Probably the most shocking news story of the year was when singer Jerry Lee Lewis married his 13-year-old 2nd cousin, Myra Gale Brown. They were divorced in December of 1970 and she quickly remarried, but that marriage also ended in divorce. She was married a third time in 1984 and started selling real estate in Georgia.
Walt Disney created an uproar in the 1958 movie White Wilderness. The movie's producers purchased scores of lemmings for a scene in which the creatures were pushed and thrown off a cliff while shooting footage that presented it as a natural occurrence. Do Lemmings Really Commit Mass Suicide? See the Britannica article HERE
Actress Lana Turner’s 14-year-old daughter, Cheryl, saw her mother being beaten by her boyfriend Johnny Stompanato and killed him with a butcher knife. Read more HERE.
In 1958 radio disc jockey Alan Freed, the man who coined the term Rock and Roll, started being questioned about his being paid to promote specific songs on his popular radio and live shows. Ultimately, Freed was arrested in 1960 for accepting $30,000 in bribes; that's about $300,000 today. In 1962 he was given a small fine and a suspended prison sentence, but his career had been ruined and he died a penniless alcoholic in 1965.
The top song was At The Hop by Danny and The Juniors:
Now, on to chess. I posted on the Haifa-Tel Aviv, 1958 international tournament a few months back and gave Reshevsky's game against Israeli Master Ari Rosenberg, but here is another Reshevsky game from the same event.
This time his victim was Dutch Master Carel van den Berg.
IM Carel Benjamin van den Berg (12 February 1924 – 29 June 1971) spent his childhood in Leiden and after WWII obtained a philosophy degree from the University of Groningen.
He won Dutch Correspondence Championship in 1943 and won the Daniël Noteboom memorial tournaments four times: in 1948, 1953, 1954 and 1959.
He was also a chess theorist and edited Losbladige Schaakberichten and collaborated with Max Euwe on a couple of books. Reshevsky told of the time he was discussing an opening variation with Euwe who suggested that they consult van den Berg. Euwe told Reshevsky that van den Berg remembered hundreds of games by heart, including the tournaments they were played in.
When Reshevsky and van den Berg met in round 12, in order for Reshevky to keep pace with Laszlo Szabo he needed to win.
The opening was one of the latest variations of the K-Indian and Reshevsky managed to get a passed Pawn, but it turned out to be a disadvantage and he had to use all of his resources to defend it.
The middlegame was played well by van den Berg and Reshevsky stated that he was starting to get worried when on his 27th move he suddenly saw a combination which looked extremely promising. It involved sacrificing his Q for a R and B plus hr gained positional superiority. Because van den Berg was in time trouble Reshevsky went for it and his opponent's resistance quickly collapsed.
This game turned out to be very complicated and I found myself running numerous Shootouts to double check the engine's evaluation. For the record, in unclear positions, in the Shootout mode the engine plays against itself until a result is reached.
Samuel Reshevsky–Carel van den Berg1–0E63Haifa/Tel Aviv12Haifa/Tel Aviv15.11.1958Stockfush 15
King's Indian: Fianchetto: Panno Variation 1.c4 f6 2.f3 g6 3.g3 g7 4.g2 0-0 5.0-0 d6 6.d4 c6 Popular today, at the time this move was one of
the newest setups in the K-Indian. The purpose is to prepare ...a6 and ...b5
by exerting pressure against white's c-Pawn. 7.c3 a6 8.h3 At the time 8.
Bf4 (rarely seen today) and 8.b3 (never seen today) were considered good
alternatives. Nowadays the text and 8.d5 (which actually gives the best
results) are the most popular by far. b8 9.e3 While not bad, this looks
awkward as he eventually has to move the B again to advance the e-Pawn. 9.e4 is the main line and after b5 10.e5 play gets interesting. 9...b5 10.cxb5 axb5 11.d2 d7 12.c1 Here Reshevsky was considering 12.Nb3 in order
to take the square a5 away from black's N, but rightly decided against it. 12.b3 b4 13.d5 much better than Reshevsky's suggested 13.Nb1 xd5 14.xd5 e5 with good play. 12...a5 Also quite good was 12...b4 13.b4 c4 14.xc4 bxc4 This is the position Reshevsky had been aiming for: he has a
passed P and has given black doubled Ps. But, as Reshevsky pointed out, these
theoretical advantages remain theoretical only because of the following
considerations: 1) His passed P cannot be easily advanced and 2) Black's
doubled Ps are not a disadvantage in this particular instance because one of
them is a passed P far in the enemy's territory. 15.a3 Several more modern
games have seen white play 15.b5 or 15.Rb1, but there is nothing at all wrong
with Reshevsky's move. c6 Obviously, intending to support his P on c4 with ..
.d5 16.d2 d5 17.g5 With the logical intention of preparing e4. e8
Black also intends to advance his e-Pawn. 17...c8 This odd looking move
was suggest by SashChess. The idea is to gain time attacking the h-Pawn then
transfer the Q to the a-file where it puts pressure on white's a-Pawn. 18.h2 a6 19.e4 with equal chances. 18.fe1 He could have played 16.e4
immediately. a8 Pressuring the a-Pawn and at the same time getting out of
the pin on his R after ...e5. The immediate ...e5 does not work. 18...e5 19.dxe5 xe5 20.f4 19.a4 b6 19...e5 is interesting, but not quite
satisfactory as after 20.dxe5 xe5 21.e3 white is slightly better. An
interesting continuation is h5 22.g4 xg4 23.hxg4 xg4 24.f4 f6 25.e4 d4 26.e5 dxc3 27.exf6 cxd2 28.xd2 xf6 29.xc4 White is somewhat better. 20.b5 Slightly better was 20.Rb1 followed by b4-b5. As a result of the
text white is left with a weak a-Pawn. e6 Due to some mistakes in his
analysis (he was annotating without an engine!) Reshevsky thought 20...cxb5
was bad, but it it's not. Both it and the move played are satisfactory. 20...cxb5 21.xf6 xf6 22.xd5 a5 23.xf6+ exf6 24.xa5 xa5 25.axb5 xb5
with equal chances. In Shootouts all five games were drawn. 21.bxc6 21.e4 Now was a good time to play this. cxb5 22.axb5 xe4 23.xe4 dxe4 24.b1 xd4 25.xd4 xd4 26.xe4 g7 27.b6 c6 in this position also five
Shootout games were drawn. 21...xc6 This is superior than taking with the
Q because now the advance of white's e-Pawn is prevented. 21...xc6 22.xf6 xf6 23.e4 22.b1 22.e4 dxe4 23.f1 23.xf6 xf6 24.xe4 ed8
favors black. 23...ed8 24.xc4 xd4 Black is slightly better. 22...a5 23.ec1 d7 This takes the pressure off the square e4.. A good move was 23...
Qa7 attacking the d-Pawn. 24.f4 24.e4 was more appropriate. b6 25.xd5 xd2 25...exd5 26.xa5 xa5 27.xb6 xa4 is good for white. 26.xd2 xd5 27.exd5 exd5 28.b6 xa4 29.xd5 ad8 30.xc4 xd4 with a likely
draw. 24...f8 As Reshevsky pointed out, his passed P is not an asset
because it is weak and feebly protected. He also observed that if black can get
control of the b-file white would be in real trouble. Also, black's pieces are
well positioned. 25.b2 Intending to play B-Q2. 25.e4 is still the best
move. One plausible sequence is a3 26.c2 b4 27.c1 xc3 28.xc3 xa4
Black is a P ahead, but his bad B and white's control of the b-file are
sufficient compensation. This was confirmed by another Shootout which resulted
in five draws. 25...a7 25...xa4 leads to complications that seem to
favor white. 26.a1 b6 27.xb6 xb6 28.c7 b3 29.xb6 xa1 30.xa1 b4 31.c1 a3 32.b1 b4 33.d1 d2 and white is better, but by enough to
win? Probably not. In five Shootouts white scored one win and one game went
over 150 moves. Practically speaking the game is likely a draw/ 26.d2 b7
For nitpickers Reshevsky said 26...Qa6 was correct while Stockfish prefers 26..
.Rb8, but there's only a fraction of a Ps difference in the evaluations. 27.xb7 This is why Reshevsky believed black should have played 26...Qa6. There
is, as he pointed out, very little doubt that van der Berg did not see this
sacrifice. Ordinarily, of course, a R and B are not sufficient material for a
Q, but in this particular case there are the additional, important
considerations. i.e. white's passed P and gaining control of the seventh rank.
Technically all things taken into consideration, the position is dead equal,
but practically, as we shall see, black's cramped position is difficult to
defend. xb7 28.xb7 d8 28...b6 is refuted by 29.e4 a6 30.f6+ h8 31.xf7 threatening mate with Rxh7, so... e7 32.xf8+ g7 33.h6+ xh6 34.g8 with a decisive advantage. 29.cb1 g7 Black's
pieces are almost completely out of play, but instead of the text which has
the logic of attacking the e-Pawn, 29...Kg7 was actually his best move. At f8
the B keeps on eye on the squares on the a3-f8 diagonal and d6 in particular. 29...g7 30.b5 e7 31.a5 b8 and it will be very difficult for white to
make any progress. 30.b5 Black's next move is the decisive mistake...
possibly a "harmless" move made in time pressure?! h8 30...b6 loses 31.a5 c8 32.a6 h6 33.a1 d6 34.a5 a8 35.c7 30...e7 31.b4 d8 32.e4 h5 33.e5 c8 34.c7 a6 35.xd7 xa4 With the
elimination of the a-Pawn a lot of white's advantage has gone also, but he
still has a lot of piece activity and can therefore force black to play
carefully. 30...e7 31.a5 The advance of this P is a road to extreme
complications that are best avoided. b8 32.c7 xb7 33.xb7 xd4 34.a6 a3 35.h6 c3 with equal chances. 36.b5 xa6 37.xd7 f6 38.d6 c2 39.h2 b6 40.xf7 xd6 41.xf6 g5 42.xd5 c1 43.xe6+ h8 44.f8+ xf8 45.xf8 An amazing position. In Shootouts going well over 100 moves Black scored
3 wins and 2 draws. 31.a5 White's passed P Is now something to
be really concerned about. b8 32.c7 Slightly less precise would have been
32.Rxf7 f8 33.e3 Protecting the d-Pawn. White need not be in any hurry
because black can't really do anything. c6 34.a6 xd4 Obviously a
desperate attempt to get some counterplay, but if black just does nothing, he
is going to be strangled slowly but surely. 35.exd4 xd4 36.a7 f6 37.b8 xf2+ 38.h2 xa7 39.xf8+ g7 40.xe6+ f6 41.f1 This is the move that
white had in mind when he made his 37th move. Black reigned. 1–0
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