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The Legend of Lone Pine

Submitted by FM FM_Eric_Schiller on Tue, 06/09/2009 at 6:20pm.

Grandmaster Chess: The book of the Louis B. Statham Lone Pine Masters-plus Tournament 1975
By GM Isaac Kashdan and the Staff of California Chess Reporter (Jude Acers, Robert Burger, Dennis Fritzinger, Guthrie McClain)
Ishi Press 2009 (ISBN:978-0-923891-05-3. $25.95
316 pages, photos, softcover. Descriptive notation.


Ishi Press has added a valuable book to their series of scanned reprints. The book of the 1975 Lone Pine Masters is a gem.  One of the most famous events in American chess is presented with insights from the players, often giving a window into the opening theory of the time. Of course the light notes have not been computer-checked and opening research is shallow, but that was life in the 1970s.
Sam Sloan has provided a useful introduction, though unfortunately no modern indexing. If you want to find a particular game, be prepared to hunt! There are interesting analytical articles that add to the pleasure and usefulness of the book.
The major drawback is that the annotated games are in descriptive language, unfamiliar to most chessplayers. The games are given  in bare form in PGN at the end of the book. It would have been better to omit those pages and lower the cost. Cumbersome PGN headers should have been edited out. It is not as though readers will scan in the games, as they can be downloaded. Instead, the publisher should have put them on a webpage or given a link to a public source. With the game onscreen, the descriptive notation would not be such a problem.


The scan does a good job on text, but diagrams suffer. Still, it is readable. Highly recommended to lovers of exciting chess.


Below I present one of the best games of the event.

» posted in Amazing Games
 

Comments:

by Captain-Morgan - 4 months ago
United States
Member Since: Aug 2010
Member Points: 2

I've got this book; the pages are kind of yellow, but it's not a "re-scan", so I think I'll not buy the new one. =)

 

Nice to see some talk of it on the internet!

by Blunderprone - 2 years ago
Greater Boston Area United States
Member Since: Apr 2008
Member Points: 804

Hi Eric,

On My blog I've been doing a tour of famous tournaments. I recently wrapped up Zurich 1953. I am currently looking at my next series to be on Lone Pine International 1975. Would you be open to the idea of loaning me the book for this project?

by sryiwannadraw - 2 years ago
Southern Coast United States
Member Since: Mar 2009
Member Points: 453

That is badazz

by victorcharles - 2 years ago
United States
Member Since: Sep 2008
Member Points: 31

i get the bishop/knight mixed up often

by Mikhail-Tal - 2 years ago
Latvia
Member Since: Apr 2009
Member Points: 98

me too, these peices cause headhache!

by qixel - 2 years ago
California United States
Member Since: May 2009
Member Points: 2197

I would like to see this book, just for the photos if nothing else.

You often hear about Lone Pine, yet I have only seen a few photos and those are usually of poor quality.

Considering that the tournament was sponsered by Statham, a millionaire and former owner of the Playboy Mansion in Holmby Hills, Los Angeles, I expected the tournament to be played in lush surroundings.  Instead, in the photos you see a plain brick interior with cheap folding tables and hand-lettered signs.  Not what I pictured at all.

Amy

by Mehdipiero - 2 years ago
Dubai, UAE Iraq
Member Since: Sep 2008
Member Points: 3152

"that horse is definately smiling" 

lol

by Abbey_Road - 2 years ago
Canada
Member Since: Oct 2008
Member Points: 17

nice game

by bluesol25 - 2 years ago
berkeley United States
Member Since: Oct 2008
Member Points: 10

that horse is definately smiling

by bluesol25 - 2 years ago
berkeley United States
Member Since: Oct 2008
Member Points: 10

i cant take these pieces seriously

 

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