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In cleaning out some closets, I came across a box of my old chess games and a whack of chess columns by D. M. LeDain who had a weekly chess column in The Montreal Gazette. How, as a teenager, I used to look forward to that column every Saturday morning! In the column I am referencing, The Québec Carnival Open Championship is mentioned by P. H. Nadeau. The TS was to be Dominique Lamontagne and it was to run from February 11-13. I think it was the first one and I played in it as well as an 8 year old Jean Hébert. One of my losses was to win the Brilliancy Prize for O. M. “Mac” MacConnell. Further down in the column another brilliancy prize game is provided where Peter Murray (a McGill U. student) won over Dr. Ariel Mengarini for a prize of $50. Probably a princely sum for Peter at that time. The game was played at Eastern New York Open at Schenectady The game follows: Peter was Black. 1.e4 c5 2.a3 a6 3.b4 e5 4.Nf3 Qc7 5.Bb2 Nc6 6.Nc3 Nf6 7.Nd5 Nxd5 8.exd5 Nd4 9.Bxd4 cxd4 10.Bd3 g6 11.Qe2 d6 12.Nxd4 Bg7 13.Nb3 0-0 14.Rc1 f5 15.c3 Bd7 16.0-0 Rae8 17.Bb1 Qd8 18.Na5 Bc8 19.c4 e4 20.d3 f4 21.dxe4 f3 22.Qd3 Qh4 23.Rfd1 Re5 24.g3 Qg4 25.Kh1 Rh5 26.Qf1 Rxh2+ 27.Kxh2 Qh5+ 28.Kg1 Bh3 29.Bd3 Bd4 30.Nb3 Bg2, 0-1. Dr. Mengarini was known for his unusual openings.
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Re: Nostalgia...
Thanks Ken, I enjoyed the game. White's opening was "successful" as he snagged a pawn but then he didnt know what to do. Peter just used logic. Following full development he attacked the king and followed through. Nice! (but brutal). Peter has been a strong player for a long time. This year he participated in the Reykjavik Open with Leon Piasetski and I'm sorry I missed it. -
Re: Nostalgia...
Thanks for the delicious info and the interesting game Mengarini vs Murray. The late Dr. Mengarini, an American NM, competed at a good level well into his senior years, and faced the young Bobby Fischer in the 1950s. I think he was into his 80s when I met him at the World Open, Philadelphia 1988.
Ken should keep those old columns. Canadian chess needs to work on a project to photocopy, collect, and post online ALL of the old published chess columns which have ever appeared in Canadian newspapers. I am going to get to the old Kingston ones, from the Kingston Whig-Standard archives, soon, in an organized manner. These were written in the 1950s and 1960s by the late Dr. George Danilov, for whom the Kingston Chess Club Championship trophy is named in memory. Dr. George, a competitor in the 1961 Canadian Zonal in Brockville, was the father of Dr. Alex Danilov, who grew up in Kingston. Alex is a longtime, still current, and strong Ottawa competitor. I have played memorable games with both Danilov's! :)Comment
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Re: Nostalgia...
Originally posted by Frank Dixon View Post
A few columns here and there won't help.
What we need is a dedicated person like Mr. Eric Malmsten who sat for 100s of hours to obtain the old chess columns for a few Toronto and area newspapers from the archives., He copied them to his computer and now has a long run of these columns available for a nominal fee to cover DVD costs (hopefully, I am accurate here!). I assume they have been donated to the TORONTO ARCHIVES for their records.Comment
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Re: Nostalgia...
Many newspapers (and their associated chess columns - if any) are available online at https://news.google.com/newspapers
e.g. Larry Bevand's first chess column (June 23, 1978)(skip/scroll to page 15): https://news.google.com/newspapers?n...rontpage&hl=enComment
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