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Weaver Adams U1800 Championship
Monday, June 2, 9, 16, 23:
4SS; 40/90, G/30;
Open to BCC members rated under 1800. Entry fee: $20.
First two winners receive free entry into the Reubens/Landey U2200 BCC Championship.
Registraton: 6:30 – 6:50 Round: 7:00
The Weaver Adams U1800 Championship begins the annual club championship cycle. It is followed by the Reubens-Landey U2200 Championship, the winner of which is seeded into the club championship - a round robin tournament of Boylston masters.
Recent winners of the Weaver Adams are:
2007 Alexander Paphitis
2006 Alexander Paphitis, Jonathan Lee, Lior Rozhansky
2005 Robert Oresick, Joshua Blanchfield
2004 Mike Griffin
2003 Robert Oresick
2002 William MacLellan
2000 Stephen E. Smith
1999 Bryan Clark
1998 Bryan Clark, Charles G. Alex
1997 Walter A. Driscoll III
1996 Hector Perez, Jared Becker
1995 Miguel A. Santana
1994 Andrew L. Yerre
1993 Charles G. Alex
WEAVER WARREN ADAMS (born Apr-28-1901, died Jan-06-1963) United States of America
Weaver Warren Adams was born on April 28, 1901 in Dedham Massachusetts. He was an American chess master. He participated in the U.S. Championship in 1936, 1940, 1944, 1946 and 1948. He won the Massachusetts State Championship in 1937, 1938, 1941 and 1945.
In 1939, he wrote a book entitled "White to Play and Win." After publication he played in the U.S. Open at Dallas. He did not win a single game as White (3 losses and 1 draw) and won all his games (4 games) as Black!
Weaver Adams won the 49th U.S. Open, held in Baltimore, in 1948. He also wrote "Simple Chess", "How to Play Chess", and "Absolute Chess."
In May, 1947, Weaver Adams, New England Champion, gave a 16-board simul in San Jose, winning all his games.
Weaver W. Adams An Autobiography
Massachusetts State Chess Association, 1949, Robert W. Reddy (Ed.) p. 6-8
I was born on April 28th, 1901 to Frank H. Adams, native of Dedham, Mass., salesman for many years for Bellantine Breweries and later (after prohibition) for Ceresota Flour, and Ethel Weaver Adams, native of Newmarket, NH and graduate of Wellesley College. I am not directly related to the Presidents, John and John Quincy Adams, although the Adams's in and about Massachusetts are mostly of the same family, deriving from a Henry Adams who landed in Braintree in 1644. The family is quite famous and boasts of many statesmen, writers, historians, judges, preachers, etc. Footing the list comes a national chess champion. In the old days he would have surely been branded as a black sheep for wasting his time at so idle a pastime, and perhaps by many even today.
My schooling was conventional, Dedham Public schools and Dedham High School, but then they tried to make an engineer out of me by sending me to Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The result was not too good. During the first year a half dozen of us, after playing a few games at Walker Memorial in Cambridge, would regularly trek across the bridge to Ye Olde Boston Chess Club on Ashburton Place or to various dives in the West End, not the least attractive of which was the Lighted Lamp operated by Boston's famous Ambrose Gring.
Those were really the balmy days of chess in Boston. Well I remember listening to tales told many times over by John Barry, Will Miller, George Babbitt, and a host of others most of whom are no longer living. I seemed to have been a favorite with John Barry because I would talk chess and analyze with him until 4 A. M. in the morning after everybody else had either gone home or turned to a bridge game. At any rate I believe I learned most of my chess from Mr. Barry, and in 1922 attained to the club championship.
An autobiography is supposed to contain a statement as to when one learned chess, although it's not clear as to why this is so important. However, for the sake of the record, I began playing at the age of about twelve. An older brother of a friend next door taught the two of us to play, and would play us both simultaneously blindfold at Queen odds.
What I do think is important, however, is the time when he took us to Boston once to visit the Boston Chess Club which at that time was located in an alley off Boylston Street. I shall never forget the thrill it was to me to see for the first time the large club size pieces in action. Instinctively I seemed to feel that that was me. A friend of mine tells me that he had a similar experience on first visiting a stock exchange and seeing the ticker tapes in action. Curiously, all the rest of his life has .been spent in the stock market.
My chess activities , of course, did not have a good effect on my marks at M.I.T., and, due redness of my report card at the half year, I was politely asked to take a vacation. This I was quite agreeable too, since it afforded me additional time for chess playing. A year went by before my parents inveigled me into attending a military school in northern Vermont, and, six months later, re-entering my class at M.I.T. All knowledge is useful, and it is always futile to look back and say if we had done so and so, life would have been better. It is completely impossible to foresee the over all plan. We can live but a day at a time.
To continue my story, about 1924 Harold Morton had just won the championship of the Providence, R. I., chess club, and a purse was gotten up for a match to take place between Mr. Morton and myself for the championship of New England. Up to that time John Barry had been unofficially recognized as the strongest player in N. E., so, with his consent and approval it was logical that the winner of the match should hold that title. Thus, in 1924 I became the NE Champion and held the title until 1929 when Morton beat me in a succeeding match. Another match between us did not take place until about 1938 which Morton again won.
After his death in 1939 the title came under the control of the N. E. Chess Association and has been decided by an annual tournament (usually held over Labor Day weekend) ever since, which is all to the good, since I am strongly opposed to the awarding of titles through private matches. The tournament method is pre-eminently fair and much more attractive to both the players and the public.
Thereby closes the local chapter in my chess career. At this time – say 1936 - I think that both Morton and myself - I know I did - thought that we were pretty good chess players. We were in for a rude awakening. In that year (1936) was held the first tournament for the Chess Championship of the United States, due to the retirement of Frank J. Marshall.
I recall that after the first few rounds I kept figuring that I might still win the tournament, provided I won all of the remainder of my games. In fact, this went on for several rounds, before I finally gave up hope of first prize. After nine rounds I was relatively proud of my score, since I had three wins and six losses, while Morton had nine goose eggs in a row. However, we finished in a tie for last place, since in the remaining six rounds Morton got six draws, and it was my turn for goose eggs. I mention this experience in order to caution the reader that unless he happens to play regularly in the chess clubs of New York City, he shouldn't put too much store by his showing in the chess clubs of other cities. There is really a difference.
In a considerable sense I feel that my serious chess playing did not begin until after 1936. Hundreds of hours I spent on opening analysis, with the result that there began forming in my mind the idea that by means of precise play White could perhaps emerge from the opening with just enough edge to win. Thus developed a small volume published in 1959 by the David McKay Co. of Philadelphia entitled "White to Play and Win", by Weaver W. Adams. Forthwith, in a tournament at Dallas, Texas in 1940 I proceeded to lose all of my games playing white and win all of my games playing black!
However, I still stick to my theory, and even under the handicap of bucking my own analysis (most writers sedulously avoid playing a move which they have recommended as best, because of fear of having to play against a line which their opponent has prepared against it) and despite the hours which I am advised that many of my opponents spend in trying to discover mistakes in my published variations in "Simple Chess," I nevertheless lost but a single half point with the white pieces in the Open Tournament at Baltimore in 1948. And it wasn't because the boys didn't try. There were my moves open for all to see in "Simple Chess." They could select any one of a hundred different opening variations and I would play the exact moves as published. Is this not just a little significant that white can win? And, if so, why is my favorite opening the Vienna, so damned by faint praise, and so shunned by all the celebrities? You answer that one. I can't.
I don't wish to take up space by tournament records. All in all, they could be a lot better, except perhaps locally, inasmuch as I have won every City of Boston, Massachusetts State, end New England tournament in which I have taken part since 1956 - some dozen or more altogether. I will merely say that having played in eighteen national tournaments, including U. S. National, U. S. Open, Ventnor City, and the Pan American in Los Angeles in 1945, I feel that this experience should mean something, and I hope eventually to demonstrate that it is possible to play chess with consistent scientific accuracy.
The following is an example of such a game. It is one of five which I have thus far played with similar accuracy for the Log Cabin Chess Team of West Orange, New Jersey, of which I have recently become a member. It was played at Elizabethtown, New York, vs. a Montreal Team, and was part of the coast to coast 1949 match between Canada and the U. S.
Adams,W - Guze [B72]
US v Canada, 1940
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 g6 6.h3 Bg7 7.Be3 Nc6 8.Qd2 a6 9.g4 Nxd4 10.Bxd4 0-0 11.0-0-0 b5 12.Bg2 Bb7 13.f4 Qc7 14.Rhe1 Rfd8 15.Qf2 Nd7 16.Bxg7 Kxg7 17.Nd5 Bxd5 18.exd5 Nb6 19.f5 Nc4 20.g5 gxf5 21.Qxf5 Qd7 22.Qf4 Rac8 23.Be4 Rc5 24.b4 Rc7 25.Bf5 Qe8 26.Qd4+ Kg8 27.Qh4 e5 28.Qxh7+ Kf8 29.Qh8+ Ke7 30.Qf6+ Kf8 31.Re4 1-0
Alex Cherniack has posted 8 games between Weaver Adams and Harry Lyman, where you can see Harry Lyman 's opinion of the forced win for white theory.
http://www.boylstonchessclub.org/Harry3.html
New York International
The Marshall Chess Club
200 Grand Prix Points (enhanced)!!
9-round Swiss-System, 40/120, SD/60
open to all players rated 2200 and above (USCF or FIDE) and special invitees
May be limited to first 50 registrants
$10,000 GUARANTEED
$5000—2500—1500—1000
Plus special Brilliancy Prize
Awards ceremony to follow round 9. Every player will receive a special prize.
ENTRY FEE:
GMs, foreign IMs, and foreign WGMs ............. $100,
returned on completion of tournament; no money deducted from prize fund
USA IMs, USA WGMs, and Foreign FIDE-rated players ..$150 in advance / $200 at site
USA players with FIDE ratings over 2200 ..$200 in advance / $250 at site
Players with USCF ratings over 2200 and FIDE rating U2200..$250 in advance / $300 at site
Players with USCF ratings over 2200 with no FIDE rating ..$300 in advance / $350 at site
All except first category:.$25 less for Marshall Chess Club members
In advance: ... By mail (checks only, made payable to The Marshall Chess Club),
postmarked by 6/14
..................... By phone (credit cards only) thru 6/18
..................... In person (cash, credit card, or check) thru 6/18
..................... On our website (credit cards only) thru 6/18
At site......... No later 30 minutes before your first game (cash, credit card, or check)
Playing Schedule:
Round one: Saturday, June 21, 12:00 Noon
Round two: Saturday, June 21, 7:00 PM
Round three: Sunday, June 22, 12:00 Noon
Round four: Sunday, June 22, 7:00 PM
Round five: Monday, June 23, 12:00 Noon
Round six: Monday, June 23, 7:00 PM
Round seven: Tuesday, June 24, 12:00 Noon
Round eight: Tuesday, June 24, 7:00 PM
Round nine: Wednesday, June 25, 12:00 Noon
Byes: Must commit by rd. 3; limit 2; limit 1 bye rounds 8–9
Players taking byes cannot make norms
USCF and FIDE-Rated. IM/GM Norms may be possible.
Tournament director: Steve Immitt
Dr. Frank Brady, International Arbiter, officiating
This tournament is generously sponsored by Chess Teacher Fedor Khrapatin
Marshall Chess Club
Phone 212-477-3716 Fax 212-995-9281
www.marshallchessclub.org
For information on lodgings,
contact the Marshall Chess Club
Posted by Robert Oresick at 10:39 AM No comments:
The 2008 Mass Open and MACA
70 players attended this year's Mass Open in Boxborough, about 10 people less than last year.
The highlight was TD Ken Ballou
presenting a plaque to John Curdo commemorating John's first of 17 Mass Championships 60 years ago at the age of 16.
The most watched battle, was a game between Jim Rizzitano and Paul Mac Intyre that went the full 6 hours, both players having equal winning chances, with MacIntyre the victor in the time scramble of a complex ending where both sides queened pawns.
Denys Shmelov won the Open Section - becoming the 2008 Massachusetts Champion. John Elmore of NH the U2000, Avery Chen of CT the U1800, Larry Kleine the U1600.
In the one day (attendance 30) Howard Goldowsky and Darwin Ding won the U2000/Open, with David Todd and Chirantan Neogy winning the U1300 .
Bill Kelleher went undefeated with 10 wins in Blitz (attendance 10). Walter Champion funded a best game prize TBD.
There were also scholastic events this weekend as well: K-6 Under 1400 Alexander Sorets won and K-6 Under 800 Jenny R Qiu won by tiebreak over Sathwik Karnik. While K-3 U12K was won Arnav Ghosh in a tie break over Henry Li, and K3-U600 was tied by Afareen Jaleel and Bridget Fox (attendance 64).
MACA election results: President: Maryanne Reilly (88 votes); Vice President: Donna Alarie (84 votes); Treasurer: Robert Messenger (92 votes); Clerk: R. Kenneth Ballou (87 votes); DIRECTORS: (elected) George Mirijanian, 93 votes; Steve Frymer, 88 votes; Stephen Dann, 80 votes; Beebe Wiegand, 73 votes; Joseph Alfano, 71 votes; Brian Lafferty, 70 votes; Brian Mottershead, 69 votes; Robert King, 63 votes; Margaret King, 60 votes.
MACA VP Donna Alarie carried most of the reporting duties in the MACA annual meeting asking for volunteers to help with various tasks performed by Maca. Donna pointed out that the increased expenses of the magazine Chess Horizons created a deficit of several thousand dollars and the MACA executive and directors have to come up with a strategy to meet this budgetary drain, but keep the magazine. Discussions revolved around the possibility of an electronic version of Chess Horizons. This deficit was absorbed due to funds in investments. Donna asked for help in reviewing MACA's investment strategies that were previously managed by the late Gus Gosselin. Currently there about 250 adult MACA members as numbers keep falling.
How do you feel about Chess Horizons?
If you have something interesting to add please comment. Mike Griffin 05/28/2008
How should you react when you blunder?
"If you've made a mistake, or committed an inaccuracy, there is no need to become annoyed and to think that everything is lost. You have to re-orientate yourself quickly and find a new plan in the new situation"
---Bronstein.
Many of my games have collapsed like a house of cards following a blunder - throwing a great position away after hours of hard work.
Paul Keres also stated that you should let it go, collect yourself, and take a new cold objective look at your current position making new plans.
Jeremy Sillman, Mr. Imbalance, says you should take inventory of the imbalances due to the error.
All of this is easier said than done. How should one act after making a blunder?
I think most people immediately get up and walk away from the board after making a mistake. This has happened so often to me that when my opponent suddenly gets up and walks away I take an extra long look. Myself, I try and keep a poker face, although I admit I have emotionally reacted right after making a mistake especially when I know I just threw the game away.
c.1340, from
O.N. blundra "shut one's eyes" (the oldest Eng. sense was "to stumble around
blindly"), from PIE base *bhlendh- (see blind). Meaning "make
a stupid mistake" is first recorded 1711.
I love the word blunder - it's a perfect way to describe a major mistake. A lot better than error, or fumble. Bill Buckner's 1986 World Series error was a super blunder (although Sox Nation now forgives him as time heals all wounds.)
Another interesting category are the occasions when your opponent has not taken advantage of a winning situation they have. I remember a battle with the late George O'Rourke, whereabouts the 5th hour I was staring at a very subtle mate in 7 and it was obvious my opponent was focused on queenside activity thus missing it and me sitting: poker face, poker face. I won that game around an hour later, around 1am in the morning.
Similarly against my nemesis Mikhail Derazhne, had to sit with a poker face staring at mate, later going on to win.
Another interesting category of this type is when you make a losing blunder, which your opponent misses, and this creates such an unbalanced situation in the position that you actually obtain a forcing winning advantage due to not being punished.
The most demonstrative response I ever remember was when Jack Martin; having dropped a pawn scrambling in a critical situation against me; slowly got up, slowly stepped away from the table, took off has ball cap, threw it on the floor and drop kicked it down the isle al la Earl Weaver.
How do you react to blunders? Do you have any interesting stories about blundering? Do you have a better term for blunder than blunder?
Please Comment. Mike Griffin 05/21/2008
Once titled, always titled...
The reason I had asked in the previous thread what is an ex-master is that in 2006 I had sought clarification on the use of titles by the USCF:
Robert Oresick wrote:
Perhaps you can help me. I have on at least two occasions been questioned on my use of the title "NM" when referring to players whose current rating is below 2200. My understanding is that once a player has attained a published rating of 2200+, they have earned the title "National Master", and that once titled, always titled.
While FIDE titles are published with a uscf members rating and membership information, nothing is published about USCF titles. Nor can I find a clear and official
definition of the various USCF titles on the webpage. In the past I have queried this, and received a good explanation, including FIDE definaitions, but I can't find it in the rule book or web page.
Thanks for your help. Robert Oresick
Chuck Lovingood to Joan Dubois, Oresick 11/1/06 Reply
Joan DuBois wrote:
Hello Mr. Oresick,
I'm going to
forward your email to Chuck Lovingood, one of our rating experts in the office. Chuck can explain to you the different rating/title levels. I'll ask Chuck to copy me on his reply so I can add his information to the OTB Ratings FAQ's we offer on our website. Thank you for letting us know we having nothing on the web about them....
Yours for Chess, Joan DuBois
U.S. Chess Director of:Communications, National Events,
Outreach, Website Content & Correspondence ChessPO Box 3967Crossville, TN
38557(931) 787-1234
Mr. Oresick,
You are correct in that players never lose their titles. As for the USCF titles, the two over the board titles are National Master (obtained by reaching 2200 USCF) and Life Master (obtained by playing 300 games at 2200 or higher).
As for posting this information, we will include it under the FAQ
section on the USCF website in the near future. Thanks for your inquiry.
Chuck Lovingood
Reply Reply to all Forward
Robert Oresick to Allan, David, Ross, WFM, Chuck show details 11/1/06 Reply
Dear Mr. Lovingood -
Thank you and Joan for your speedy and clear response. I appreciate that you will post a notice about titles on the FAQ site.
Might I suggest that as we put FIDE titles on each members rating history and membership status, we might put USCF titles on the page as well. I think it would help TDs list players correctly on pairings and crosstables, honoring them as I think we
should for their achievement.
Robert Oresick
So, my understanding from this correspondence is that once a player has acheived a published rating (even in a monthly or bi-monthly supplement), the title of National Master has been earned. And even if the rating drops back below 2200, the title remains.
Once titled, always titled. There are no ex-masters.
The 9th annual Paramount at the BCC is completed. A 10 round double-round robin founded by Brian Clark, the Paramount is one of the few tournaments in the calendar that includes adjournments.
This year expert Brian Salomon won the first section with 9 points.
Adam Yedidia continued his consistent improvement winning 7 points to tie with Adam Fletcher with 7 as well. (The previous report was erroneous - I had misread an email from Adam reporting that Adam had won over Adam.)
Congratulations to the winners and all the players.
Recent Chess Results at the Boylston
May 3rd Swiss
The esteemed BCC President Paul MacIntyre swooped in for a rare weekend appearance and takes first place. His win over Chris Chase in the third round ended Chris's string of BCC tournament victories, but I'm sure this is only a temporary setback.
Wednesday Quick Quads-May 7th
Ten players braved the blistering pace of the G30 Wednesday night quads, which is now a club WEEKLY event. Laywer Times won the top quad 3-0, while Adam Pittman took top honors in the 2nd group. The biggest upset victory was Natasha Christiansen's victory over Greg Kaden, whose rating had been soaring (almost 200 points in a year and a half!) from 2000, when I met him back in 2007, to a brief spell at 2200 in April. Expert floor to flirting with master in a year -- what's your secret Greg? Maybe Natasha knows the secret, too-- her rating recovered 100 points in a month!
Saturday G60 Quads, May10th
Twenty-five players tackled the ever-popular Saturday G60 Quads at the BCC. Game in 60 minutes is no leisure walk, especially when facing players of similar rating.
The top section of 4 masters* saw a tie between Chris Chase and Chris Williams at 2.5 each.
Quad#2 was won by Ben Goldberg, who slashed through three other experts to acheive a perfect 3-0.
Quad#3's victor was Afranio Soares, whose Harvard Square seasoning paid off in spades. Jesse Nicholas's razor sharp tactics in a Silician Dragon claimed a 200 point ratings upset win against Jason Rihel in quad 3, the biggest upset of the day.
Quad#4 was won by the popular BCC blogger Mike Griffin, who held the top spot despite a first round loss.
Quad#5 first place was taken by Adam Yedidia, with a fine 2.5/3 effort over a tight field. Speaking of ratings gains, Adam has soared over 200 points in six months. One of his victories was over Seth Lieberman, who is up over 100 points in the past six months as well. What fountain is everyone drinking from? I know it isn't the BCC water cooler....
Quad#6 was taken by Alexander Lee with a perfect score.
If you attended these events, and have stories to relate, please share them. I can only add what I saw personally, and I would love to hear other vignettes from these events.
* May 21st- An earlier version of this post included the phrase ("and ex-masters"), but it has been clearly established by Bob Oresick's research and post(see above) that once a master, always a master.
Posted by Rihel at 8:41 AM No comments:
Jorge Sammour-Hasbun lecture
This Friday at the Blackstone Chess Academy, two time Dos Hermanas Champion Jorge Sammour-Hasbun is giving a lecture at 7:00pm.
This lecture is free for BCA members, and only $10 to non-members.
Following the lecture is a blitz tournament, Game 7 (5-2s), starting shortly after 8.
Entry fee is $7, $5 for BCA members. Prizes $100based on 20.
See http://blackstonechess/event85g.htm for details.
Non-members can enter the tournament and attend the lecture for only $12! Sets provided, bring a clock if possible.
The Blackstone Chess Academy is located at the To Kalon Club, 26 Main Street, Pawtucket RI, just off the highway (95).
For more information and directions, please visit:
http://blackstonechess.com/
Thanks, and pass this along to your chess friends!
Blackstone Chess
Chess and the Fairer Sex
I can count beyond my hands and feet male players who have left chess when they developed a special relationship with a particular female. I don't want to sound sexist but I have not known of the reverse to happen. And I'm not going to name names for fear of getting beaten up or something.
And I have to admit that I have a deal with my wife to not play chess during the summer on the weekends when the weather is good enough to go to the beach. I hear stories about divorces because of chess but I don't buy it, there is probably more to each story. I doubt that the divorce rate of chess players is higher than say hunters or poker players.
There seems to be three major phases in a chessplayer's life where giving up OTB has a high probability.
First, late in high school about the Junior year when college takes on a big piece of life and in addition chessplayers seem to figure out how to deal with girls around that age.
Next is when a player begins to have a family; I retired from OTB chess for 19 years while my kids were growing up. It took a wife getting her master's degree and my kids not wanting to spend time with their crazy old man, to get me back to OTB. I wish there was a way to reach out to people in this group, because I do feel there is an opportunity to bring them back if we knew how to find them.
Then I have seen many boomers drop out of chess when they see their skills slipping, getting beaten up too may times by these highly coached wunderkind, or they begin a new relationship. In fact the USCF is concerned that boomers are dropping out at an accelerating rate while youth is not replacing this drop off, causing a slowly increasing decline in the demographics that is the biggest threat to OTB.
If I could transfer any experience into other chess players it would be the exhilaration one has playing well in a several day tournament, class prize for me, when round after round you sit across the board and ask yourself "How am I going to beat this guy?" And some how it's the last round and you are playing for the 1st prize and you win. I wish everyone experiences this at least once in their life.
In an attempt to discourage people considering stopping OTB chess all together, I try and persuade them to go into "weekend warrior mode" -- set the goal to play in a few tournaments a year out of shape. Budgeting time so that you can participate weekly or routinely during a week night which might help to keep skills up. Personally I guess I'm in a type of this mode, attending the Quincy Chess Club every Tuesday night, when work doesn't interfere.
Contrary to the above phenomenon, there was a time when the Quincy Chess Club actually attracted a wave of women who were looking for eligible bachelors. These women were older successful professionals apparently networked, and somehow got the idea to visit the club. These chess groupies seemed odd, but when you think about it, it made better sense to look for single guys in a chess club rather than a bar. You would probably find some pretty bright people at a chess club, albeit some socially challenged. In fact a couple of the women did find Mr right there, and chess subsequently lost those guys. So lookout for older chess groupies they could be harmful to your game.
What are you feeling about chess and women?
Any ideas to save the boomers? Or anything else?
Please Comment Mike Griffin 05/13/2008
The Day I co-won a tournament with John Curdo
Photo: Robert Oresick
Clearly John Curdo is a chess legend. If John Curdo was a pro ball player, who would he be? To date Curdo has won 807 tournaments over more than 60 years. Won the Mass Open over 17 times (we say "over 17" because our record keeping is so poor). Cy Young with 511 career victories had an average of 24 wins for 21 years is the baseball player closest I can think of. I bet John Curdo easily won about 4000 wins which is 67 wins per 60 seasons. And still going.
Photo: Steve Stepak
Saturday 10/02/2004 early morning I head west on the Mass turnpike. Memories of my playing on the Westfield Chess Team/Club flash in my mind. I turn off at the Palmer/Ware exit now heading on North Main Street Palmer and stop of at RA Manley & Sons Plumbing Supply to talk to past chess teammate Ron Manley who is stuck watching the store and won't be playing in today's 2nd Annual Palmer Open. But he said he will drop in. Saying goodbye I head up to the Grange Hall that has conditions right out of the past: the hall is a dark musty building of wood construction of 100+ years old.
Logistics for an exerb tournament is trickier than in cities or suburbia where venues are more static. The director has to show up very early to places like this and deal with the conditions as presented. Set up the computer and make sure that chairs and tables are arranged ok. Move the cows out of the parking lot if necessary(only joking). You have to be more patient with the directors out here as they don't direct very often and it takes a little longer to work through things.
It's time for round one and the director Ed Kostreba is beside himself as the open section has only four players for three rounds. I say I'll play up if it will help. In fact there are 4 sections and only 25 players which make things complicated everywhere because the players don't want sections to be combined?!
In 2003, the previous year, The 1st Palmer Open had 38 players and Alexander Ivanov blew away the field. I think Ivanov's biggest challenge of that day was finding a good cup of coffee.
My Westfield State chess coach/sponsor Dr. Les Hutton was playing in the u1600 section and we had a nice reunion. Round 1 I got a 1 point bye being in the Open section; round 2 - I faced a mid 1800 opponent and won a nice game. John Curdo was the strongest player that day. I watched as Curdo created positions so tense they looked painful to look at, then blam they explode in Curdo's favor, winning his first two rounds.
Final round to be paired: I have two points and Curdo has two points, we are the leaders. We expect to face each other. This will be my first time to face John. My former teammate Ron Manly broke away work to watch me play the last round.
When the parings went up John and I were NOT pared against each other?! We went up to the TD and simultaneously asked what's going on? TD said that people would have to play each other twice in order for us to face each other. And that's not going to happen. So I was paired against a mid 1900'ds player, me with Black played a French defense and got to successfully blow him up with a nice bishop sac on his h2.John made short notice of his opponent as well. I WAS CO-WINNER OF THE 2nd ANNUAL PALMER OPEN WITH JOHN CURDO! My grandchildren will hear about this, probably too many times. John, classy guy that he is, gave me a hearty hand shake and congratulations. Later that summer at a college reunion I met several of my Westfield State chess buds and they congratulated me on being so lucky as to not having to face John Curdo.
What ball player or athlete would you equate John Curdo with?
Do you have any good Curdo stories?
Andor Lilienthal
A belated happy birthday at the suggestion of Ben Goldberg.
Photos from Chessbase online.
The incredible 92-year-old Andor Lilienthal, who, believe it or not, has chalked up wins against Marshall, Tartakower, Lasker, Capablanca and Alakhine. You don't believe us? Here are some games...
Age difference 72 years: Lilienthal with FIDE champ Ruslan Ponomariov
Andor Lilienthal, Viatcheslav Beresnev (vice-president of Russian Chess Federation), David Bronstein (79), Anatoly Karpov (ex-world champion) and Alexander Bakh (arbiter)
Andor Arnoldovich Lilienthal
Born May 5, 1911 (1911-05-05)(age 97)
Title Grandmaster
Andor (Andre, Andrea) Arnoldovich Lilienthal (born May 5, 1911) is a Hungarian chess Grandmaster. In his long career, he played against ten world champions, beating Emanuel Lasker, José Raúl Capablanca, Alexander Alekhine, Max Euwe, Mikhail Botvinnik, and Vasily Smyslov. Lilienthal, who celebrated his 97th birthday on May 5, 2008, is still active, in good health, driving his car, and writing articles for chess magazines. As of 2008 he is the oldest living Grandmaster.
Lilienthal was born in Moscow to Hungarian Jewish parents and moved to Hungary at age two. He played for Hungary in three Chess Olympiads, 1933, 1935, and 1937. Emigrating to the Soviet Union in 1935, he became a Soviet citizen in 1939. Lilienthal played in the USSR Chess Championship eight times, with his best result being a first place tie with Igor Bondarevsky in 1940. He qualified for the Candidates Tournament once, in 1948.
From 1951 until 1960 he was Tigran Petrosian's trainer. Lilienthal began a friendship with Vasily Smyslov in 1938, and was Smyslov's second in his world championship matches against Botvinnik. He retired from tournament play in 1965 and returned to Hungary in 1976.
Lilienthal is one of a few players who have an even record against Capablanca. Here's his win against Capablanca in Hastings in 1935:
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.a3 Bxc3+ 5.bxc3 b6 6.f3 d5 7.Bg5 h6 8.Bh4 Ba6 9.e4 Bxc4 10.Bxc4 dxc4 11.Qa4+ Qd7 12.Qxc4 Qc6 13.Qd3 Nbd7 14.Ne2 Rd8 15.O-O a5 16.Qc2 Qc4 17.f4 Rc8 18.f5 e5 19.dxe5 Qxe4 20.exf6 Qxc2 21.fxg7 Rg8 22.Nd4 Qe4 23.Rae1 Nc5 24.Rxe4+ Nxe4 25.Re1 Rxg7 26.Rxe4+ Kd7 1-0
Hooper, David and Kenneth Whyld (1996). The Oxford Companion to Chess. Oxford University. ISBN 0-19-280049-3.


text:
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.IO;
using System.Linq;
using System.Linq.Expressions;
using System.Reflection;

using IronPython.Runtime;

using Microsoft.Scripting;
using Microsoft.Scripting.Hosting;

using Oxide.Core;
using Oxide.Core.Plugins;
using Oxide.Core.Plugins.Watchers;

namespace Oxide.Ext.Python.Plugins
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Represents a Python plugin
    /// </summary>
    public class PythonPlugin : Plugin
    {
        /// <summary>
        /// Gets the Python engine
        /// </summary>
        private ScriptEngine PythonEngine { get; }

        /// <summary>
        /// Gets this plugin's Python class
        /// </summary>
        private object Class { get; set; }

        /// <summary>
        /// Gets this plugin's scope
        /// </summary>
        private ScriptScope Scope { get; set; }

        /// <summary>
        /// Gets the object associated with this plugin
        /// </summary>
        public override object Object => Class;

        private IList<string> Globals;

        // The plugin change watcher
        private readonly FSWatcher watcher;

        /// <summary>
        /// Initializes a new instance of the PythonPlugin class
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="filename"></param>
        /// <param name="engine"></param>
        /// <param name="watcher"></param>
        internal PythonPlugin(string filename, ScriptEngine engine, FSWatcher watcher)
        {
            // Store filename
            Filename = filename;
            PythonEngine = engine;
            this.watcher = watcher;
        }

        #region Config

        /// <summary>
        /// Populates the config with default settings
        /// </summary>
        protected override void LoadDefaultConfig()
        {
            Config.Clear();
            if (Class != null)
            {
                PythonEngine.Operations.SetMember(Class, "Config", new PythonDictionary());
            }
            CallHook("LoadDefaultConfig", null);
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Loads the config file for this plugin
        /// </summary>
        protected override void LoadConfig()
        {
            base.LoadConfig();
            if (Class != null)
            {
                PythonEngine.Operations.SetMember(Class, "Config", Utility.DictionaryFromConfig(Config, PythonEngine));
            }
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Saves the config file for this plugin
        /// </summary>
        protected override void SaveConfig()
        {
            if (Config == null) return;
            if (Class == null) return;
            if (!PythonEngine.Operations.ContainsMember(Class, "Config")) return;
            var configtable = PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<PythonDictionary>(Class, "Config");
            if (configtable != null)
            {
                Utility.SetConfigFromDictionary(Config, configtable);
            }
            base.SaveConfig();
        }

        #endregion

        /// <summary>
        /// Loads this plugin
        /// </summary>
        public void Load()
        {
            // Load the plugin
            string code = File.ReadAllText(Filename);
            Name = Path.GetFileNameWithoutExtension(Filename);
            Scope = PythonEngine.CreateScope();
            var source = PythonEngine.CreateScriptSourceFromString(code, Path.GetFileName(Filename), SourceCodeKind.Statements);
            var compiled = source.Compile();
            compiled.Execute(Scope);
            if (!Scope.ContainsVariable(Name)) throw new Exception("Plugin is missing main class");
            Class = PythonEngine.Operations.CreateInstance(Scope.GetVariable(Name));
            PythonEngine.Operations.SetMember(Class, "Name", Name);

            // Read plugin attributes
            if (!PythonEngine.Operations.ContainsMember(Class, "Title") || PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<string>(Class, "Title") == null) throw new Exception("Plugin is missing title");
            if (!PythonEngine.Operations.ContainsMember(Class, "Author") || PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<string>(Class, "Author") == null) throw new Exception("Plugin is missing author");
            if (!PythonEngine.Operations.ContainsMember(Class, "Version") || PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember(Class, "Version").GetType() != typeof(VersionNumber)) throw new Exception("Plugin is missing version");
            Title = PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<string>(Class, "Title");
            Author = PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<string>(Class, "Author");
            Version = PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<VersionNumber>(Class, "Version");
            if (PythonEngine.Operations.ContainsMember(Class, "Description")) Description = PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<string>(Class, "Description");
            if (PythonEngine.Operations.ContainsMember(Class, "ResourceId")) ResourceId = PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<int>(Class, "ResourceId");
            HasConfig = PythonEngine.Operations.ContainsMember(Class, "HasConfig") && PythonEngine.Operations.GetMember<bool>(Class, "HasConfig") || PythonEngine.Operations.ContainsMember(Class, "LoadDefaultConfig");

            // Set attributes
            PythonEngine.Operations.SetMember(Class, "Plugin", this);

            Globals = PythonEngine.Operations.GetMemberNames(Class);

            // Bind any base methods (we do it here because we don't want them to be hooked)
            BindBaseMethods();
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Binds base methods
        /// </summary>
        private void BindBaseMethods()
        {
            BindBaseMethod("SaveConfig", "SaveConfig");
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Binds the specified base method
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="methodname"></param>
        /// <param name="pyname"></param>
        private void BindBaseMethod(string methodname, string pyname)
        {
            MethodInfo method = GetType().GetMethod(methodname, BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.NonPublic);
            var typeArgs = method.GetParameters()
                    .Select(p => p.ParameterType)
                    .ToList();

            Type delegateType;
            if (method.ReturnType == typeof(void))
            {
                delegateType = Expression.GetActionType(typeArgs.ToArray());
            }
            else
            {
                typeArgs.Add(method.ReturnType);
                delegateType = Expression.GetFuncType(typeArgs.ToArray());
            }
            PythonEngine.Operations.SetMember(Class, pyname, Delegate.CreateDelegate(delegateType, this, method));
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Called when this plugin has been added to the specified manager
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="manager"></param>
        public override void HandleAddedToManager(PluginManager manager)
        {
            // Call base
            base.HandleAddedToManager(manager);

            // Subscribe all our hooks
            foreach (string key in Globals)
                Subscribe(key);

            // Add us to the watcher
            watcher.AddMapping(Name);

            // Let the plugin know that it's loading
            CallFunction("Init", null);
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Called when this plugin has been removed from the specified manager
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="manager"></param>
        public override void HandleRemovedFromManager(PluginManager manager)
        {
            // Let plugin know that it's unloading
            CallFunction("Unload", null);

            // Remove us from the watcher
            watcher.RemoveMapping(Name);

            // Call base
            base.HandleRemovedFromManager(manager);
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Called when it's time to call a hook
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="hookname"></param>
        /// <param name="args"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        protected override object OnCallHook(string hookname, object[] args)
        {
            // Call it
            return CallFunction(hookname, args);
        }

        /// <summary>
        /// Calls a lua function by the given name and returns the output
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="name"></param>
        /// <param name="args"></param>
        /// <returns></returns>
        private object CallFunction(string name, object[] args)
        {
            object func;
            if (!Globals.Contains(name) || !PythonEngine.Operations.TryGetMember(Class, name, out func) || !PythonEngine.Operations.IsCallable(func)) return null;
            return PythonEngine.Operations.InvokeMember(Class, name, args ?? new object[]{});
        }
    }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
<?php

namespace Illuminate\Broadcasting;

use Illuminate\Contracts\Events\Dispatcher;

class PendingBroadcast
{
    /**
     * The event dispatcher implementation.
     *
     * @var \Illuminate\Contracts\Events\Dispatcher
     */
    protected $events;

    /**
     * The event instance.
     *
     * @var mixed
     */
    protected $event;

    /**
     * Create a new pending broadcast instance.
     *
     * @param  \Illuminate\Contracts\Events\Dispatcher  $events
     * @param  mixed  $event
     * @return void
     */
    public function __construct(Dispatcher $events, $event)
    {
        $this->event = $event;
        $this->events = $events;
    }

    /**
     * Broadcast the event using a specific broadcaster.
     *
     * @param  string|null  $connection
     * @return $this
     */
    public function via($connection = null)
    {
        if (method_exists($this->event, 'broadcastVia')) {
            $this->event->broadcastVia($connection);
        }

        return $this;
    }

    /**
     * Broadcast the event to everyone except the current user.
     *
     * @return $this
     */
    public function toOthers()
    {
        if (method_exists($this->event, 'dontBroadcastToCurrentUser')) {
            $this->event->dontBroadcastToCurrentUser();
        }

        return $this;
    }

    /**
     * Handle the object's destruction.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function __destruct()
    {
        $this->events->dispatch($this->event);
    }
}


PEGATRON LITHIUM ION BACK UP BATTERY MODEL: PB013 FOR: MODEM/GATEWAY DPC3939 DPQ3925 DPQ3212 ONLY* 10.8V---2600mAh For CISCO and Motorola Modems UPTO 8 HOUR BACKUP BATTERY FOR CABLE MODEM FOR DPC3939 DPQ3925 DPQ3212 MODELS ONLY Battery requires 12-17 Hours Prior to use. Backup Battery only supports the Phone service in case of electrical outage. Battery Port on your Modem needs to be active by the activated on your modem by your service provider. MAKE SURE YOU PLUG THE MODEM DIRECTLY INTO ELECTRICAL SOCKET AS THE BATTERY MAY NOT CHARGE IF PLUGGED INTO APS OR POWER SURGE PROTECTORS OR SO ON.
Welcome to the exciting world of high-speed Internet service. Your new Cisco® Model DPC3825 DOCSIS® 3.0 or EPC3825 EuroDOCSISTM Wireless Residential Gateway is a cable modem that meets industry standards for high-speed data connectivity. The DPC3825 and EPC3825 residential gateway delivers data and wired (Ethernet) or wireless gateway capabilities to connect a variety of devices in the home or small office and support high-speed data access, all in one device. With a DPC3825 or EPC3825 residential gateway, your Internet enjoyment, home and business communications, and personal productivity will surely soar.
Size: 12.50in. x 9.30in. x 2.60in.
http://www.howtonetwork.com/courses/cisco/cisco-ccda/ - Video training course for the Cisco CCDA exam.
Want more Cisco Model similar ideas? Try to explore these searches: Wrought Iron Garden Planters, Lrg T-shirt Shorts, and Watchmakers Magnifier.


eTechnology consultants is a group of professional trainers and educators who work with businesses and educational institutions to develop technology and leadership skills to improve their organization's learning environments. We have more than twenty years experience working with schools and businesses providing a variety of trainings as well as software and hardware support for our clients. Our experience includes time spent as corporate and international trainers, K-12 school educators and adjunct faculty for colleges and universities.
We provide custom technology training for businesses and schools.


Recently it was prom weekend for Academy High School, and I had the absolute pleasure of photographing a young lady and her date.
When M's mom first contacted she mentioned M was a photographer and had youtube channel. I always get nervous photographing other photographers, but I knew it would be a fun shoot.
M had this incredible idea of doing prom pictures downtown Temple Texas, which is a location I love to shoot portraits. Downtown has so much architectural appeal with old buildings posing as great backdrops.
The weather was gorgeous but we had to battle a strong occasional wind, which I always worry about the hair during a session. I sent M's mom a text after I watched the weather to bring extra bobby pins and hair spray just in case.
I had so much fun with M and her date, L, can you feel the awesome energy from their shoot? Thank you SO MUCH to M for inviting me along!


text:
With Stop-Motion Short 'Sister,' Director Siqi Song Examines Psychological Toll Of China's One-Child Policy
'Pinocchio'-Inspired Live-Action Film Being Developed At Disney
Anita Busch
@DeadlineAnita
More Stories By Anita
Netflix Options YA Book 'The Impossible Fortress' for Jason Bateman's Aggregate Films And GoldDay
The Gotham Group Options 'Stay Up With Hugo Best' From Author Erin Somers
Lionsgate Jumpstarts Howard University Program To Bring More Diversity Into Hollywood
April 8, 2015 12:49pm
EXCLUSIVE: Yet another live-action version of a tried-and-true Disney fairy tale is wending its way to the big screen. Peter Hedges is penning a feature loosely based on the original Pinocchio story about a marionette carved from wood who dreams of becoming a real boy. Pinocchio gets his wish but is prone to stretching the truth, and each time he does, his nose grows longer.
The story is really about the relationship between a father and son, the ramifications of lying and creating stories and living in a fantasy world. Pinocchio came from the mind of author Carlo Collodi, who wrote the 1883 novel The Adventures Of Pinocchio.
This is not the only Pinocchio-inspired film in Hollywood. Guillermo del Toro also has a darker version of that story in development at his company. The Book Of Life producer is planning to co-direct that version from a script he co-wrote with Matthew Robbins. It would be a stop-motion animated 3D film. Foreign financiers are said to be circling that one.
Disney has been combing through its coffers of late, looking for live-action versions of popular fairy tales and has several on the horizon, including The Jungle Book, being directed by Iron Man and Iron Man 2 helmer Jon Favreau; Beauty And The Beast, which will star Emma Watson, Luke Evans and Josh Gad; and Dumbo, to be directed by Tim Burton; and Mulan. There has also been buzz about a live-action Winnie the Pooh-inspired tale in development. What a smart business plan by the powers that be at the studio led by Alan Horn.
Disney brought the animated version of the original Pinocchio story to the screen in 1940, and it has been remade several times both in toon and live-action versions, once with Mickey Rooney (1957). The story has come to life on the small and big screens in the U.S. and in overseas productions, the most memorable in recent years being Roberto Benigni's Pinocchio. Another loosely based version starred Verne Troyer as a killer puppet in a 1996 horror pic from Trimark called Pinocchio's Revenge.
'Cinderella' Is Having A Ball Worldwide With $400M Box Office
Hedges is repped by CAA and attorneys Marc Glick at Glick & Weintraub and Stephen Breimer at Bloom, Hergott.
Big Deals Film

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
by Charles Sasser on March 1, 2019 at 8:00 am
Arctic winds howled past the crude trappers' hut coated in ice and snow on the edge of the Arctic Ocean. Dog sledding with my friend from Baffin, an Inuit Eskimo named Alloloo, we sat up almost all night and laughed and swapped stories with a couple of other Eskimo trappers. By dawn, we were lifelong friends—and had for lunch fresh raw liver harvested from a seal at an air hole…
I have the fortunate ability to blend in wherever I go. I am of an international medium color, medium size, unprepossessing manner, willingness to share my life with others. And what a journey it has been…
In Vietnam, an entire rural village took me in for the night, fed me, arranged me a bed, told me stories while we all laughed…
I generally travel alone, which makes it easier to make friends. In the slums of Panama City where scraps of tin, plyboard, and canvas serve as family housing—like a warren of rats—I was taken in by a family to sleep in a huddle on the ground while we chatted through the night…
As I walked across Guatemala, I met an elderly woman who walked with me while we gossiped and she knitted. When we parted, she handed me a wonderful knitted miniature cup and saucer she had made for me to remember her by…
In South Korea, I had dog stew for dinner with my army counterpart Li Shik and the mayor of Inchon…
A piranha on the Amazon bit me. I traded two t-shirts to a villager for a blowgun. Some of the kids in the village let me play with their baby anteater…
I raced camels in Egypt, climbed Mt. Sinai, and lay down in the dark on a boulder to take a nap. I awoke just as a rather broad woman was about to sit on my face. I couldn't help shrieking. Startled, she almost jumped off the mountain before we both burst into laughter…
In Tanzania, Africa, Swahili friend Veda took me out to see elephants in the wild…
While solo-kayaking the inside passage to Alaska up Canada's coast, some Canadian trappers took me in for the night and fed me…
In Alaska, I helped an old friend from north of Fairbanks ride and herd a remuda of horses across Alaska to a moose hunting camp on the Yukon…
Algeria is an odd mixture of refugees, slaves and terrorists. In the middle of the Sahara Desert I met these lovely black girls who had been stolen in Nigeria and sold into slavery in Algeria…
I've sailed the Caribbean alone in a 17-foot sailboat, served in the U.S. Navy as a journalist, in the U.S. Army as a Green Beret soldier, as a police homicide detective, and as a professional kickboxer… I've taught high school and I've taught at university… I've gone to wars, flown airplanes as a pilot, eaten rattlesnakes in the desert, walked across Central America, ridden "chicken buses" all over Mexico…
I've lived life exactly the way I've wanted, thanks to God's blessing and watch over me.
Charles W. Sasser has published over 60 books; his latest is Crushing the Collective: The Last Chance for America to Remain Free and Self-Governing,. Available at book stores, and Amazon.com and Barnes&Noble.com. He is currently working on Looneyville USA.
Machines V Human Beings
Posted In: Growing Up, My life, What I Think
I entered a restaurant and took a table. What struck me was how quiet things seemed—until I realized that few diners were actually having conversations with each other. Their heads were lowered, faces expressionless, completely consumed in electronic devices ranging from iPhones to games. They more resembled robots, machines, rather than living human beings.
As a kid, I, my parents, my brothers, cousins, aunts, uncles—everyone—congregated at our grandparents' farmhouse where the "old folks" sat around outside underneath the stars and related stories and tales of their lives. Kids ran and played, chased fireflies, shouted and laughed. It's called interacting.
Contrast that to the modern era of machines and electronic devices.
A new scourge has taken root in society. An addiction to devices and machines that is destroying human potential in a variety of ways. An entire social world has been built around them, with a language of grunts and signs reminiscent of the Neanderthal period. U there dude? LOL. LMAO.
Machines have gone from servants to masters. Once people become dependent on them, they can never go back. Machines have revved up life's treadmill and made our days more anxious and agitated. The art of communication has been largely destroyed, along with the ability to concentrate. Reading, which requires concentration, for example, is leading to "the end of books." It's easier and faster, and requires less thought and concentration, to simply "google it."
Most millennials say they had rather text each other than actually talk face to face. An emoji, they say, is more meaningful than words. In days gone by and now buried by technological "progress," people like my family who lived in the mountains were far less lonely. We didn't even have a telephone.
Today, hooked on "devices" of one form or another, we hang distracted like flies on a web of technology. Studies reveal that the tech generation is the loneliest generation in history. The International Classification of Diseases has formally designated this obsession with devices as a psychological addiction that alters behavior and rewires neural pathways to mimic being hooked on drugs, alcohol or gambling.
As a result of constant exposure to tech and social media, an eighth-grader's risk for depression jumps 27 percent. "Devices" are blamed for a teen suicide rates in the U.S. that now eclipses the homicide rate. An Austrian designer invented a "substitute phone" to help frequent smartphone users cope with withdrawal symptoms by providing physical stimulation as a substitute for device usage—and perhaps return a sense of reality.
Two of the biggest tech figures in recent history—Bill Gates and Steve Job—seldom let their own kids play with the very products they helped create. That in itself should be a warning.
Not long ago, I did a two-hour interview with BBC-London on what lies ahead in technology: Spyware to keep constant track on every individual on the planet, robots with artificial human intelligence (AHI) that replicates the human mind, that can actually reason, think and feel, including self-awareness and the instincts of self-survival. People first become dependent on the machines they create. Then, they make machines that think and have the power to control their creators. This is no longer science fiction; it's a recipe for disaster.
Charles W. Sasser is a historian and author of over 60 books. His latest is CRUSHING THE COLLECTIVE: AMERICA'S LAST CHANCE TO REMAIN FREE AND SELF-GOVERNING. Available at book stores, and Amazon.com and Barnes&Noble.com.
The Baby Elephant
by Charles Sasser on January 14, 2019 at 4:27 pm
Posted In: Adventure, Growing Up, Liberal Myths, My life, Travels, What I Think
As a kid growing up in a shack in the mountains, and having read all the Tarzan books, I developed a growing fascination with Africa and elephants. I was constantly bringing home wild animal pets—crows, hawks, squirrels, raccoons, dove, opossums, skunks. . . But what I wanted more than anything was to add a baby elephant to the menagerie. Mom merely shook her head and sighed.
Finally, years later, I made it to Tanzania in equatorial Africa. A Swahili friend, Blessing Boy (that's his true name), took my son Darren and me out to find wild elephants. Seeing the mamas and their beautiful babies did it.
"I want to take a baby elephant back with me to my ranch in Oklahoma," I proposed.
Blessing Boy stared at me. I couldn't be serious. "How you get him there?"
I had a plan. "What I'll do," I explained Soto-voiced, "is dress it in a big loose Mumu, a bonnet, a purse, put lipstick and makeup on its face, buy a passenger's ticket, and tell Airport Security she's my wife."
Blessing Boy really stared at me now, speechless, unable to process the image. "You can't do that!" he finally exclaimed and burst out laughing.
"Sure I can. Americans have gotten so looney with political correctness that authorities won't dare object. If my wife identifies as an elephant, they won't dare be insensitive enough to challenge her."
I did, in fact, bring an elephant back to the U.S. The day I left Tanzania, Blessing Boy surprised me with a miniature elephant—carved out of wood.
Author/photographer/adventurer Charles W. Sasser has published over 60 books, thousands of magazine articles, and has traveled every continent on the globe except Antarctica. But that's next.
Many Lives, Many Worlds
by Charles Sasser on December 4, 2018 at 2:48 pm
I must have been a strange kid. Barefooted, patched jeans, growing up in three-room tin-roofed shacks in the woods. I was about six or seven years old when I informed my mother that I wasn't going to live just one life. I was going to live many lives and travel all over the world. Just like my heroes did in the adventure books I read.
I've done just that. During just my 74th year on God's wonderful earth, I climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro, the tallest peak in Africa; raced a bicycle 500 miles; parachuted out of airplanes as a member of the WWII Parachute Demonstration Team; won a Silver Medal in downhill slalom ski races in Colorado. . .
And then—cancer. And surgery that has put me on the sidelines for over two years. For a man of action and adventure, that is tantamount to a death sentence.
My wife Donna Sue is a good and wise woman. "You've done things in your life the vast majority of people in the world has never done and never will," she scolded. "Don't dwell on what you could do. Think about what you have done."
When my Mom first accepted that I was, well, different, she began keeping scrapbooks of my adventures and my careers as published author; U.S. Navy journalist; U.S. Army Green Beret; cop; combat correspondent; dinner theater actor; pilot; rodeo cowboy and rodeo clown; archaeologist. . . So far, I have ten scrapbooks, thick with photos, news clippings, and other memorabilia going all the way back to my birth in 1942—and then, thanks to relatives and Ancestry.com, one book back to 1640.
Donna Sue is right. When things get too bad and I start dreaming of canoeing the Congo River, of searching for ruins in Central America, of trekking Antarctica—adventures I can't do again until I heal—I take out my scrapbooks, and through them my life unfolds.
God has indeed been good to me. Allowed me to see and experience so much of this glorious world He created for us.
During my life, I've ridden Arabian horses to the Pyramids; encountered African elephants in the wild; raced camels across the Sinai; had lunch with peasants in Vietnam; kayaked the Inside Passage up the Pacific Coast; set a world's flight record as pilot of an ultralight aircraft; canoed across the Yukon Territory; rode horses through Alaska; dived for pirate treasure in the Caribbean; ran with the bulls in Spain; was bitten by a piranha on the Amazon River; explored Mayan ruins in the jungles; parachuted onto the Korean DMZ; won kickboxing fights; backpacked into some of the most remote regions on earth; hopped freight trains as a hobo; survived combat firefights; motorcycled Europe; traveled Israel; explored the Florida Everglades by canoe; solved murder cases as a police homicide detective; lived on a tiny sailboat in the Caribbean; trekked the Sahara Desert; dog-sledded the Arctic; published over 60 books; seen my sons and grandsons grow up…
I have indeed lived many lives and beheld many wonders, not the least of which are sunrises and sunsets all around the globe. I asked God in prayer that if I make it to Heaven, will He let me explore the universe and have adventures for the rest of eternity…
Charles W. Sasser is author of over 60 books, many of which are available at Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com, and at numerous bookstores.
"Uncles" Of Slavery
The mud huts of the African Sahara Desert. Camels, goats—and slaves. I had been recruited for security and as a translator to accompany a group of female Christian missionaries to the Saharawi refugee camps in Algeria. The Sahrawi speak Spanish from when their homeland, West Sahara, was a Spanish colony and before they were driven into desert exile by the Moroccan invasion.
But. . . SLAVES?
At a camp near Tindouf where Saharawi refugees have lived for over 30 years, I became friends with a local named Zorgon and with a young African woman I'll call Fatima, which is not her true name for reasons that will soon became apparent. From them, from my own observations, and from Nancy, one of the missionaries, I unraveled a shocking trail of slavery in the modern world that still engulfs many of the wretched of the earth.
I had noticed the presence of only a small number of black Africans in the Saharawi village. They lived in a group of hovels on the outskirts. Fatima and the other women came in every day to work in the Sahrawi tents and houses. They tended the goats and camels in pens outside the village.
Some men also labored in the village and were likewise kept isolated on the periphery of the camp. They were small men, old and worn-looking, faces expressionless against desert winds and blowing sand.
"This is where we keep the Moroccan prisoners of war," Zorgon explained. "They have been here since 1975. The desert with no bars provides the best prison in the world."
Slave masters, referred to as "uncles," often made the women work in Tindouf as prostitutes for Algerian soldiers. A black slave woman must have sex with her master—or anyone he designates—at any time he chooses.
Zorgon and most of the others did not own slaves. Governing bodies known as Palisario kept the refugee camps largely closed to the outside world, making crimes such as slavery difficult to identify.
During the previous two centuries, hundreds of thousands of captives were transported across the Sahara caravan routes to be sold as slaves in the northern cities and then into Europe and elsewhere. England and the rest of the West began outlawing the slave trade from the 1700s. Slavery, however, continued to be an integral part of the Maghreb culture in the region of North Africa that includes Morocco, Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Mauritania, and what is now Southern Morocco.
Although slavery has been criminalized in the region of the Maghreb as recently as 2007, slaves are still bought and sold. Anti-slavery International estimates approximately a half-million men, women and children from Mauritania alone are presently slaves.
A close relationship exists between slavery, human trafficking, and organized Islamic terrorism. Slaves are a source of income for terrorist cells. Victims are transported through borders as unreported persons. Young Sahrawi men are given as much as $300 cash to drive across the desert to Mauritania or Mali to pick up people and transport them to other destinations where they become slaves. Even Europe is part of this pipeline. Once a person gets into Europe as an illegal immigrant, he or she can be "remote controlled" to work for his or her owner like the slaves they really are.
A slave may be severely punished, even slain, for revealing his status to outsiders.
Fatima was a very pretty young woman, very dark of skin and with fine aquiline features.
"Are you a slave?" I asked her.
Tears appeared in her eyes and she nodded almost imperceptibly.
Charles W. Sasser is author of two recently published novels about terrorism in Africa, novelizations of the popular History Channel mini-series SIX: SIX: Blood Brothers; and SIX: END GAME. Available at Amazon.com; BarnesandNoble.com; and at most book stores.
The Witness (Conclusion)
A "star witness," Sammie Lintonberg, had come forward to accuse Harold, her ex-boyfriend, of being the serial murderer of three young women killed in Tulsa.
She was lying; I knew she was lying. The Police Chief and other staff members nonetheless decided to take all Sammie's statements to the DA and file murder charges against Harold. I went to the homicide sergeant.
"Don't you see?" I said. "They've led her through her statements like a dog on a leash. I want you to go to the DA and tell him this is the wrong man. I want the right killer, the guilty one."
"I can't do that."
I stalked out of the bullpen. "What are you going to do, Sasser?" he called after me.
"Find the right killer."
I radioed my partner McCracken to witness what I had to do. Sammie was a mental case. In questioning her, I would prove conclusively that an interrogator could make her say anything he wanted her to say. False witnesses with their own agendas are not that unusual in criminal cases.
McCracken and I took her to Riverside Park near the bicycle/jogger path where Suzanne Oakley's mutilated body had been found.
"Where were you when this all started?" I asked her.
"You don't believe me," she whined. "You think I'm a liar."
"Show me!"
She flinched. After a moment of blank staring, she led the way off the trail to a spot near the trees.
"Now, point to where Harold attacked the girl."
She pointed. The bicycle path was eighty feet away.
"You were right here and heard him. What was it he said to her?"
"He asked her for a light, and then he asked her if she wanted to smoke some pot."
"Stay here."
McCracken and I stood on the path within Sammie's view.
"She's a fat, sloppy, dirty, smelly, lying pig," I said in a louder than normal voice. I smiled and waved at Sammie.
"You heard me, right? What did I say?"
"You asked if he had a light," she called back. "Then you said, like, 'Do you want to smoke some pot?'"
I looked at McCracken. "This is just the beginning," I promised, and for the next half-hour I led Sammie through her paces.
"Did you see Harold stab Suzanne?"
"No, man, no."
"Sammie, you don't have to be embarrassed. You can tell the truth. You saw him stab her (in the genitals), didn't you?"
"I was scared, man. Like I tried not to look. . . I seen him stab that girl. He stabbed her in the (genitals)."
Suzanne's wounds were in the throat and left breast.
"Get it all out, Sammie. How many times did he stab her? Tell the truth."
"Like, I seen him stab her three times."
"Was that when you ran away?"
"Man, I was scared."
"But then you came back to see?"
"He had a spell on me."
"Sammie, tell the truth. You never even left, did you?"
She hung her head.
"Why did you lie about Wes being there with you?"
"I thought you'd see I was telling the truth about Harold if somebody else was there too."
I kept at her, giving her no relief, leading her wherever I wanted.
"Where did he get the knife?"
"He had it in one of those canes with a knife in it."
"Did he stab her before or after he (raped her anally)."
"That was before. He had gun, man, and, like, he held it on me while he (raped) her."
He hadn't raped her at all.
"Sammie, Harold made love to you first, didn't he?"
Tears appeared. "I wasn't going to tell you about that."
"Isn't it also true that you had sex with him after he killed Suzanne, not before?"
"He wanted (oral), but I wouldn't do it."
I gave McCracken a grim look. I coached Sammie into changing her story several more times before I let up. Finally, McCracken stopped me.
"You've made your point," he said.
No charges were filed against Harold. Sammie was charged with making a false police crime report.
Twenty-eight years later, DNA, a technique not available previously, led to the arrest and conviction of Clyde Carl Wilkerson, a long-distance truck driver from California, for murdering Geraldine Martin, one of my three victims. He was suspected of, or convicted of, killing a number of other young women across the nation in his travels. He remains the primary suspect in the homicides of Suzanne Oakley and Marie Rosenbaum.
Charles W. Sasser is the author of Homicide!, the grim autobiography of a police homicide detective.
The Witness (Part II)
I was the Tulsa Police homicide detective assigned the investigation of three young women—Geraldine Martin, Marie Rosenbaum, Suzanne Oakley–who were murdered one by one three months apart in a MO (modus operandi) that suggested the work of a serial killer.
A witness came forward. Sammie Lintonberg stated that her boyfriend Harold had confessed the homicides to her. My partner McCracken and I ran Harold down and interrogated him for two days. Harold was a pervert, but I was convinced he was innocent. I released him. (See Part I previously)
"Sammie Lintonberg has no reason to lie on him," McCracken objected.
Another detective, "Doc" Roberts, and I had given a title to women like Sammie who came out of the woodwork in high profile cases to reap the notoriety of "star witnesses." We called it the "Fat and Ugly Girl Syndrome." Women do and will lie.
Every week or so after that, the homicide sergeant tossed another police report at me as Sammie pursued her crusade for attention.
Sammie Lintonberg stated she could produce the murder weapon in the Marie Rosenbaum murder case.. (She) had even helped him get Rosenbaum's body over a fence because he couldn't do it himself due to his small size… She said she had seen Harold slice the body completely down the back with a knife…
Reporting officer was approached at the YMCA by Sammie Lintonberg, who stated that the reason Miss Oakley was killed was that she was a sacrifice and that Harold was the perpetrator of the crime…
Sammie stated she could take officer to a location where a knife had been stashed by Harold which he had used to inflict mortal wounds on a 16-year-old runaway by the name of Marie. Sammie stated that Harold had committed the homicide sometime during August in basically the same area where Suzanne Oakley was killed.
Officer proceeded to a location where she pointed out a spot where the knife was buried. There was nothing found at this time…
McCracken, the homicide sergeant, even the Police Chief started to think Sammie might really be on to something. Things came to a head when the Police Chief received a long letter from Sammie in which she claimed to have been present when Harold murdered Suzanne Oakley.
Met Harold at Keith's Bar. We took five hits of speed. We walk down the path in River Park and sat down by those trees. We started talking off the walls. We saw her coming. He jump up and said, "Here is your chance to see all the blood you want."
There was another person with us that we met on the bridge. I think his name was Wes. Harold went up to her and asked her for a match. He ask her if she would like to smoke a joint. She said, "No." He hit her in the mouth and threw her on the ground and drag her by the hair down to where me and Wes was. She was screaming and crying. I got scared and tried to run up the hill. Wes grab hold of me and held me on the ground.
Harold held her down while Wes held me down. They took off their belts and tied me to a tree and told me I better keep my mouth shut and my eyes open. I tried to get away. Harold started to beat her with his cane and Wes was laughing. . But I got the belts loose and run…
"She's lying through her teeth," I assured McCracken. "Harold needs to be behind bars—but not for something he didn't do."
"Sasser, just because they call you Colombo doesn't mean you're always right."
A command decision was made behind my back to take an official statement from Sammie and go to the District Attorney to file murder charges on Harold.
(To be concluded in Part III)
Charles W. Sasser is author of HOMICIDE!, his grim autobiography of life as a homicide detective.
The Witness: Women Don't Lie (Part I)
Three young women were murdered three months apart that year by a serial killer. At some point each year near the anniversary of the death of one of the girls, the Tulsa Tribune (Oklahoma) featured an update:
Chuck Sasser, Tulsa homicide detective, has been assigned to solve the Martin-Rosenbaum-Oakley cases. He has interviewed more than 1,500 persons, and jailed briefly 30 for questioning… He spends most of his time interviewing people with strange quirks and bizarre sexual habits…
It haunted me that this psychopath who raped and mutilated young women was still lurking somewhere out there because I wasn't smart enough or lucky enough to catch him.
A potential witness surfaced. In spite of political correctness saying otherwise, women will lie on men.
Sammie Lintonberg produced a new suspect—Harold.
"Harold is really weird," she offered. "He burns candles, sits in trees, puts spell on people in the moonlight. He goes to Satan conventions and tells everybody he's a warlock."
I stared at her.
"Well, he does. He tried to strangle me once. We was, like, drinking and smoking pot, and went to bed. We had sex, and Harold wanted (oral). But I wouldn't do it. Like, we was laying there and he got on top of me and started strangling me. He said he knew what I was thinking, that he was the one who killed them girls."
"That doesn't mean he killed the girls," I pointed out.
"He told me he did it. Do you remember when the jogger was killed in the park? I seen Harold after that, and he had scratches on both arms. He said, like, he'd better watch out or the police would think he was that guy went around murdering girls. Later on, like, we drove off the road in Sandy Park by the river and got stuck. We was sitting there listening to music and a weird song came on. Harold said, 'I have something I want to confess to you. I murdered those girls. Don't you never tell nobody or I'll murder you too.'"
My partner McCracken was ready to go to the district attorney with it.
McCracken and I ran down Harold denned up in a dilapidated rooming house where he lived on welfare and food stamps. Government takes care of its "victims of society." At 35-years-old and barely five feet tall, Harold was an evil dwarf who continuously emitted a slithering, sniggering sound that was not quite a laugh. His police rap sheet included at least 30 sex-crime arrests.
"I ain't no killer," he protested. "I'm just a sex freak."
He provided an example: "Sandra (a girl with whom he once lived) is a short, dumpy little broad with a face like an ugly baby. She introduced me to sadomasochism. She liked to get beat with a belt, so I kept her all bruised. I started trying to get rid of her. Who wants to make love to a chick that's all battered up? I don't mean I was going to kill her. One day I came home and she'd left a note saying she was going to Houston with a big dude with a big belt. I was glad she left.
"Sammie and that friend of hers are really weird. One night they drove me out to Kip's Big Burger. They were smoking pot and drinking and hollering out at police cars. After I ate, I made an excuse to go to the bathroom. I climbed out the bathroom widow and left them there. They couldn't tell the truth if their fat butts depended on it."
Harold was guilty of all kinds of misdemeanors and felonies. But, "I ain't never kilt nobody," he continued to deny after two days of interrogation. "You ain't gonna believe me, are you? I didn't do it, but you got your mind made up."
Everything about him revolted me. If perversion could be personified, it would look like Harold. He was a pervert—but I was convinced he wasn't my killer.
The homicide sergeant looked concerned. "I'm catching heat from the brass, Colombo."
That was the PD's name for me; Governor David Boren once called me "perhaps the best homicide detective in the nation."
"How can you be so sure Harold didn't do it?" the sergeant pursued. "The DA would file on him now. Let a jury make the decision."
"His girlfriend is wacky, and she's lying," I said. "I want the right suspect."
Harold and Sammie would soon resurface.
Charles W. Sasser is author of Homicide, his grim autobiography of life as a homicide detective.
Me and Pa
Posted In: Growing Up, My life
He might have been a character from Grapes of Wrath. All angles in a pair of dirty bib overalls worn pale and thin from Gran'ma's scrubbing them in a tub on a rubboard out by the well. Face weather-worn darker than his field work shoes, seamed and cracked, not a smile left in it.
I never hear my Gran'pa laugh. Never. But I still hear his voice coming from the "Lower Forty" as he drives Ol' Jude the brown mule up and down endless rows of corn, this survivor of hard times and the Great Depression, as weathered as Drake's Prairie near Sallisaw in eastern Oklahoma where John Steinbeck began his classic novel.
"G** D*** you, Jude! When I says 'haw' I means 'haw!'"
Gran'ma—we call her "Ma; Gran'pa is "Pa"—Ma sends me to the field with a quart canning jar of cool water from the well. It'll be warm by the time Pa drinks it. He never complains.
I'm six years old. Pa has never put his arms around me, but everybody says I'm the only living creature other than Jude and Buster the dog that Pa has ever loved. None of Pa's numerous grown offspring or any of the other grandkids dare go near the beehives to rob them of honey. I can take all the honey from them I want. Pa just looks the other way.
I know he likes me 'cause one time he brought me a present—a fly swat to assassinate house flies that swarm in from the barnyard whenever someone opens the house door.
By the end of that year when I am six, I learn to plow ol' Jude while Pa works Jack or Bess. There we go in the hot sun, up and down the rows, Pa occasionally shouting curses back at ol' Jude. He never cusses any of the other livestock. Just Jude because Jude has floppy ears and passes gas, looks like a rusty barrel on stilts, and has a personality every bit as nasty as Pa's.
When the sun starts going down, Pa lifts me to ol' Jude's back to ride home. I am nodding off by the time we reach the barn.
Did I tell you that Pa is a drunk? Home brew corn when he can get it, beer when he has a few nickels left over.
Old Man Marble's country store and bar is about four miles away down by the highway. We walk there together, Pa and me. Ma often sends me with him to make sure he gets home.
One day there is an altercation in the bar. Old Man Marble whips out a slap jack and whacks the head of a farmer named Stu because Stu accuses Marble of messing around with his wife.
I bolt out the back door and am burning the road home when Pa, now in his 70s, flies right past me, kicking up dust like a whirlwind.
Another time, Ma dispatches Pa to get a sack of flour. He's gone about all day. Ma sends me to get him. We meet on the road where he's staggering home. He has snagged the 25-pound sack of flour on something. Dusted with flour, he looks like a ghost. He still clutches a handful of flour left in the sack. I burst out laughing.
"Boy!" He always calls me 'Boy.'" "Boy, what's so G** D*** funny?"
I love that old drunk. I never hug him either, but I love him. I see him cry once, a single tear down his thorny cheek when I enlist in the military and leave home. Ma has died by then after they sell the farm and move to Sallisaw.
Pa is now in his 90s. I am still away when his 36-year-old girlfriend's ex-boyfriend murders him, beats him to death in his own house. My Mom orders me not to come home for the funeral because she is afraid I will hunt down Pa's killer.
Charles W. Sasser is the author of over 60 books and novels available in bookstores, Amazon.com, and BarnesandNoble.com.
Into the Wilds
by Charles Sasser on August 9, 2018 at 8:08 pm
Full night never fully descends in June upon Canada's Far North Yukon Territory. I set off alone to canoe from Quiet Lake near Whitehorse, down the Little Salmon River to the Big Salmon, and then on to the mighty Yukon that flows across Alaska to the sea. In former lives I might have been a Swahili warrior in Africa, a Bedouin on the Sahara, an Eskimo in the Arctic, a Cheyenne brave on the Great Plains… I have traveled by dogsled, horse, ox cart, boat, donkey, camel, on foot, or on bicycle into some of the most remote deserts, mountains, seas, and forests on the planet.
I never feel alone. The Wild Kingdom is well populated.
From Quiet Lake, I plummeted down white water rapids in a narrows on the Little Salmon and surprised a cow moose with her head lowered to drink. I passed almost underneath her nose. I could have touched her with my paddle. Calmly, she watched me, her head following my progress until I rounded the bend out of sight.
A large black boar bear was harvesting grubs from beneath a decayed log on the river bank. I nosed my canoe ashore not ten feet away.
"Br'r Bear, do you mind if I take your picture?"
He didn't. I think he smiled for his portrait, but I couldn't be sure.
Young bears are curious animals. Whenever I pitched my tent to sleep, they came to pay their respects. Finally, in order to sleep at all, I repaid their curiosity by shouting and throwing rocks at them to drive them away.
During one of my hikes off the river to explore, I met a porcupine on a narrow game trail. They are near-sighted creatures. I froze motionless until he was only a couple of feet away.
He sprang straight into the air and, with surprising speed and agility, scaled a tree and peered down from a limb to locate the source of his discomfiture. I laughed and moved on.
The Yukon is a mighty river hugged by evergreen forests and snow-capped mountains. On one of the islands I startled a cow moose and her newborn. Mom growled a warning and I politely backed off.
During a sudden storm, I found myself trapped on a one-acre island with a grizzly. The griz took one end of the island, I took the other, and in this manner we rode out the tempest together.
A few afternoons later with the sun bobbing low and red above the western horizon, I pitched camp on a small sandy island overshadowed on the shore by a towering precipice. Suddenly, a pack of timber wolves silhouetted against the late sun began serenading me from the top of the precipice.
I relaxed and stretched out on my back next to the fire to enjoy a concert orchestrated by God's creatures. Life is always good in the wilds.
Charles W. Sasser is author of more than 60 books and thousands of magazine articles in national magazines. He has traveled to every continent on earth except Anarctica.


The 120V 107341QLP Silhouette/Series V 57.5 x 92" Motorized Screen with Low Voltage Controller, Plug & Play, and Quiet Motor from Draper supports wall or ceiling installation and features a tab-tensioning system. The sleek, curved aluminum case and endcaps are finished in white. The screen and dowel retract completely inside the case.
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She-Knits: #75 So what would you be doing if you weren't knitting and mystery thoughts and kits.
#75 So what would you be doing if you weren't knitting and mystery thoughts and kits.
How do you find community? Were/are you lonely when your kids were little. Do you use the internet to build community especially within your knitting world. I also give up more Mystery KAL information.


An area near the peak of Mount Kurodake in central Hokkaido is covered with the first snow of the season in the early morning of Aug. 17, the earliest snowfall recorded since 1974.
Mount Kurodake in the town of Kamikawa in the northernmost prefecture of Hokkaido had its first snow of the season on Aug. 17, the earliest snowfall observed there since records began being kept in 1974.
The snow near the peak of the 1,984-meter-high mountain among the Daisetsuzan Volcanic Group was more than a month earlier than last year's, which fell on Sept. 28.
The previous earliest snowfall date on record was Aug. 21, 2002. The average date is Sept. 18.
The snow was reported by Rinyu Kanko Co., a Sapporo-based firm that operates a ropeway on the mountain. According to the company, the manager of an evacuation cabin about 700 meters from the peak noticed the falling snow at around 1 a.m. on Aug. 17, and areas surrounding the structure were thinly covered in white by early morning.
According to the Japan Meteorological Agency's Sapporo Regional Headquarters, a mass of chilly air swept over Hokkaido following the passage of a low pressure system. The lowest temperature in Sapporo in the early hours of Aug. 17 was 13.4 degrees Celsius, 5.7 degrees lower than the average for this time of year, and about the same as the mid-September average.


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Katrin Sohns, head of the Program Department of Goethe-Institut Indonesia, in conversation with Ery Mefri.
Eri Mefri on his ensemble Nan Jombang Dance
When did you start this dance troupe? Perhaps you could tell us a bit more about it?
Nan Jombang was established on November 1,1983. However, I first became acquainted with art when I was three years old because my father was a dancer and my mother was a gold thread weaver. My father practiced dancing twice a week, and I always went along to watch him dance. My father also played musical instruments during the practice sessions with other dancers. At night, as I fell asleep in my mother's lap while she was weaving, I would hear the drums. This made me aware of the arts of West Sumatra, where they have the saying: Seeing and observing is better that trying to learn something on one's own. Perhaps that saying has influenced me. When I finished junior high school, I entered the art school in Padang Panjang, Middle School for the Performing Arts (Sekolah Menengah Karawitan Indonesia, SMKI). After graduating from SMKI, I moved to Padang, where I worked at the Taman Budaya Padang Cultural Center.
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What kind of work was that?
I was in the dance division. I was assigned to manage the dance program for the the Cultural Center in 1982. On November 1, 1983, I established the group I called Nan Jombang. People were in the habit of calling my father "Jombang", "Nan Jombang". Nan meaning best and Jombang meaning a bit mischievous but charismatic and likable.
It was my choice to become a choreographer and a dancer, even though my relatives in my village did not approve. I wanted to be a dancer and choreographer no matter what the risk, and I knew I would not regret that. Years passed before we had much of a chance to perform. By 1988, with no offers of gigs except maybe occasionally in and around West Sumatra, I decided that if nobody, not even the government, was going to give us a chance, that I would just have to create an opportunity myself. So, in 1988, I set up a festival called the Sumatra Dance Arena. I did the fundraising myself. The first funds came from taking an advance on my salary as a civil servant. That was the initial capital for the festival. I held the festival every two years. Then people in Jakarta, Solo, and Jogja heard about it and invited me to perform in their cities and in the Indonesian Dance Festival in Jakarta, which was initially known as Indonesia Choreography Week. By 2001, I simply could not keep putting on the Sumatra Dance Arena festival because it was driving me deeper and deeper into debt. What a disaster that was, especially for my family. Then, in 2004, an invitation came from the Indonesian Performance Art Market (IPAM) in Bali. There, I performed my choreographic work titled Sarikaik Pangka Sangketo, a phrase which means encounters and relationships that result in partings and estrangement that lead to conflict. After 21 years of struggle, Bali was just the place for Nan Jombang; everything started there. In 2004, we met Andrew, the director of Brisbane Powerhouse. Andrew's first gift to us came in 2005 when he said, "You and Angga go to Brisbane to watch performances and look around". We spent 15 days at the Queensland Music Festival, watching various performances together.
Then Andrew came to visit just to see what my living situation was like. Back then, I was renting a house. I did not have this place yet. Andrew came to our wreck of a house and slept over. Then, in 2007, Andrew took one of my choreographic pieces to Brisbane, Australia. Then in 2009, we were invited to IPAM again, this time in Solo. It was there that blessings began to shower down upon us. We performed Rantau Berbisik there to a tremendous response. Extraordinary! It drew standing ovations, and producers and buyers even showed up to talk to us in the back stage dressing room. There, we got contracts to perform at the Theater der Welt Festival in Essen, Germany, at the Berlin Festival, the Asian Pacific - all in Germany, as well as at Esplanade.
What year was that?
Esplanade was in 2009. We went to Essen in 2010. We also toured Australia; Brisbane, Cairns, Adelaide, and Darwin. Also in 2010, we got offers from Japan and Korea. With the funds from these performances, we bought land and built this place.
Then, on June 18, 2011, the American embassy called to invite us to participate in the Center State program in which we got to visit four cities in America: Los Angeles, Washington, New York City, on Broadway, and then to Rhode Island. In 2012, we went on a long tour with our newest creation Tarian Malam (Night Dance). This performance was produced by; Esplanade Singapore, Darwin Festival, and Brisbane Powerhouse.
Exploring the boundaries of music and dance, would you say that the background of music and dance is the same?
I am a choreographer, but I also dance and play music. We do not have a composer, so I guess I am both the choreographer and composer for Nan Jombang. I had the basics of dance and music from SMKI, along with all that I had learned from my father. I had mastered all of the dance and artistic traditions my father had passed on to me, including the music. I did not want anyone else composing the music for my dance pieces. This is because I felt that, yeah, maybe someone might be able to interpret it all correctly, but it would make me cry, really break my heart if what I was trying to convey failed to communicate to others. It is like when I feel pain, and I need to scream from it, it makes no sense to ask someone else to scream for me, that would make no difference. So I create the music for my choreographic dance pieces. I have learned a lot about composing from my friends who are senior musicians here in Indonesia. I also keep in mind what Rizaldly Siagian, an expert musician from North Sumatra once told me. In1989, I visited his place and asked him, "Bang Rizal Siagian, what kind of music is good for dance?" He answered with just one sentence, "The best dance music is music that is not heard." I put that away for contemplation in 1989, and it was not until 2000 that I began to understand it. So, in 2000, I gave up entirely on using music for my choreographic pieces. My dancers became my musicians and my thespians. They not only had to dance, they also had to make music, and create theater through the choreography. Now, I would call the result of this neither dance nor theater nor musical theater. The result is simply performance. I am focusing on creating an art production, an art performance. All of this originating from that single sentence from Rizaldly Siagian, "The best dance music is music that is not heard." So no matter how hard a drum was beaten, it simply would not be heard over the visuals conveyed by the dance. That was the inspiration; the thing that helped.
Do you wish for Nan Jombang to continue to be a family tradition?
I most certainly do. It must. It must become a family tradition and a tradition among the public, in society. I have imbued all of my children with this as a family tradition. I got art from my father and my mother, they handed it down to me, and now I am passing it on to all of my children. And when they have children, it must be passed down to them. We never expected to make an enterprise like this from artistic endeavors, yet the results of dance have enabled us to buy land, to build a home, which just means that the Almighty has blessed through this very thing.
Did the 2009 earthquake in Padang affect your work?
Yes, indeed. That earthquake enraged me. The western edge of Sumatra - Aceh, Padang, Bengkulu - were devastated by that earthquake. The people wept, the people screamed. And I was enraged, I also screamed. However, I screamed through my work, Tarian Malam. I could not help anyone, but maybe, with this work, the world would help me to help; to help Padang, to help Japan, which gets hit by these tremors all the time. I often communicate with friends in Japan. When Hiromi, Japan, experienced an earthquake, also in Padang and Aceh the earth was shaking. I couldn't help but to indulge in introspection about what was happening. And I feel that it is our fault. We have damaged the beauty of nature, and perhaps this has angered God. And we have to do something to fix ourselves. And I was angry at myself, and at the populace who did not nurture nature properly. Nature is the creation of God and people must preserve and conserve and protect it, just like we would take care of ourselves. But we, as human beings, are always damaging nature, and perhaps this has angered God.
We have spoken of your success internationally; how have these travels or tours affected your work?
Travel does affect my work because I can see the worlds of dance, music, and theater better. I saw that all across the world my artist colleagues are successful with their choreography, theater and music. The conclusion I have drawn from all of that is: In this world, the culture of any given nation is proprietary to that nation alone, but is the property of all nations, all peoples. The Indonesian culture belongs to other countries. America's culture belongs to Indonesia. The people of Indonesia also possess the culture of Germany, and the Germans own our culture as well. The greatest wealth is art and culture because art and culture unify humankind. Money and politics cannot do that, but art and culture can. During my journeys, I spoke with many people who became my friends, and I told them, "The culture of Indonesia is your culture, not just my culture. And the culture here too is my culture because culture is the thing that connects our consciences, that links us in the core of our humanity; culture is what unites us, not weapons, not bullets, not political dialogues. Cultural dialogues and talking about art is what brings us together and unites us." As artists, we see the disastrous condition this world is in now; it is in chaos. We weep and we weep, always. This evening my friends have been weeping about Egypt. But does the government, or any government, weep? Yet, we, the artists, always weep. Egypt, Yemen and Libya make us weep. How can it be that culture and art cannot unite them over there in some way? After all, art and culture are extraordinary in that they can unite us all.
And just one more question. What do you hope for, looking forward?
Not very much. I do not have major expectations. We will always keep creating, we will always be involved in the artistic process somehow. However, our place, our presence in Padang, our presence in this place, will hopefully benefit performance art around the world. I hope that our birth into this world will have a meaning and be of benefit to many others. We expand our energy and thinking into this world through art. So, we will continue to work no matter what happens and anywhere we may be, for whoever may need us; we will come no matter the risk, if it is for art.
Special Feature: Padang (Impressions)
Special Feature: Padang
Nick Power
Daniel Kok
Faith Tan
Virve Sutinen
Shaun Parker
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