monthly...
, Myers began visiting the Decatur Chess Club weekly. In 1946, he played in his first chess tournament
Chess tournament
A chess tournament is a series of chess games played competitively to determine a winning individual or team. Since the first international chess tournament in London, 1851, chess tournaments have become the standard form of chess competition among serious players.Today, the most recognized chess...
, finishing second in the Decatur high school championship.
Myers majored in history and political science
Political science
Political Science is a social science discipline concerned with the study of the state, government and politics. Aristotle defined it as the study of the state. It deals extensively with the theory and practice of politics, and the analysis of political systems and political behavior...
at Millikin University
Millikin University
Millikin University is an American co-educational, comprehensive, private, four-year university with traditional undergraduate programs in arts and sciences, business, fine arts, and professional studies, as well as non-traditional, adult degree-completion programs and graduate programs in...
, graduating in 1951. While in college, he became obsessed with chess. In 1950–52, he won the Decatur city championship thrice consecutively by lopsided scores, scoring 14.5 out of 16 possible points, 15 out of 16, and a perfect 14 out of 14, respectively.
In 1951, Myers tied for first in the Illinois championship with Kimball Nedved and John Tums, each scoring 6 out of 7 possible points in the Swiss system tournament, but Nedved won on Sonneborn-Berger tiebreaking points. Myers then challenged Nedved to a match, which Myers won in 1952 with 3.5 out of 4. Myers won the 1955 Wisconsin state championship with 6.5 out of 7, drawing in the last round with Arpad Elo
Árpád Élo
Arpad Emrick Elo is the creator of the Elo rating system for two-player games such as chess. Born in Egyházaskesző, Austro-Hungarian Empire, he moved to the United States with his parents as a child in 1913.Elo was a professor of physics at Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He was...
. In 1962, Myers won the Missouri Open championship on tiebreak over J. Theodorovich of Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, each scoring 5 out of 6.
From 1965 to 1968, Myers was the top-rated player in the Dominican Republic. He played first board for its national chess team at the Chess Olympiad
Chess Olympiad
The Chess Olympiad is a biennial chess tournament in which teams from all over the world compete against each other. The event is organised by FIDE, which selects the host nation.-Birth of the Olympiad:The first Olympiad was unofficial...
s at Lugano
Lugano
Lugano is a city of inhabitants in the city proper and a total of over 145,000 people in the agglomeration/city region, in the south of Switzerland, in the Italian-speaking canton of Ticino, which borders Italy...
1968 (scoring 4 wins, 5 draws
Draw (chess)
In chess, a draw is when a game ends in a tie. It is one of the possible outcomes of a game, along with a win for White and a win for Black . Usually, in tournaments a draw is worth a half point to each player, while a win is worth one point to the victor and none to the loser.For the most part,...
, and 6 losses) and Haifa
Haifa
Haifa is the largest city in northern Israel, and the third-largest city in the country, with a population of over 268,000. Another 300,000 people live in towns directly adjacent to the city including the cities of the Krayot, as well as, Tirat Carmel, Daliyat al-Karmel and Nesher...
1976 (scoring 3 wins, 3 draws, and 5 losses).
In 1983, Myers tied for first with Mitch Weiss in the Iowa State Championship, a round robin
Round-robin tournament
A round-robin tournament is a competition "in which each contestant meets all other contestants in turn".-Terminology:...
, each scoring 3.5 out of 4. Later that year, Myers and Weiss also tied for first in the USCF
United States Chess Federation
The United States Chess Federation is a non-profit organization, the governing chess organization within the United States, and one of the federations of the FIDE. The USCF was founded in 1939 from the merger of two regional chess organizations, and grew gradually until 1972, when membership...
Region VIII (Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, and Nebraska) championship, each scoring 4.5 points in the 5-round Swiss. In 1994, Myers played third board for "Fear Itself", the team that won the U.S. Amateur Team Championship.
Myers died in Davenport, Iowa
Davenport, Iowa
Davenport is a city located along the Mississippi River in Scott County, Iowa, United States. Davenport is the county seat of and largest city in Scott County. Davenport was founded on May 14, 1836 by Antoine LeClaire and was named for his friend, George Davenport, a colonel during the Black Hawk...
on December 22, 2008.
Chess strength
Myers achieved an Elo rating of 2350 while living in the Dominican Republic. In the United States, he first attained a rating over 2200 (National MasterChess master
A chess master is a chess player of such skill that he/she can usually beat chess experts, who themselves typically prevail against most amateurs. Among chess players, the term is often abbreviated to master, the meaning being clear from context....
level) in 1983 and kept it over 2200 for ten years. Between 1993 and 2003, his rating fell from 2219 to 2054. According to Chessmetrics
Chessmetrics
Chessmetrics is a system for rating chess players devised by Jeff Sonas. It is intended as an improvement over the Elo rating system.-Implementation:...
, at his peak in December 1969 Myers' play was equivalent to an Elo rating of 2322, and he was ranked number 667 in the world. Today FIDE, the World Chess Federation, awards the FIDE Master title to players who achieve published Elo ratings of at least 2300.
Chess writing and contributions to opening theory
Chess opening
A chess opening is the group of initial moves of a chess game. Recognized sequences of opening moves are referred to as openings as initiated by White or defenses, as created in reply by Black. There are many dozens of different openings, and hundreds of named variants. The Oxford Companion to...
s. He published the books New Strategy in the Chess Openings (1968), The Nimzovich Defense (1973; French edition 1979; revised editions 1986, 1993, and 1995), Reversed King Pawns, Mengarini's Opening (1977), and Exploring the Chess Openings (1978). His most important opening work was on the Nimzowitsch Defense, on which he was considered the foremost authority. Myers' autobiography
Autobiography
An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...
, A Chess Explorer, was issued in 2002.
From 1979–88, Myers edited and published 38 issues of the Myers Openings Bulletin. Nine double-sized issues, called the New Myers Openings Bulletin, came out in 1992–96. The ChessBase.com obituary
Obituary
An obituary is a news article that reports the recent death of a person, typically along with an account of the person's life and information about the upcoming funeral. In large cities and larger newspapers, obituaries are written only for people considered significant...
of Myers observes that in the Myers Openings Bulletin, Myers offered:
"...a remarkable diet of deeply-researched openings articles (no opening seemed too abstruse for consideration), historical features, book reviews and topical commentary. He included contributions from many writers who later gained prominence in their own right, and the Bulletin built up a loyal, affectionate readership throughout the world."
FIDE Master Allan Savage observes that the Bulletin "became a cause celebre for practitioners of unusual openings, a forum for airing of opinions of diverse chess writers, and a target for those conformists who would malign the very existence of offbeat ideas." Savage calls Myers "a trailblazer, iconoclast, original thinker, curmudgeon, and at his peak, a strong master".
Probably Myers' best-known contribution to opening theory is the eccentric line 1.c4 g5!?, a sort of Grob's Attack
Grob's Attack
Grob's Attack is an unconventional chess opening where White immediately moves the king knight's pawn two squares ahead:-Discussion:The opening takes its name from Swiss International Master Henri Grob who analyzed it extensively and played hundreds of correspondence games with it...
(1.g4) with colors reversed. It has become known as Myers' Defense because of his advocacy of it. When Myers discussed it in New Strategy in the Chess Openings his publisher, without consulting him, inserted in the book the remark, "I can't believe that 1.c4 g5 is good for Black. There is no need to even give the reasons for my opinion; the move 1.-- g5 violates chess principles as I learned them." International Master John L. Watson
John L. Watson
John Leonard Watson is a chess International Master and author.Watson was born in Milwaukee and grew up in Omaha, Nebraska. He was educated at Brownell-Talbot, Harvard, and the University of California at San Diego, where he took his degree in engineering...
, an authority on the English Opening
English Opening
In chess, the English Opening is the opening where White begins:A flank opening, it is the fourth most popular and, according to various databases, anywhere from one of the two most successful to the fourth most successful of White's twenty possible first moves. White begins the fight for the...
, wrote that this variation "has become the theoretical
Chess theory
The game of chess is commonly divided into three phases: the opening, middlegame, and endgame. As to each of these phases, especially the opening and endgame, there is a large body of theory as how the game should be played...
property of Hugh Myers, who has both played it and published proposed improvements." Watson opined that the line "seems playable", but it is largely ignored in general opening manuals. It is not mentioned at all in the current edition of Modern Chess Openings
Modern Chess Openings
Modern Chess Openings is an important reference book on the chess openings, first published in 1911 by the British players Richard Clewin Griffith and John Herbert White...
(2008), the Encyclopedia of Chess Openings (1996), or Batsford Chess Openings 2 (1989), and it receives only a brief footnote in Nunn's Chess Openings (1999). In the first edition of Batsford Chess Openings (1982), future World Champion Garry Kasparov
Garry Kasparov
Garry Kimovich Kasparov is a Russian chess grandmaster, a former World Chess Champion, writer, political activist, and one of the greatest chess players of all time....
famously dismissed 1...g5 with the remark that, "Chess is not skittles."
Chess controversy and politics
In 1985 and 1986, Myers wrote in the Myers Openings Bulletin about FIDE President Florencio CampomanesFlorencio Campomanes
Florencio Campomanes was a Filipino political scientist, chess player, and chess organizer.- Education :...
' controversial decision to terminate the 1984–85 Karpov
Anatoly Karpov
Anatoly Yevgenyevich Karpov is a Russian chess grandmaster and former World Champion. He was the official world champion from 1975 to 1985 when he was defeated by Garry Kasparov. He played three matches against Kasparov for the title from 1986 to 1990, before becoming FIDE World Champion once...
–Kasparov World Championship
World Chess Championship
The World Chess Championship is played to determine the World Champion in the board game chess. Men and women of any age are eligible to contest this title....
match after 48 games, and schedule a new match later in 1985. Myers argued that the decision to stop the match and start afresh was in Kasparov's interest, since he had been trailing and would have needed three more victories to win the match, while Karpov needed only one. Chess historian
Historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...
Edward Winter
Edward Winter (chess historian)
Edward Winter is an English journalist, archivist, historian, collector and author about the game of chess. He writes a regular column on that subject, Chess Notes, and is also a regular columnist for ChessBase.-Chess Notes:...
later wrote, "This reasoning, originally voiced by hardly anyone except ... Myers, is now gaining ground." Myers also asserted that Kasparov’s statements, which suggested that Campomanes had terminated the match at Karpov’s behest and over Kasparov’s opposition, were duplicitous.
In 1986, Campomanes hired Myers to write the bulletins at the Chess Olympiad later that year in Dubai
Dubai
Dubai is a city and emirate in the United Arab Emirates . The emirate is located south of the Persian Gulf on the Arabian Peninsula and has the largest population with the second-largest land territory by area of all the emirates, after Abu Dhabi...
, and to work for Campomanes' reelection as FIDE President. Campomanes' opponent was Lincoln Lucena, whose running mate
Running mate
A running mate is a person running together with another person on a joint ticket during an election. The term is most often used in reference to the person in the subordinate position but can also properly be used when referring to both candidates, such as "Michael Dukakis and Lloyd Bentsen were...
was Raymond Keene
Raymond Keene
Raymond Dennis Keene OBE is an English chess Grandmaster, a FIDE International Arbiter, a chess organiser, and a journalist and author.p196 He won the British Chess Championship in 1971, and was the first player from England to earn a Grandmaster norm, in 1974. In 1976 he became the second...
, a candidate for General Secretary of FIDE. Myers wrote a series of ten bulletins for distribution to national chess federations, entitled F.I.D.E. Facts, that criticized Keene, as well as Lucena supporters such as Kasparov and David Levy
David Levy (chess player)
David Neil Laurence Levy , is a Scottish International Master of chess, a businessman noted for his involvement with computer chess and artificial intelligence, and the founder of the Computer Olympiads and the Mind Sports Olympiads. He has written more than 40 books on chess and computers.- Life...
. The November 1986 issue of CHESS magazine
CHESS magazine
CHESS magazine , also called CHESS and previously called CHESS Monthly, is a chess magazine published monthly in the UK by Chess and Bridge Limited. CHESS was founded by Baruch Harold Wood in 1935 in Sutton Coldfield. Wood edited it until 1988, when it was taken over by Pergamon Press and changed...
contained a written response, drafted by Myers and signed by Campomanes, to Keene's charges against Campomanes. Myers also created a cartoon that portrayed Lucena as a marionette
Marionette
A marionette is a puppet controlled from above using wires or strings depending on regional variations. A marionette's puppeteer is called a manipulator. Marionettes are operated with the puppeteer hidden or revealed to an audience by using a vertical or horizontal control bar in different forms...
controlled by Keene and Levy. Just before the election, Lucena withdrew, ensuring Campomanes' victory. Myers took credit for Campomanes' reelection, writing, "It could be reasonably argued that Campomanes was either a good guy or a bad guy, but I'm proud that discovering the truth and telling it proved that his opponents were worse."
Notable games
Myers won the following game against an extremely strong American junior who won the World Junior Chess ChampionshipWorld Junior Chess Championship
The World Junior Chess Championship is an under-20 chess tournament organized by the World Chess Federation ....
later the same year with the only perfect score in its history and was awarded the Grandmaster title by FIDE in 1960. Hans Kmoch
Hans Kmoch
Johann "Hans" Joseph Kmoch was an Austrian-Dutch-American chess International Master , International Arbiter , and a chess journalist and author, for which he is best known....
annotated it in Chess Review. Myers included the decisive moment of the game on the cover of his autobiography A Chess Explorer.
Myers–William Lombardy
William Lombardy
William James Lombardy is an American Grandmaster of chess, writer, teacher, and one-time Catholic priest.- Life and career :...
, Manhattan Chess Club
Manhattan Chess Club
The Manhattan Chess Club in Manhattan was the second-oldest chess club in the United States . The club was founded in 1877 and started with three dozen players; membership later reached into the hundreds before the club ended its existence in 2002...
championship semifinal, New York
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, 1957:
1.g3 Nf6 2.Bg2 d5 3.Nf3 Bf5 4.c4 c6 5.cxd5 cxd5 6.Qb3 Bc8 7.O-O e6 8.Nc3 Nc6 9.d4 Bd6 Here and on his next few moves Black plays strangely, initiating complications before having castled. Normal was 8...Be7 9.Rd1 0-0. 10.Rd1 h6 11.a3 Na5 12.Qc2 Bd7 13.b4 Nc4 14.e4! dxe4 15.Nxe4 Rc8 16.Ne5! Bxe5 17.dxe5 Nd5 18.Qe2 O-O 19.Qh5 Qc7 (diagram at right) 20.Rxd5!! exd5 21.Nf6+!! gxf6 Black must capture, since 21...Kh8 22.Bxh6! is even worse. 22.exf6 Nd6 23.Bxh6 Bf5 24.Bxd5 Qc2 25.Bxf8 Rxf8 26.Qh6 Ne8 27.Re1 Bg6 28.Rxe8 Qd1+ 29.Kg2 Qxd5+ 30.f3 Qd2+ 31.Qxd2 Rxe8 32.Qh6 1–0
Myers considered the following game one of his best. It shows his unconventional approach to the openings, with both of his rook pawns moved by move six. This game was also annotated by Kmoch, in Chess Life & Review.
Myers–Juan Leon, San Juan, Puerto Rico
San Juan, Puerto Rico
San Juan , officially Municipio de la Ciudad Capital San Juan Bautista , is the capital and most populous municipality in Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 395,326 making it the 46th-largest city under the jurisdiction of...
Championship, 1969:
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 g6 3.h4 Bg7 3...h5 is better. 4.h5 d6 5.Bb5+ Bd7 6.a4 gxh5? 6...Nf6. 7.Rxh5 a6 8.Bxd7+ Qxd7 9.d3 Nf6 10.Rh4 Nc6 11.Nc3 0-0-0 12.a5 d5 13.Na4! Kb8? 14...Qd6. 14.Bf4+ Ka7 15.Nxc5 Qe8 16.Bc7 Rc8 17.Bb6+ Ka8 18.Qe2 dxe4 19.dxe4 Nd7 20.Nxa6! bxa6 21.Qxa6+ Kb8 22.e5! Threatening 23.Rb4. Rc7 23.Bxc7+ Kxc7 24.e6! fxe6 25.Ng5 Qg6 26.Rc4 Ndb8 27.Qb6+ Kd7 28.Rd1+ Ke8 (diagram at left) 29.Qxb8+! 1–0 If 29...Nxb8, 30.Rc8#
Checkmate
Checkmate is a situation in chess in which one player's king is threatened with capture and there is no way to meet that threat. Or, simply put, the king is under direct attack and cannot avoid being captured...
.