There is a program streaming now on Netflix – Queen’s Gambit. It is a fictional account of a young orphaned girl who becomes a brilliant chess player. If you have Netflix, it’s a must-watch series. If you don’t have Netflix, it’s a good reason to sign up. Nancy and I watched each episode, spell bound, sometimes 3 episodes in a single evening.
It reminded me of the chess mania that swept this country back in 1972 as America became fascinated with a young man named Bobby Fischer.
Fischer was a chess prodigy. At age 13, he won a match that was dubbed “The Game of the Century”, but America didn’t really get involved until 1972 when Fischer took a seat across the chess board from Boris Spassky of Russia, at that time considered the greatest chess player in the world. Then, America took notice as Fischer and the Russian did battle for the World Chess Championship.
It was a best of 19 matches, and every newspaper in the country put the results on the front page. Each of Fischer’s’ moves was displayed and analyzed. Two hundred million Americans became chess fanatics, including yours truly. I didn’t know much about chess at the time, but I was intrigued as the young American took on the noted Chess Master from the Soviet Union for the bragging rights in the Cold War. Russians ate and slept chess. Americans were largely disinterested, until Bobby Fischer moved his first pawn.
My neighbor Joe Davis also became interested in chess. We found an old set in somebody’s basement and played every day. We were pretty close in skill. He beat me sometimes and I won on occasion. The victory or loss was usually the result of one of us making a stupid mistake, not because of the brilliant strategy of the opponent. I learned to play defensive chess and not make mistakes. I thought I was pretty good until I played my brother Charlie, who actually knew about chess strategy, and he cleaned my clock, often within a dozen moves.
Fischer ultimately beat Spassky by 10 games to 5. It was a rout and all of America celebrated. We wanted more from young Fischer, but the 20-year old was a certified basket case. Brilliant as he was in chess, he was a psychological mess and refused to defend his title. Americans, with very short attention spans, soon lost interest in the sport and the chess boards across this country went back into cedar closets.
This week, after watching the final episode of Queen’s Gambit, I retrieved my old set and lined up the men.
“Your move!”