Hall of Fame #37: Harry Pillsbury
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[A note for my new readers: I believe it is useful to read the full introduction your first time. Cheers!]
This blog is a celebration that leverages an outstanding concept of GMs Nielsen and Gustafsson (both of whom are also popular chessable.com authors) but offers my unique take. The two GMs produced videos and multiple lessons regarding their top 50 chess players of all time. Although I provide a link to their work below, my focus is different, though I freely accept their rankings.
How does my work differ? Well, first off, I'm not a titled player. Second, I wrote brief biographies for each player and offer limited discussion and pictures of some of their works (if they wrote). Third, if they were eminently quotable, I'll throw in a few of those! I may have found occasion to add quotes from other famous (or even unknown) chess names regarding the Hall of Famer. Fourth, I'll toss in the occasional caricature😏.
Fifth, and most difficult, I will include at least two games analyzed by the individual, if such games exist. After all, the greatest of the great should be able to explain what they were thinking during a game, shouldn't they? (Spoiler alert: perhaps, except when there is no evidence that they ever had analyses published. Also, many of them analyzed games, but the ones available to me only offer some alternative lines, with symbolic indications but no textual explanations.)
Plus, I attempt to provide links to other relevant materials regarding these grandmasters of the game.
We've reached #37, Harry Nelson Pillsbury!
In 1892, he beat World CC Steinitz in a 3-game match…but while receiving odds of a pawn. His greatest victory was toppling the rest of the field to claim victory in the 1895 Hastings chess tournament. By doing so, he finished ahead of Emanuel Lasker, Steinitz, Chigorin, Gunsberg, Tarrasch, Schlechter, and Janowski. He won the US CC in 1897 and retained the title until he died in 1906.
Here's a table of his performance against some of the top grandmasters of his era. His total statistics tilt towards the results in his matches against Jackson Showalter, simply because the large number of games they played compared to Pillsbury's encounters with others of his peers. Still, the only person against whom he had a negative lifetime score was Blackburne.
Pillsbury did not write any books that I'm aware of, though I did easily find several books about him. However, he occasionally wrote articles for newspapers or periodicals. You'll see a few samples below, so I won't reproduce those here.
American Chess Magazine, August 1899, page 75. Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
While Pillsbury may not have penned any books, he had some things to say!
There is nothing nobler or more intellectual in sport than chess. It calls out qualities of character – of the heart as well as the head. New York Tribune, 29 September 1895, p.15 Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
I might say with Byron, without being considered egotistic, “I awoke one morning and found myself famous”. I had become a chessplayer of the first rank. I did not become so through design. Fame was thrust upon me. Then I had to study and work hard to keep up the reputation I had won. St Louis Post-Dispatch, 1 January 1899, p. 17 Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
Before entering a tournament, I make it a point to take a good, long sleep, but that is my only form of preparation. Ibid
Chigorin plays a fine, dashing game. He is still unable to speak more than a dozen words of English. Owing to his splendid physique I hold him to be the strongest member of the Hastings team. - Regarding Hastings 1895, p. 6 of the New York Times, 29 September 1895. Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter (Even now, that's funny. Probably a dad joke though.)
I think physical training a good thing for a chess player before entering a tournament. Ibid
There is nothing nobler or more intellectual in sport than chess. It calls out qualities of character – of the heart as well as the head. I have often wondered why chess is not taught in the schools. It brings about concentration of thought upon a given subject as no other study I know of. New York Tribune, 29 September 1895, p. 15, Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
Besides the quality which we have, for want of a better name, called concentration, there are others that are essential to the good chessplayer. One of these is patience, or ability to wait. We have players who are known as plungers, who see an opening and drive ahead into it without studying out all that it leads to. Such men can never become good players. The chessmaster must have full control of himself at all times. He must not be impatient, he must be content to mark time, as it were, till he sees the result of his opponent’s attack, and he must be able to resort to meaningless moves to kill time if there is no other way of holding fast to the fortified position till the danger is over. Not all men can do this. They want to rush out and attack, and thereby they expose themselves and lose the game. The Independent, 10 May 1900, Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
Here's a sampling of what others had to say about Pillsbury.
...an emphatic dynamism distinguished the play of Chigorin, Lasker, Pillsbury, and Alekhine. [Romanovsky, Soviet Middlegame Technique, p.18]
Pillsbury aspired for the candle of his life to burn constantly at both ends. 'Wine, women, and not harmless songs, but strong cigars' - this was Pillsbury's principle in life. - Alexander Alekhine Chess Quotes by Chess Grandmasters
His play was highly diverse, he was always guided by the demands of the position, he employed a variety of opening variations, and, most important, he was the first prominent player to begin thinking not only in variations, but also schematically. - Anatoly Karpov Chess Quotes by Chess Grandmasters
Janowsky spoke freely of his colleagues among the chess masters of the world, not hesitating to place himself in the niche he believed he fitted. He stated he classed Harry N. Pillsbury, the American champion, and Emanuel Lasker, the world’s champion, above Dr Tarrasch, and thinks that he and the champion are about equal in strength just below the other two. He thinks Lasker is a sounder player than Pillsbury, but Pillsbury possesses greater powers of combination than the world’s champion. Despite his modest admission that he considers the others above him, he said he did not fear any of them, and would not be averse to matches with them. Janowsky, American Chess Magazine, November 1898, p. 215-216 Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
Once I asked Pillsbury whether he used any formula for castling. He said his rule was absolute and vital: castle. from Napier’s Amenities and Background of Chess-Play Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
...Pillsbury played a dozen blindfold simultaneous games against various passengers, winning them all handily. The tables were in the smoking room and Pillsbury sat with me on deck, talking about early school days. Stewards from the smoking room flitted back and forth with paper memoranda to communicate the moves from the various tables. I tried to get Harry to tell me how he did it, but he couldn’t; and I don’t believe he knew himself. He said he didn’t carry a picture of the various tables in his mind and he didn’t memorize the moves. He seemed to just know, when told what the move had been on one table, what he wanted to do. At any rate, if he was able to tell me how he did it, he successfully refrained. - The reminiscences of Norman W. Bingham, a boyhood friend of Pillsbury’s. The two crossed the Atlantic together in 1899. May-June 1944 Iowa Chess Correspondent. Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
‘Like other great masters, Pillsbury was hampered in the development of his chess talent by the fact that it was his only source of income and at his period there was not sufficient interest manifested in this country to guarantee a livelihood to a chess master. Therefore, it was a continual struggle for him to make both ends meet. Possessing a generous disposition and holding a just pride in his association with those more blessed with worldly goods, he never placed himself under the slightest obligation, though he lamented to me that the trophies won by him in tournaments and matches were one by one parted with for their intrinsic value to meet his actual necessities. A.B. Hodges on pages 90-91 of the May-June 1923 American Chess Bulletin. Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
The kind of overly deep analysis that often suits my desires. It's not useful for all. Not even for me at times.
Given these are fifty of the greatest players of all time, how were they as annotators? Well, for those who wrote books we could truly explore that question in depth. But to keep the playing field even, I had been including only games taken from a DB. Why that limitation? Well, I didn't want to burden myself with transcribing comments from a book into a pgn file. Or increase my debt burden by buying books of those who did not yet offer free access to books released to the public domain. Besides, far easier and faster to look for annotated games in an online database. Eventually, I changed my position on that for the reasons given in Hall of Fame #41: Jan Timman (The Best of the West!). There was nothing useful in the DBs I explored. So, books are now in.
Fortunately, I did manage to find several games with notes by Pillsbury, but only by visiting Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter. The notes are quite limited and were written in descriptive notation. I've translated that into our default standard of algebraic in the games shown below but offer you images of the originals (from the Winter website).
Marshall, Frank - Janowski, David, Match Marshall - Janowski +8-5=4, Paris, 1905
The notes are a bit sketchy by "still trying to learn this game" standards. Note that at the time, the Slav Defense did not have a good reputation. That assessment has waxed and waned over the years, but computers and super-GMs have rehabilitated this opening for the moment. Now it offers many incredibly complex ideas...you might have guessed that I'm a fan. Though I also don't mind playing against the Slav, as I find most don't really understand the themes behind it.
Some of Pillsbury's comments would no longer be considered germane in our silicon-powered world that has discovered sometimes a tempo gained, or even three, may not matter at all. Certainly, however, he had a GM's feel for when a defender was about to be felled in crunch time. I chose not to add my own thoughts, as one goal here is to explore how HoFers explained games.
Teichman, Richard - Leonhardt, Ostend Masters, June 16, 1905
Pillsbury never wrote a book, but he did occasionally provide material for magazines. I found this article particularly interesting because Pillsbury's introduction to the game largely revolves around his disparagement of Leonhardt for taking advantage of Teichman's disability. He also provided some brief notes, similar in depth to those found in the first game shown. (Images from Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter)
Below, I've recreated the text from Pillsbury's column shown above. No reason for you to strain your eyes.
Teichman's "Bad Eye" Game. A very interesting game in the fourth round of the Ostend Tournament was between Teichman and Leonhardt. Teichman is afflicted with what is known as one "blind eye," and occasionally the other eye, good under ordinary circumstances, also becomes exceedingly weak. Of course, no genuine chess player cares to win from an opponent who suddenly goes practically blind, and if Teichman is to be in tournaments, there should be a provision that when his right eye has suddenly failed him, the game may be adjourned.
This eye did go back on him at Ostend at the point of the twenty-sixth move, when he could have taken the bishop with a rook, two of which protected the pawn. Teichman uses something for his one eye and doubtless would have won had the game been adjourned, a clear point for Leonhardt which he didn't deserve, and which shows that he took advantage of Teichman's bed eyesight to make moves he would never have thought of making had his opponent not been practically blind.
Care for a journey down memory lane? Just pick your path! The whole purpose of this section is to address some obvious questions that might pop into your head. How come Kevin didn't talk about this? Or that? Not to mention the other thing! Well, just call me lazy! Or you could appreciate the fact I'm limiting the word count that is imposed on you😏.
Nonetheless, in the series I'll be using this little section to provide links to more fulsome discussions that revolve around some well-known and lesser-known facets of the featured chess giant. That will range from videos to links to other chess.com blogs, usually by Top Bloggers. Enjoy or skip, it's your call, as always.
- GM @Julio_Becerra Pillsbury-Lasker: An Explosive Rivalry
- NM @SamCopeland Pillsbury Destroys Lasker's French Defense - Best Of The pre-1900s - Pillsbury vs. Lasker, 1896
- NM @SamCopeland Chess Amateur Plays Four Brilliant Moves - Best of the 1900s - Halprin vs. Pillsbury, 1900
- @simaginfan The 'Pillsbury Bind'. Games Out Of My Head!
- @KevinChessSmith Secrets of Trapping Pieces: Pillsbury's Mate
- @batgirl Mr. H. N. PILLSBURY'S CHESS CAREER
- @batgirl Pillsbury and the Ladies
- @batgirl Mrs. Pillsbury
- @NimzoRoy Pillsbury Pummels Tarrasch! Hastings 1895, QGD D55
- Harry Nelson Pillsbury by Edward Winter
- The Best Chess Games of Harry Nelson Pillsbury - Chess.com
- Harry Nelson Pillsbury | Top Chess Players - Chess.com
As so often, I like to offer a link to one of GM Ben Finegold's discourses on The Great Players of the Past.
That's it for the fourteenth installment of my own take on chess.com's 50 greatest players of all time. Hope you enjoyed the blog. The good GMs below have a full selection of videos and puzzles dedicated to each of the fifty.
Cheers!
If you enjoy reading "greatest of" lists then you might also enjoy chess.com's Every Chess 'Player Of The Decade' (From Morphy To Magnus).
Sources for this information included chess.com, wikipedia.com, ChessBase, FIDE, individuals' websites, YouTube.com, news articles, books, and other sources. Plus, my faulty memories. I mixed, matched, cut, and pasted so much that separation is implausible, and I apologize for misattributions. Particularly with quotes which are found in a thousand repositories, not to mention book covers, t-shirts, and the rantings of chess coaches of whom I've had more than a few thanks to Chess University and @AttilaTurzo (my primary instructor and co-author of three books, for different chess strengths, we are writing on how to analyze during a game and after.)
HoF #49: Karjakin–"The Minister of Defense"
HoF #48: Portisch–"The Hungarian Botvinnik"
HoF #47: Polugaevsky–"The Great Poluga"
HoF #46: Kamsky–"London's King"
HoF #44: Leko–"The Cement Meister"
HoF #43: Winawer (The French King)
HoF #42: Najdorf–"Happy-Go-Lucky"
HoF #41: Jan Timman (The Best of the West!)
HoF #40: Mikhail Chigorin (Father of the Russian School of Chess)
