Carmine Nigro, President of the Brooklyn Chess Club, had persuaded the 12-year-old Bobby Fischer to play in the tournament. There doesn’t seem to be any record of the crosstable and as far as I know the following game is the only one of two Fischer’s that have survived from the event. The other was an 11 move draw with Sanford Greene (1936-2023) whom I remember as a strong correspondence player.
Fischer’s opponent was Albert B. Humphrey (1811-1997). He was born in Hempstead, New York. He was the second of three children born to a builder and carpenter James D. Humphrey (1879-1963) from Canada and Ethel Brown (1891-1969) from New York, who married in 1908.
After high school Humphrey went to college and law school at the University of Virginia (Charlottesville). While there he won the college chess champion in Virginia. He graduated there in 1935, established his own law office in Hempstead in 1937 and was the town solicitor.
He got married around 1939 to a stenographer and bookkeeper named Edith L. Willock (1906-1983) who was from Queens, New York. They had a son, James.
While keeping an office in New York, in 1949, the family moved to Egremont, Massachusetts, where, in 1950, Humphrey was admitted to the Bar and joined a local law firm.
Humphrey was stricken with polio at the age of four and drove specially built cars with the pedals replaced with hand levers.
In this game, Fischer had a winning advantage in the final position, but it’s not known why he agreed to a draw. However, after allowing Stockfish to analyze the position for 10-15 minutes it became clear that winning the game was probably beyond his skill level at the time.
Both players were probably in the 1700-1800 range at the time… or were they?! After the auto-analysis with Stockfish, the Fritz program assigns white a Weighted Error Value of 0.37 while Fischer’s WEV is a “very precise” 0.14! That’s a VERY good score for amateurs.
What exactly is WEV? It measure how closely the moves played in the game compare to the engine’s choice. If the moves matched the engine exactly the WEV would be 0.00. In any case, the lower the WEV score, the better.
Albert B.Humphrey–Robert Fcher½–½E61US Amateur. Lake Mohegan, NY6Lake Mohegan, NY USA22.05.1955Stockfish 16
E90: King's Indian Defense 1.d4 f6 2.c4 g6 3.c3 g7 4.f3 0-0 5.e4 d6 6.h3 bd7 7.e3 e5 8.d5 a5 9.e2 9.g4 was played in Bjelobrk,I (2329)
-Vajda,L (2632) Sydney AUS 2013 which continued c5 10.xc5 dxc5 11.d2 e8 12.e3 b6 13.d3 with slightly better chances. 9...b6 This is too
passive. The thematic 9...Nc5 is the recommended move. 9...h5 10.g3 f6 11.h2 g7 12.d2 e7 13.g4 c5 White;s position is the more promising.
Dickenson,N (2300)-Bisby,D (2311) Hinckley ENG 2014 10.0-0 Other moves
that have been played here are 10.Nd2, 10.Qc2 and 10.Bg5 e8 11.c2 c5 12.h2 A better plan was 12.a3 to be followed by b4 f5 13.f3 f4
Black has achieved a promising position with prospects of a K-side attack
whereas white's prospects on the Q-side are clearly limited. 14.f2 g5
A promising idea was ...Bf6 and Bh4 eliminating white's dark square defender. 15.h1 Very good! It's a handy defensive move. d7 16.g1 f6 17.g4 It's difficult to suggest anything other than passive defensive moves
(17.b3 or 17.Nf1) for white, but this move results in what should have been a
serious weakening of his K's position. fxg3 18.xg3 h6 19.d1 h5 19...xh3 This is not as risky as it appears as there is no way white can take
advantage of the position of black's Q. 20.g1 h5 21.f1 xf1 22.xf1 f4 with what should amount to a decisive advantage. 20.g1 xh3 21.e3 f4 22.f2 f6 23.g3 Because the N on f5 is pinned white threatens
24.Rxh3 d7 24.fg4 xg4 25.xg4 g7 26.ag1 It appears all is well for
white as he has survived black's operations on the K-side, but Stockfish is
indication a decisive advantage for black. e7 Necessary in the event white
plays Bxf4 27.d2 f7 28.1g3 28.xf4 xf4 29.xf4 exf4 30.xf4
leaves white even worse off after xb2 31.g4 xe2 31...f8 32.e3 f6 33.xf6+ xf6 34.f4 xa2 35.e5 f8 36.e6 and white has more play than he
deserves. 32.h6+ h8 32...g7 33.f5+ draws 33.f7+ xh6 34.xe7 xf3+ 33.f7+ g7 34.h6+ g8 and white has no followup. 28...af8 29.xf4 xf4 30.h3 f7 31.gg3 It appears that with hsi f-Pawn solidly
defended black can make no headway, but Stockfish is indicating slightly over
a 3 Pawn advantage for black and a decisive advantage. Because its evaluations
tend to run on the high side I also ran Komodo 14's "Human" engine here and it
shows black to be "clearly better" with a two Pawn advantage. h4 32.g4 f2 33.d1 Draw agreed. 33.f1 Stockfish's lengthy analysis
runs as follows: d4 34.g2 xe4 35.fxe4 xf1+ 36.xf1 xf1+ 37.h2 g1+ 38.xg1 f2+ 39.xf2 xf2+ 40.g2 f4+ 41.gg3 xe4 42.b3 e2+ 43.g2 f1 44.gg3 a4 45.g4 g7 46.g2 e4 47.hg3 f5 48.g1 f4 49.g4 f3 50.4g3 d1+ 51.h2 axb3 52.axb3 f1 53.e3 f4+ 54.gg3 f6 55.g1 h5 56.h3 h4 57.b4 e5 58.a3 g5 59.c5 c1+ 60.h2 d2+ 61.g1 dxc5 62.bxc5 bxc5 63.f1 d4 64.a4+ c4 65.aa3 g4 66.xh4 c1+ 67.g2 xa3 68.h2 g3 69.h3 gxh2+ 70.xh2 f3 71.d6 e3 72.g1 g4+ 73.f1 cxd6 74.e1 e2# ½–½
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