On the US chess scene Adele Rivero won the women's championship, Samuel Reshevsky the men's and Reuben Fine the US Open.
Al Horowitz was seriously injured and New England champion Harold Morton died in Iowa after a car wreck when Morton collided with a truck. The strong Boston amateur John F. Barry died at the age of 66.
In Russia Igor Bondarevsky and Andor Lilienthal tied for first in the USSR Championship.
The 59-year old Polish champion David Przepiorka was present at a forbidden meeting of the Warsaw Chess Circle when the Germans arrested everyone there. As a result, he was executed by the Nazis in part of what became known as the Palmiry massacre, a series of mass executions carried out near the village of Palmiry in the Kampinos Forest northwest of Warsaw.
Alexander Alekhine's whereabouts at the time was not known, but in September the New York Times reported that both Alekhine and Capablanca were in Buenos Aires and Alekhine was hoping they could play a match.
Capablanca had said that two other players were worthy of consideration: Paul Keres and Mikhail Botvinnik. Fred Reinfeld wrote that he suspected they were mentioned only because they were not available ...they were in Russia and the war was going on. Reinfeld also mentioned that he was baffled by the snootiness of their ignoring Samuel Reshevsky and Reuben Fine.
As mentioned, Reuben Fine won the US Open that was held in Dallas, Texas when he scored 8-0 in the finals ahead of Herman Steiner, Weaver Adams, Erich Marchand, W.N. Kendall, J.C. Thompson, Arpad Elo, Howard Ohman and Harold Burge.
In one of the preliminary qualifying sections Fine finished ahead of Thompson, Elo, Albert Roddy, Jr., Joseph Rauch, Edgar Hartsfield, R.S. Underwood and R.D. Allentharp
In that section Fine and Thompson scored 6.5-1.5 and Elo scored 6-2.
Albert Roddy, Jr., who was living in Tulsa, Oklahoma just missed qualifying, but in the process he created a stir with a sensational draw against Fine.
Almost nothing is known about Roddy, but I discovered an Albert Roddy (1900-1966) who is listed as registering for the WWI draft in the September 26, 1918 issue of the Ada (Oklahoma) Weekly News.
There was also an Albert H. Roddy (1919-1999) who lived in Tulsa for a while and registered for military service in 1942. He died at the age of 79 on February 6, 1999, in Dallas, Texas. This may have been Junior and the Army Second Lieutenant that I discovered who was captured by the Nazis while serving in Germany and was sent to Stalag Luft 3 near Sagan, Germany. He was freed in 1945.
I searched the first USCF rating list in 1950 and the list for 1951 and did not find a Roddy listed. Only three of Roddy's games seem to be known and they are from the 1940 US Open. Did he ever play any tournament chess again?! One wonders how good he really was. Here's one of his games from that 1940 US Open.
Arpad Elo–Albert Roddy0–1B58US Open. Prelims, Dallas220.08.1940Stockfiah 15.1
Sicilian Dragon 1.e4 c5 2.f3 c6 3.d4 cxd4 4.xd4 f6 5.c3 d6 6.e2 g6 In his 1953 autobiography, the Russian master and amateur astronomer
Fyodor Dus-Chotimirsky claimed that he coined the name Dragon Variation in
1901, after the fancied resemblance between black's K-side P-structure and the
constellation Draco. 7.0-0 g7 8.b3 0-0 9.f3 e6 10.d5 c8 10...b5
was played in Euwe,M-Landau,S Netherlands 1939 which continued... 11.a4 bxa4 12.xa4 xd5 13.exd5 b6+ 14.h1 b4 with equal chances. 11.c4 More
solid would have been 11.c3 b5 11...e5 would have challenged white's last
move. After 12.d2 This N wanted to go to d4, but now it's needed to defend
the c-Pawn. 12.d4 works out in black's favor after xc4 13.xe6 fxe6 14.f4 d5 and now 15.xe6 would lose to b6+ 12...h5 This hinders any
white advances on the k-side. here black can claim to have at least equalized. 12.xf6+ xf6 13.cxb5 b6+ 14.h1 b4 15.d2 c2 16.b1 e3 17.xe3 xe3 Here white must figure out how to avoid getting his Q-side Ps wrecked by
...Bxb3 18.c1 But this isn't the way to do it. 18.a5 xa2 19.a1 e6 20.c6 is completely equal. 18...c7 19.e1 b6 Certainly not bad, but
he had an even stronger continuation. 19...h6 This strongly threatens ...
Be5 20.g3 and black has two promising continuations: 20...Rfc8 and 20...d5 20.b3 fc8 Black has good piece activity for the P. 20...d5
was also quite good according the engines, but no human could see the long
sequence that leads to the advantage. In fact, at the end it's not likely that
black, a P up with all Ps on the same side, could win. 21.exd5 d7 22.c4 xd5 23.xd5 e6 24.a4 xd5 Black is actually better here. A sample line... 25.c2 fd8 26.b4 e7 27.f1 d2 28.c4 2d4 29.c6 b8 30.e2 d2 31.g3 c8 32.e4 a2 33.a1 cc2 34.xa2 xa2 35.c6 d8 36.e4 xa4 37.b6 a6 38.b7 xb6 39.xa7 xb4 21.d3 f2 22.e2 h4 This prevents Nf4,
but 22...Qe3 was a better way to do it. 23.g3 h6 24.c1 This
is a tactical blunder! 24.f4 does not work out too well against e5 25.e2 d5 26.exd5 xd5 and white's position is unenviable. 24.g1 This
move would have allowed white to claim he had equalized because black no
longer has any forcing continuation. h3 24...e5 25.f4 leads nowhere for
black. 25.f4 c3 26.e2 d4+ 27.h1 White's K is quite safe and black
can't make any use of the c-file. 24...xc1 25.xc1 c3 26.f1 h3 27.f2 This not only gets out of the line of fire of the B on h3, but it will, white
thinks, prevent ...Bb2 27.f4 was the best try he had, but after b2
From the human point of view this is better than winning the exchange at once. 27...xf1 28.xf1 and black has winning chances. 28.e2 h5 and white
has to surrender the exchange anyway. 29.f5 29.g1 f3+ mate next move. 29.f2 c1 29...xf1 30.xf1 g4 31.fxg6 hxg6 Black is clearly better. 27...b2 There is absolutely no way to meet this. 28.e2 e3 29.g1 This allows a nifty finish. Technically 29.Qg1 was no better, but it
would have made black work for the point. 29.g1 e5 30.c4 xc4 31.bxc4 a3 32.g4 c5 33.c1 xf2 34.xf2 xf2 35.d3 b6 36.a4 f1 37.b4 xc4 38.c6 is Stockfish's line. 29...xf2 30.xh3 Black still has his work
cut out to score the point! d4 31.e2 a3 32.c4 e6 33.f4 g7 34.g2 g5 35.xe6 c3 35...fxe6 Of course this is not playable. 36.xe6+ 35...c1 was a bit better. 36.h5+ g6 37.g4 c3 and white is in even more
serious trouble 36.h5+ g6 37.f5+ xh5 38.f4+ h6 39.fxg5+ g7 40.h5 Threatening mate with Qh6+, but the fun is over! c2+ 41.h3
A most interesting situation has arisen! Black has only one move that secures
the win! f8 Very nice. White resigned. A fine attacking game by Roddy. 41...g1 42.h6+ g8 43.xh7+ mates in 3 41...f2 42.xh7+ f8 43.h6+ e8 44.h8+ e7 45.f6+ draws 41...f2 42.h6+ g8 43.xh7+ h8 44.g6+ draws 41...f8 The only move to avoid the draw. 42.h6+
and black can play either 42...Qg7 or 42...Ke8 and white will be helpless. 0–1
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