The First Lone Pine

     "I am Louis D Statham, Millionaire. I own a mansion and a yacht. But what I really want is a chess tournament!" 
     Stathham's wish began a series of tournaments that were held annually until 1981. After an inauspicious start they eventually included some of the world's most prominent players: Svetozar Gligoric, Laszlo Szabo, Anthony Miles, Arthur Bisguier, Pal Benko, Florian Gheorghui, Oscar Panno, Miguel Quinteros, Tigran Petrosian, Migule Najdorf, Oscar Panno, Bent Larsen, Vastimil Hort, Yasser Seirawan and Viktor Korchnoi. 
     The first Louis D. Statham tournament (or Lone Pine as the were commonly known) initially was open to all USCF masters (rated over 2200) and Experts (rated 2000–2199) and had but 33 entrants. It was played in Lone Pine, California from March 14th to the 20th in 1971. 
     The inaugural Lone Pine tournament had almost no publicity. At the end of the National Open in Reno, Nevada the TD (Isaac Kashdan) announced there would be a players' meeting in Lone Pine the next day! Thirty-three players either made the 250 mile drive from Reno to Lone Pine or they were transported by volunteers for $10 a head. The time limit was 45 moves in 2-1/2 hours, followed by 16 moves per hours. Games were played from 1:00-6:00 in the afternoon, with adjournments following a two-hour break. 

    Shown is the Dow Villa Motel located in the heart of downtown and in easy walking to a grocery story, coffee house and several restaurants. John Wayne was a special guest and...Wi-Fi is provided in the main lobby. YouTube has an interesting video tour of some of the ghost towns near Lone Pine HERE. 
    One benefit of playing in Lone Pine was that it offered a chance for lower rated, unknown players to meet strong masters and grandmasters. The point was made in the first round when the seven time Washington State champ, 35 year old James McCormick, bumped off Larry Evans. 
     GM James Tarjan took the early lead when he won five straight, including a win over Walter Browne, but then his hopes faded when he drew with Gligoric and lost to Evans in the last round. 
     Gligoric was certainly a big favorite, but in round 4 he was held to a draw by the legendary Wisconsin champ William Martz. A draw with Tarjan in round six set up the last round pairings: 

Tarjan (5.5) against Evans (5.0) 
Browne (5.0) against Gligoric (5.0) 
Martz (4.5) against Bills (4.0) 

   Evans scored his sixth win in a row to finish first and $1,000 in prize money. Final standings, tied players in order of tiebreaks. 

1) Larry Evans 6.0-1.0 
2-5) Walter Browne, James Tarjan, Svetozar Gligoric and William Martz 5.5-1.5
6) John Grefe 5.0-2.0 
7) Ross Stoutenborough 4.5-2.5 
8-15) Eugene Martinovsky, Andrew Karklins, Dennis Waterman, Julius Loftsson, Ronald Gross, Ariel Mengarini, William Bills, Daniel Fischheimer 4.0-3.0 
16-20) Roy Ervin, Bill Jones, Robert Newbold, James McCormick and William Abbott 3.5-3.5 
21-24) Erich Marchand, Greg Fulkerson, Gary Simms and Robert Anderson 3.0-4.0 
25-29) Craig Barnes, Richard Brent, Donald Dean, Robert Avery and Paul Shuey 2.5-4.5 
30-32) Harry Mayer, Robert Klein and Gary Forman 2.0-5.0 
33) Sidney Rubin 1.5-5.5 

     The following game was played by one of the more exciting players of the day, Jim Tarjan (born February 22, 1952, in Pomona, California) who played for the American team at five straight chess Olympiads, scored first place at Subotica 1975, Vancouver 1976, and first equal at Vrsac 1983. 
     Other good finishes included tied for third at Chicago 1973, tied for fifth at Venice 1974 and tied second at Bogota 1979. 
     Tarjan played in several U.S. Championships during the 1970s and 1980s with his best result being in the 1978, which was a Zonal qualifier, when he tied for second. In the 1979 Riga Interzonal he scored 50 percent and did not advance. 
      In 1984, he gave up chess to become a librarian after the U.S. Championship where he finished tied for third. After retirement in 2014 he returned to chess and played in the U.S. Open where he finished half a point behind a six-way tie for first place. 
     There followed an international open tournament on the Isle of Man in October 2014 where he tied for places 20th to 22nd. More recently he played in the very strong 2017 Isle of Man open and finished in a massive tie for places 25th to 47th, but defeated former world champion Vladimir Kramnik. For the complete story see the great post on Chess.com HERE. 
     Also in 2017, he won the Oregon Open. This year he tied for 7th place in the U.S. Open and won the 2018 Seattle Chess Classic. His current FIDE rating is 2402 and his current USCF rating is 2495.
     His opponent, William Martz (March 21, 1945 – January 17, 1983), was one of the country's leading players for more than a decade.