Horowitz-Gudju Miniature

Miniatures are the jokes of chess.

 

      Gudju?! Never heard of him aside from this game but it turns out Ion Gudju (14 July 1897 – 1988) was a Romanian master who represented Romania in the first unofficial Olympiad at Paris.

      The first Team Chess Tournament had been held by coinciding with the 1924 Summer Olympics in Paris, 12–20 July 1924. At the core of the organizing committee were the Frenchmen Pierre Vincent and Alexander Alekhine. Fifty-four players representing 18 countries arrived to Paris. They were decided to be split into nine preliminary groups of six, a winner of each qualifying into the Championship Final while the rest joined eight-round Swiss consolation tournament. The winner of the individual tournament earned the title of the Amateur World Champion. Gudju became one of 15 founders of FIDE and he played in three Olympiads (The Hague 1928, Hamburg 1930 and Prague 1931)
      He took 4th at Hastings 1926/27 in the “B” tournament which was won by George Koltanowski. In Bucharest 1927 he finished second behind a player named Wechsler. Other results: 4th at Bucharest 1928 (Sigmund Herland and Wechsler won), shared 2nd, behind Alexandru Tyroler, at Jassy 1929 (Romanian Championship), took 5th and won at Bucharest 1929, and tied for 2nd-5th at Bucharest 1930 (Iosif Mendelssohn won). He was the Honorary Vice President of FIDE in 1982–1988.