Buffalo Wild Wings (BWW)for those of you not in the know of our acronym world. See you there.
We are averaging 12 players an evening, so come on by for some casual chess or lessons if you prefer.
Now this is a second article your humble scribe has posted about Grandmaster Akiba Rubinstein (left). He had an eventful and tragic life. There is an excellent search bar on this site in the upper left corner if you wish to read that article and look at a game or two of his.
Now on with GM Rubinstein's story:
Born December 12, 1882 in Stawiski - a ghetto in Russian-Poland. For generations, his ancestors had been rabbis and scholars of the Hebrew classics, but not ones to chase wealth or even middle class.
A few weeks before his birth, his father died, leaving behind a wife and TWELVE children! Akiba was moved to live with his grandparents, and they raised him and started his education to become a teacher of the Talmud and a full student of Hebrew, as his father and his father before him. And that is all Akiba wanted to do.
But at age sixteen, by chance he saw two children playing chess and was fascinated immediately. He found the only chess book in Hebrew at the time and devoured it. His grandparents mourned Akiba's new love.
At 19 Rubinstein learned that in the nearby town of Lodz, George Salwe lived. A chess champion who had crossed swords with the great Tschigorin. He left immediately for Lodz to see how he would fare. But even given rook odds, he was no match for Salwe. He was told by that local chess club that being a chess professional was out of his reach. No one had any faith in Rubinstein's chess ability, but Rubinstein.
Akiba returned to Lotz six months later and asked to play George Salwe again. Salwe said fine and Rubenstein won! The leaders of the chess club huddled together, and a 10-game match was agreed to take place between Salwe and Rubenstein.
The first match ended 5 to 5. A second match of 8 games was quickly agreed to, and Rubinstein won it with a 5 to 3 score! A new champion was crowned!
A year later in 1905, Rubinstien went to Kiev, Russia to play with the grandmasters of the day and he finished 5th. He had arrived as a chess player. He went then to Germany to play in that Championship and finished 3rd. In four years, he went from losing with rook odds to a grandmaster, to becoming one!
Next at Ostend, Belgium he finished 3rd over 36 entrants behind only Schlechter and Maroczy ahead, and Bernstein, Teichman, Marshall and Janowsky behind him!
The next year at Ostend he tied for 1st with Bernstein and at Karlsbad he won his first clear 1st! He now was mentioned in the same breath with Capablanca, Niemzowitch, Spielmann, Tarkakower and Vidmar. In St. Petersburg in 1909 he tied for first with the world champion Lasker while actually going 1-0-1 in their games in the round robin tournament.
Then in 1912, Rubinstein won five tournaments, all untied. A feat no grandmaster has done before or since.
Inexplicably, in 1914 Rubinstein had a horrible tournament in St. Petersburgh. But none the less, a world championship match between Lasker and Rubinstein was scheduled.
Then, World War I broke out.
More next time.
PS: The next meeting for LCCC at BWW will be on June 6th, as we skip the Memorial Day weekend.
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