Weaver W. Adams
Encyclopedia
Weaver Warren Adams was an American chess
master, author, and chess opening
theoretician
. His greatest competitive achievement was winning the U.S. Open Championship
in 1948. He played in the U.S. Championship
five times.
Adams is most famous for his controversial claim that the first move 1.e4 confers a winning advantage upon White
. He continually advocated this theory in books and magazine articles from 1939 until shortly before his death. Adams' claim has generally been scorned by the chess world. However, International Master Hans Berliner
in a 1999 book professed admiration for Adams, and similarly claimed that White may claim a winning advantage, albeit with 1.d4, not 1.e4.
Adams did not succeed in showing the validity of his theory in his own tournament and match play. Indeed, his results suffered because he published his analysis of White's supposed winning lines, thus forfeiting the element of surprise and enabling his opponents to prepare responses to his pet lines. Future World Champion
Bobby Fischer
used the Adams Attack, the line Adams advocated against the Najdorf Variation of the Sicilian Defense, with success.
in 1936, 1940, 1944, 1946, and 1948. He won the Massachusetts State Championship in 1937, 1938, 1941, and 1945. In 1944, he won a master tournament in Ventnor City.
Adams' greatest competitive success was winning the 49th U.S. Open, held in Baltimore
in 1948, for which achievement he appeared on the cover of the August 1948 issue of Chess Review magazine. Adams played in the 1950–51 Hastings Christmas Chess Congress, but finished 9th out of 10 players with 2.5/9 (two wins, six losses, one draw).
Grandmaster Larry Evans
wrote that Adams' "tournament results were damaged by his dogmatism. Playing under the self-inflicted handicap of arming his opponents with advance knowledge of his 'best' lines, he felt honor-bound to steer straight into them even though his adversary invariably had a cook up his sleeve. By the time Weaver found a refutation and published it, another player found a different cook and so on ad infinitum." According to Chess Review, this phenomenon may explain Adams' poor result at Hastings 1950–51.
is decisive, i.e. that White has a forced win from the starting position. His first and most famous book arguing this, White to Play and Win, was published in 1939. There, Adams claimed that 1.e4 was White's strongest move, and that if both sides played the best moves thereafter, "White ought to win." If Black responded with 1...e5, Adams advocated the Bishop's Opening
, 1.e4 e5 2.Bc4.
Adams was unable to prove his theory in tournament or match practice. The year after his book was published, he played in the U.S. Open at Dallas, 1940. Ironically, in the finals he did not win a single game as White (three losses and one draw), but won all four of his games as Black. Adams also lost a match to IM I.A. Horowitz, who took the black pieces in every game.
Adams later wrote Simple Chess, which he revised several times; How to Play Chess; and Absolute Chess. Ultimately giving up on the Bishop's Opening, he switched to the Vienna Game
, claiming a win with White after 1.e4 e5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Bc4 Nxe4 4.Qh5 Nd6 5.Bb3 Nc6 6.Nb5, a sharp line that has since been dubbed the Frankenstein–Dracula Variation.
When Adams was also unsuccessful with this variation, he switched to other lines. In 1962, he advocated what he called the Adams Gambit, substituting 6.d4!? for 6.Nb5. He explained his repudiation of 6.Nb5: "it is antipositional to move a developed piece a second time, and masters have long given it up as hopeless."
Adams' "White to Play and Win" thesis was widely ridiculed. Larry Evans wrote that "Mr. Adams and his cronies may be linked to the radical right wing of chess. ... Weaver is not content with such halfway measures as equality. All or nothing—right-wing logic, true to form."
However, IM Hans Berliner, a former World Champion of Correspondence Chess
, wrote that Adams' "theories, though looked upon with scorn by most top chess players, made an immediate and lasting impression on me. Weaver W. Adams was the first person I met who actually had theories about how chess should be played." Berliner is himself a controversial figure, who argued in his 1999 book The System, that 1.d4 may win by force for White.
Although Adams was rarely successful at the top levels, his ideas were studied and sometimes adopted by strong players. Future World Champion Bobby Fischer scored notable wins using the Adams Attack against the Najdorf Variation of the Sicilian Defense: 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.h3!?, preparing the pawn
thrust g2–g4.
and John Quincy Adams
, but that the Adamses "in and about Massachusetts are mostly of the same family, deriving from a Henry Adams who landed in Braintree
in 1644". Both Weaver and Warren were his ancestral names. His mother's side has been traced back to the founding fathers of America. His father's side has not as yet been established.
Grandmaster Arnold Denker
related of Weaver that he was "a master who inherited a chicken farm and who was – so to speak – a White man clear through. He wrote a book, White to Play and Win, lived in a White house on White Street, chewed antacid
pills that left the inside of his mouth perpetually White, and raised only white chicken
s that laid white eggs. Predictably, Adams' business was soon no more than a shell." Harry Golombek
wrote in 1977 that Adams, whom he described as "author of White to Play and Win and a sodium bicarbonate
addict
", was on Golombek's "reserves" list for "the ten most interesting personages" from the past 100 years.
Adams was homosexual
, as discussed in his autobiographical article reprinted in Chess Pride.
Marchand–Adams, U.S. Open 1941:
1.d4 d5 2.c4 e5 3.dxe5 d4 4.Nf3 Nc6 5.a3 a5 6.g3 Be6 7.b3 Bc5 8.Bg2 Nge7 9.0-0 Ng6 10.Bb2 Ngxe5 11.Nxe5 Nxe5 12.e3 Bg4!? 13.f3??
13...dxe3! 14.Qe2
14...Nxf3+! 15.Kh1
15...Nxh2 16.Qc2 Nxf1 17.Qe4+ Qe7 18.Qxg4 e2 19.Nd2 f5 20.Qh5+ g6 21.Qh6 Nxg3+ 22.Kh2 Nh5 23.Ne4 Qh4+ 24.Bh3 fxe4 25.Be5 Rf8 0–1
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, author, and 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...
theoretician
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...
. His greatest competitive achievement was winning the U.S. Open Championship
U.S. Open Chess Championship
The U.S. Open Championship is an open national chess championship that has been held in the United States annually since 1900.-History:Through 1938, the tournaments were organized by the Western Chess Association and its successor, the American Chess Federation .The United States Chess Federation ...
in 1948. He played in the U.S. Championship
U.S. Chess Championship
The U.S. Chess Championship is an invitational tournament held to determine the national chess champion of the United States. Since 1936, it has been held under the auspices of the U.S. Chess Federation. Until 1999, the event consisted of a round-robin tournament of varying size...
five times.
Adams is most famous for his controversial claim that the first move 1.e4 confers a winning advantage upon White
White and Black in chess
In chess, the player who moves first is referred to as "White" and the player who moves second is referred to as "Black". Similarly, the pieces that each conducts are called, respectively, "the white pieces" and "the black pieces". The pieces are often not literally white and black, but some...
. He continually advocated this theory in books and magazine articles from 1939 until shortly before his death. Adams' claim has generally been scorned by the chess world. However, International Master Hans Berliner
Hans Berliner
Hans Jack Berliner , a Professor of , is a former World Correspondence Chess Champion, from 1965–68. He is a Grandmaster of Correspondence Chess, and an International Master for over-the-board chess. He directed the construction of the chess computer HiTech. Berliner is also a chess writer.-Life...
in a 1999 book professed admiration for Adams, and similarly claimed that White may claim a winning advantage, albeit with 1.d4, not 1.e4.
Adams did not succeed in showing the validity of his theory in his own tournament and match play. Indeed, his results suffered because he published his analysis of White's supposed winning lines, thus forfeiting the element of surprise and enabling his opponents to prepare responses to his pet lines. Future 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....
Bobby Fischer
Bobby Fischer
Robert James "Bobby" Fischer was an American chess Grandmaster and the 11th World Chess Champion. He is widely considered one of the greatest chess players of all time. Fischer was also a best-selling chess author...
used the Adams Attack, the line Adams advocated against the Najdorf Variation of the Sicilian Defense, with success.
Playing career
Weaver Adams was one of the leading American masters during the 1930s and 1940s. He played in the U.S. ChampionshipU.S. Chess Championship
The U.S. Chess Championship is an invitational tournament held to determine the national chess champion of the United States. Since 1936, it has been held under the auspices of the U.S. Chess Federation. Until 1999, the event consisted of a round-robin tournament of varying size...
in 1936, 1940, 1944, 1946, and 1948. He won the Massachusetts State Championship in 1937, 1938, 1941, and 1945. In 1944, he won a master tournament in Ventnor City.
Adams' greatest competitive success was winning the 49th U.S. Open, held in Baltimore
Baltimore
Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
in 1948, for which achievement he appeared on the cover of the August 1948 issue of Chess Review magazine. Adams played in the 1950–51 Hastings Christmas Chess Congress, but finished 9th out of 10 players with 2.5/9 (two wins, six losses, one draw).
Grandmaster Larry Evans
Larry Evans
For the football player of the same name, see Larry Evans .Larry Melvyn Evans was an American chess grandmaster, author, and journalist. He won or shared the U.S. Chess Championship five times and the U.S. Open Chess Championship four times...
wrote that Adams' "tournament results were damaged by his dogmatism. Playing under the self-inflicted handicap of arming his opponents with advance knowledge of his 'best' lines, he felt honor-bound to steer straight into them even though his adversary invariably had a cook up his sleeve. By the time Weaver found a refutation and published it, another player found a different cook and so on ad infinitum." According to Chess Review, this phenomenon may explain Adams' poor result at Hastings 1950–51.
White to play and win theory
Adams was best known for his books and magazine articles in which he claimed and attempted to prove that White's first-move advantageFirst-move advantage in chess
The first-move advantage in chess is the inherent advantage of the player who makes the first move in chess. Chess players and theorists generally agree that White begins the game with some advantage. Statistics compiled since 1851 support this view, showing that White consistently wins slightly...
is decisive, i.e. that White has a forced win from the starting position. His first and most famous book arguing this, White to Play and Win, was published in 1939. There, Adams claimed that 1.e4 was White's strongest move, and that if both sides played the best moves thereafter, "White ought to win." If Black responded with 1...e5, Adams advocated the Bishop's Opening
Bishop's Opening
The Bishop's Opening is a chess opening that begins with the moves:White attacks Black's f7-square and prevents Black from advancing his d-pawn to d5....
, 1.e4 e5 2.Bc4.
Adams was unable to prove his theory in tournament or match practice. The year after his book was published, he played in the U.S. Open at Dallas, 1940. Ironically, in the finals he did not win a single game as White (three losses and one draw), but won all four of his games as Black. Adams also lost a match to IM I.A. Horowitz, who took the black pieces in every game.
Adams later wrote Simple Chess, which he revised several times; How to Play Chess; and Absolute Chess. Ultimately giving up on the Bishop's Opening, he switched to the Vienna Game
Vienna Game
The Vienna Game is a chess opening that begins with the moves:White's second move is less common than 2.Nf3, and is also of more recent vintage; a book reviewer wrote in the New York Times in 1888 that "since Morphy only one new opening has been introduced, the 'Vienna.The original idea behind...
, claiming a win with White after 1.e4 e5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Bc4 Nxe4 4.Qh5 Nd6 5.Bb3 Nc6 6.Nb5, a sharp line that has since been dubbed the Frankenstein–Dracula Variation.
When Adams was also unsuccessful with this variation, he switched to other lines. In 1962, he advocated what he called the Adams Gambit, substituting 6.d4!? for 6.Nb5. He explained his repudiation of 6.Nb5: "it is antipositional to move a developed piece a second time, and masters have long given it up as hopeless."
Adams' "White to Play and Win" thesis was widely ridiculed. Larry Evans wrote that "Mr. Adams and his cronies may be linked to the radical right wing of chess. ... Weaver is not content with such halfway measures as equality. All or nothing—right-wing logic, true to form."
However, IM Hans Berliner, a former World Champion of Correspondence Chess
Correspondence chess
Correspondence chess is chess played by various forms of long-distance correspondence, usually through a correspondence chess server, through email or by the postal system; less common methods which have been employed include fax and homing pigeon...
, wrote that Adams' "theories, though looked upon with scorn by most top chess players, made an immediate and lasting impression on me. Weaver W. Adams was the first person I met who actually had theories about how chess should be played." Berliner is himself a controversial figure, who argued in his 1999 book The System, that 1.d4 may win by force for White.
Although Adams was rarely successful at the top levels, his ideas were studied and sometimes adopted by strong players. Future World Champion Bobby Fischer scored notable wins using the Adams Attack against the Najdorf Variation of the Sicilian Defense: 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.h3!?, preparing the pawn
Pawn (chess)
The pawn is the most numerous and weakest piece in the game of chess, historically representing infantry, or more particularly armed peasants or pikemen. Each player begins the game with eight pawns, one on each square of the rank immediately in front of the other pieces...
thrust g2–g4.
Personal life
Adams' parents were Frank H. Adams and Ethel Weaver Adams. He wrote that he was not directly related to Presidents John AdamsJohn Adams
John Adams was an American lawyer, statesman, diplomat and political theorist. A leading champion of independence in 1776, he was the second President of the United States...
and John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams
John Quincy Adams was the sixth President of the United States . He served as an American diplomat, Senator, and Congressional representative. He was a member of the Federalist, Democratic-Republican, National Republican, and later Anti-Masonic and Whig parties. Adams was the son of former...
, but that the Adamses "in and about Massachusetts are mostly of the same family, deriving from a Henry Adams who landed in Braintree
Braintree, Massachusetts
The Town of Braintree is a suburban city in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. Although officially known as a town, Braintree adopted a municipal charter, effective 2008, with a mayor-council form of government and is considered a city under Massachusetts law. The population was 35,744...
in 1644". Both Weaver and Warren were his ancestral names. His mother's side has been traced back to the founding fathers of America. His father's side has not as yet been established.
Grandmaster Arnold Denker
Arnold Denker
Arnold Sheldon Denker was an American chess player, Grandmaster, and chess author. He was U.S. Chess Champion in 1945 and 1946....
related of Weaver that he was "a master who inherited a chicken farm and who was – so to speak – a White man clear through. He wrote a book, White to Play and Win, lived in a White house on White Street, chewed antacid
Antacid
An antacid is a substance which neutralizes stomach acidity.-Mechanism of action:Antacids perform a neutralization reaction, increasing the pH to reduce acidity in the stomach. When gastric hydrochloric acid reaches the nerves in the gastrointestinal mucosa, they signal pain to the central nervous...
pills that left the inside of his mouth perpetually White, and raised only white chicken
Chicken
The chicken is a domesticated fowl, a subspecies of the Red Junglefowl. As one of the most common and widespread domestic animals, and with a population of more than 24 billion in 2003, there are more chickens in the world than any other species of bird...
s that laid white eggs. Predictably, Adams' business was soon no more than a shell." Harry Golombek
Harry Golombek
Harry Golombek OBE , was a British chess International Master and honorary grandmaster, chess arbiter, and chess author. He was three times British chess champion, in 1947, 1949, and 1955 and finished second in 1948. He became a grandmaster in 1985.He was the chess correspondent of The Times...
wrote in 1977 that Adams, whom he described as "author of White to Play and Win and a sodium bicarbonate
Sodium bicarbonate
Sodium bicarbonate or sodium hydrogen carbonate is the chemical compound with the formula Na HCO3. Sodium bicarbonate is a white solid that is crystalline but often appears as a fine powder. It has a slightly salty, alkaline taste resembling that of washing soda . The natural mineral form is...
addict
Behavioral addiction
Behavioral addiction is a form of addiction which does not rely on drugs or alcohol. Increasingly referred to as process addiction or non-substance-related addiction ) behavioral addiction includes a compulsion to repeatedly engage in an action until said action causes serious negative consequences...
", was on Golombek's "reserves" list for "the ten most interesting personages" from the past 100 years.
Adams was homosexual
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
, as discussed in his autobiographical article reprinted in Chess Pride.
Representative game
Here is a game Adams won using the Albin Counter Gambit, a favorite of his, against National Master Erich Marchand, after White made an oversight on move 13. (Notes from Chess Review.)Marchand–Adams, U.S. Open 1941:
1.d4 d5 2.c4 e5 3.dxe5 d4 4.Nf3 Nc6 5.a3 a5 6.g3 Be6 7.b3 Bc5 8.Bg2 Nge7 9.0-0 Ng6 10.Bb2 Ngxe5 11.Nxe5 Nxe5 12.e3 Bg4!? 13.f3??
- After 13.Qd2!, it is difficult to see how Black would hold the position together.
13...dxe3! 14.Qe2
- Black threatened 14...e2+.
14...Nxf3+! 15.Kh1
- If 15.Bxf3, Bxf3 16.Rxf3 (16.Qxf3 e2+) Qd1+!! 17.Qxd1 e2+ wins.
15...Nxh2 16.Qc2 Nxf1 17.Qe4+ Qe7 18.Qxg4 e2 19.Nd2 f5 20.Qh5+ g6 21.Qh6 Nxg3+ 22.Kh2 Nh5 23.Ne4 Qh4+ 24.Bh3 fxe4 25.Be5 Rf8 0–1