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Checkers Game
Player Sam Gonotsky
Sam Gonotsky Checkers 1902 - 1929
Another dynamic American checkers player
from the early 20th century was Samuel Gonotsky,
born in Poland in 1902. Unfortunately, Sam
only lived for a very short time but checkers
game player Sam Gonotsky was still able to
leave his mark on the checkers world through
his meteoric career as a checkers champion.
Player Sam Gonotsky and Willie Ryan knew
each other well as they grew up together
and became friends. They understood each
other and shared a common interest in the
great game of checkers. It seemed that Willie
knew his buddy, Sam, better than anyone else.
They both enjoyed playing checkers and devoted
a lot of their time to developing solid skills.
A bonus for these two friends was the reward
of making money while playing against opponents
in checkers. Checkers player Sam Gonotsky
was Ryan’s
mentor and teacher, and according to checkers
sources, it is believed that Willie Ryan
thought highly of Sam, and wrote in his books
that Gonotsky was one of the greatest checkers
players in the history of the game, even
if he only blessed the checkerboard scene
for a few shorts years.
This statement certainly bears credence
considering the fact that Ryan and Sam Gonotsky
played over 800 checkers games together,
and sources say that Sam won over 100 of
those games against Ryan. Throughout Willie
Ryan’s early checkers career, Sam Gonotsky
was the one who encouraged him to develop
techniques and analytical skills, and in
consequence, Willie gave Sam the chance to
practice the checkers game with regularity
and thus had constant practice and very good
competition. They were both a bone for each
other and Sam Gonotsky, without a doubt,
provided a constructive and positive influence
for Ryan. However, during these early days,
Willie was no match for Gonotsky. He came
into his own much later in 1939.
However, during their close relationship,
Sam Gonotsky quickly developed a checkers
mindset and used all available resources
to his benefit. Sam was a man of small stature,
and yet, it is said that with a protruding
forehead, he struck terror in the hearts
of his peers as he displayed a "sphinx"-like
appearance at the checkerboard.
His sharp features would indeed lend a certain
stern or even harsh look as Sam concentrated
on a checkers game, and he took his play
very seriously so that his intensity would
also cast a certain demeanor over the checkers
champion.
It would appear that there are no known
checkers games between checkers game player
Sam Gonotsky and the two other recognized
great players of that era; namely, Asa Long
and Newell Banks. It is only a hypothesis
that the other checkers champions may have
avoided challenging player Sam Gonotsky because
of his fierce checkers reputation. Or it
may also be possible that Sam avoided playing
the others or that time simply didn't allow
for checkers matches with Asa Long or Newell
Banks, as they, too were caught up in their
own lives and checkers championships. However,
some sources believe that Sam Gonotsky was
the most feared checker player in the world,
and if this was indeed so, then it is conceivable
that the others may have had their own reasons
for not wanting to play Gonotsky. Of course,
this is only speculation and unless there
are records to the contrary, checkers enthusiasts
will not glean the true answer to this theory.
Checkers player Sam Gonotsky was unquestionably
one of the strongest natural cross board
checkers players who ever lived, and may
even be considered one of the greatest all
around checkers champions in the history
of the mind sport.
Unfortunately, Gonotsky was denied a chance
at the World Championship title because the
World Champion, Robert
Stewart, was unable to defend his title
at that time due to ill health as he had
contracted Alzheimer’s. Sam Gonotsky
and Sam Levy did challenge the title, but
Stewart was never in a position to defend
his title and it basically went unchallenged
for sixteen years. Perhaps the world checkers
community should have formulated an edict
that if the champion was unable to defend
the title after a certain period of time,
then the championship title became ‘open’ to
new defenders. Using this philosophy, it
is feasible that Sam Gonotsky could have
successfully claimed the title. Considering
this, player Sam Gonotsky could certainly
be considered the Uncrowned
World’s Checker Game Champion from
1927-1929.
Checkers became Sam’s life and in 1924, he
entered his first national checker tournament
This was his first major checkers success because
he outplayed and beat Alfred Jordan, to claim the
title of American Champion by winning the 6th
American Checkers Tournament in New York City.
Then during the following year in 1925,
checker great, Louis C. Ginsberg, challenged
Sam to a 30-game match played in Brooklyn,
New York. The purse of $500.00 was offered
and this was substantial for that period
of time. Sam Gonotsky won the match with
two wins, no losses, and twenty-eight draws.
These games clearly indicate the level of
checkers play that player Gonotsky had developed
over the years because both Alfred Jordan
and Louis Ginsberg were world class checkers
players of their time, and Sam Gonotsky was
able to beat his opponents without much quibble.
Always studious, Gonotsky and another friend, Mike
Lieber, continued to work on their checkers game
and readily used the great resources at the
Brooklyn Library where the finest checkers library existed.
Then, in 1927, the 2nd International Match
between the U.S. and Great Britain was held
at the "Hotel Alamac" in New York
City. By this time, many strong checkers
players had been born in the U.S. and the
U.S. team consisted of such great checkers
players as Asa Long, Mike Lieber, and Sam
Gonotsky, and these young men were all in
their early twenties. The World Title was
still back in Scotland with the World Champion,
Robert Stewart, but the American team had
an opportunity to play against other great
players from Great Britain.
During this international match, Gonotsky
clearly showed his checkers ability, where
he scored a total of thirteen wins, no losses,
and twenty-seven draws for the U.S. Team.
His performance in the 1927 2nd International
Match was indeed amazing and he was the high
man for the U.S. Team. This record had only
been achieved once before in the 1st International
Match in 1905, by Richard
Jordan, the World Champion at the time,
who also had a high score of 13-0-27. However,
checkers player Sam Gonotsky claimed that
his record was better than Jordan ’s
score because Richard was in several losses
and missed several wins during that 1905
match, but player Sam Gonotsky was not in
any losses and did not miss any wins.
Of course, checkers experts have questioned
Gonotsky’s claim over the years, and
some have reviewed Sam’s games from
that tournament and have stated that his
claim wasn't quite accurate. However, he
truly believed that his record was better
than Jordan’s. "This ties Dick
Jordan's record (in the 1st International
Match games) but mine is better as I was
in no losses, and missed no wins." Time
may have tempered that statement, but regardless,
Gonotsky’s result was amazing.
His checkers ingenuity and cross-board skill
in the 1927 tournament qualified Sam Gonotsky
as the best player in the world, a fact that
was acknowledged by everyone in checkers
during that time period.
The following year in January of 1928, U.S.
team member and friend, Mike Lieber, also
a world-class checker master who was undefeated
with a score of 8-0-32, challenged Sam Gonotsky
to a 40-game match that offered a high stake
of $1000.00 wherein the winner takes all.
This was unheard of in 1928. The checkers
match was played in Long Island, New York,
and the result had and unusual outcome of
40 draws. This result certainly made an impact
on the checkers world at that time because
Mike Lieber was reportedly very well prepared
with a whole manuscript of cooks and a personal
coach, Jesse B. Hanson, whereas Sam Gonotsky
was not prepared at all and actually played
the checkers match with very little notice.
However, checkers great Sam Gonotsky relied
on his great cross board ability to see him
through and it did because he was able to
tie his counterpart, manuscript and all.
Later on that year, Sam entered his second
National Tournament that was held at Cedar
Point, Ohio. This match was for the 11-man
ballot championship of the world. Once again,
Sam’s checker play was successful and
gained him another win in this National Tournament.
In this event he was in three known losses,
but winning two games in which he was in
a loss and drawing the other one, and thus
exhibiting cross board ability of the highest
caliber, rarely seen before or since.
Then in 1929, player Sam Gonotsky entered
his third National Tournament, which was
the Seventh American Checker Tournament,
also known as “The
Rump Tourney”, held in March at the
Morrison Hotel in Chicago, Illinois. He won
the tourney much as everyone expected but
not without working for it, and little did
the public know that this was to be Gonotsky’s
last tournament.
In Round 4 of the tournament, Sam defeated
Jesse Hanson with one win, no losses, and
five draws, and then, in the final round,
he defeated Hanson again with the score of
two wins, one loss, and three draws. However,
Sam Gonotsky was not a well man during this
tournament; in fact, though he did not know
it, he was literally a dying man. He coughed
a lot and began spitting up blood, and they
actually stopped the tournament play on six
separate occasions due to his severe coughing
spasms. However, this did not stop him from
offering a stunning performance by playing
game after game of magnificent checkers.
After his win, Gonotsky returned to Detroit,
where he was employed by Chrysler, and shortly
thereafter, he was hospitalized. Unfortunately,
a mere seventeen days later, Sam Gonotsky
died in Hurley Hospital, Flint, Michigan,
on April 5, 1929, from Pleural Tuberculosis.
He was only twenty-six, and the real tragedy
was that his death followed that of his friend
and checker companion, Mike Lieber, who had
died as a result of the flu epidemic only
two weeks prior to the tournament. With the
death of Sam Gonotsky, America lost one of
the greatest natural cross board checker-playing
talents ever developed in this country. To
this day Gonotsky is considered to have been
one of the best to ever play checkers.
The following account, entitled A
Gonotsky Gem, was written by Bob
Podoff, who personally knew Samuel Gonotsky.
In it, he sheds some insight into the young
checker player from 1920’s, and discusses
the quality of his checker prowess and
cross board skill.
“When I
was 16 years of age, I was Junior Checker
Champion of Brooklyn. I had played 4 draws
with Willie Ryan; I had defeated Ben Boland
in a short match 2-1-3; I had won one game
from Monte Schleiffer; I beat Louis Burt
in a 10 game match 5-2-3. All the games
were of course GAYP, as I didn't know any
other style then! The time was 1946 and
I frequented Harold Fisher's (not Fischer)
checker club, called "The New York
Academy of Chess & Checkers" in
Time Square every Saturday. It was there
I met my first mentor, A. J. Mantell. We
soon became good friends. One Saturday
we were talking about Sam Gonotsky. We
both admired him very much. Abe said to
me, "How would you like me to run
up a game for you that I witnessed in the
rooms of the old Brooklyn Checker Club
about 1924 or 1925? This was one of the
greatest endgame wins I ever saw in my
life." I then proceeded to copy down
the moves and put it away in an envelope
and completely forgot about it all these
years.
I was clearing out all my old papers and envelopes
full of tons of old checker games in preparation
for the 2001 ID's, when to my surprise and
pleasure I ran into this old masterpiece that
I had long forgotten about. It is a real beauty.
It highlights the pure simplicity
and elegance of Gonotsky's brilliant style much
better than I can say in words. He was playing
Hershkowitz (or Hershkovitz) a well-known member
of the club, not known as a book player, but
a very dangerous and strong cross board player
who was also famous as a champion Spanish Pool
player. It was for 50 cents a game Gonotsky
never played a game (unless
it was for money),
and of course Sam had to give him the draws.
Nobody at that time ever played checkers player
Sam Gonotsky unless he got odds.
This game illustrates Gonotsky's clean, clear, simple,
open style of play. This game may be the ultimate
Gonotsky game, showing his great endgame ability
and his superb cross board prowess for which
he was very famous and feared. All I
can say is that this game has never before
been published, and I am proud and honored
to be the one to finally show this great masterpiece
and example of Gonotsky's true great ability
and genius to the checker fraternity.”
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