Rook House
Chess History, Articles, Games, Puzzles, and Books.
1883 – Mason vs Bird
Featured below is a classic game from the sixth round of the 1883 London International tournament between legendary chess greats James Mason of Ireland and Henry Edward Bird of England. Bird would play a Sicilian Defense against his opponent’s king’s [...]
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Featured Puzzle
White to Move & Mate in 4 Moves. A chess puzzle from Joseph Henry Blackburne.
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The Evergreen Game
Here is a classic game between Adolf Anderssen and Jean Dufresne from 1852 in Berlin, Germany. Anderssen was the 10th unofficial chess champion of the world and was recently coming off his victory at the first international tournament in London [...]
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Alessandro Salvio
Alessandro Salvio was an Italian chess player who was considered by many to be the 4th unofficial world champion between the years 1598 and 1620. He started an Italian chess academy in Naples, Italy, and wrote a book called Trattato [...]
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Carl Haffner’s Love Of The Draw
Austrian author Thomas Glavinic produced a book in 1999 entitled “Carl Haffner’s Love Of The Draw”. The book is predominantly a fictional account of the 1910 match for the world chess championship between Emanuel Lasker and Carl Schlechter. The main [...]
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Bald-Headed vs Full-Haired Match (1891)
The September 20th edition of the New York Tribune in 1891 announced the Manhattan Chess Club had organized a curious chess contest between bald-headed members and “those blessed with full crops of hair”. Club members were having a great deal [...]
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Wilhelm Steinitz – Obituary
The chess world lost a legend in the truest sense of the word when Wilhelm Steinitz passed away on April 12th, 1900. Many newspapers and periodicals throughout the world expressed their condolences in the form of published articles, past games, [...]
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Royal Rules for Sprightly Skittles
A word often used when referring to casual or off-hand chess games is “skittles”. This term was more prevalent in the late 1800′s and early 1900′s, but should be somewhat familiar to chess enthusiasts nonetheless. The implied use is in [...]
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An Interview with Emanuel Lasker (1892)
Emanuel Lasker gave an interesting interview in the December 18th, 1892 edition of the Washington Post. He discussed many chess related topics, mostly going in depth on the subject of blindfold chess play. Also included are some fascinating stories about [...]
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A “New” Napier Game (by John S. Hilbert)
William Ewart Napier was born in England on January 17, 1881. His family soon moved to the United States, and because they did American chess has been all the richer. Napier first played correspondence chess, participating in one of the [...]
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