Why 2k?

Why, indeed?

Today jeromegambit.blogspot.com hits 2,000 posts.

That's a lot of focus on "Jerome's Double Gambit" and related subjects.

Many, many thanks for those who have contributed - and continue to contribute - games and analysis.

With my focus on completing All or Nothing! The Jerome Gambit, I still have plenty of time for the blog that started it all, and the chess friends who have kept me company along the way.

I have tried a new layout, simpler and more direct.

As the Grateful Dead have noted, in another context, of course, What a long, strange trip it's been!

Before This Blog Began...

Before I started this blog (see "Welcome") I had a series of Jerome Gambit-related posts at www.chesshistory.com (under the "Puzzles and Mysteries" section) from 11/24/01 to 9/6/04. A lot of topics were explored, and some paths crossed and re-crossed, as I was finding my way in the world of "Jerome's Double Gambit".

Probably the funniest episode was my mis-guided search for the imaginary book All or Nothing! The Jerome Gambit, by Chiam Schmendrick...

Trips to the White Collection in the Cleveland Public Library helped fill in the gaps of my knowledge, as did the contribution of many chessfriends world-wide. 

Following that "debut", I started to find my "voice" in the ChessPub Forum (www.chesspub.com), a discussion forum for ChessPublishing.com, from 1/19/05 to 12/29/07. What began as a series of posts by me, responding to others, quickly became a series of posts by me, responding to me -- and I was eventually dis-invited to continue.

[Although there was a bit of a fall-off from the previous months, the number of visitors to this blog in February 2014 was the best for a February since I began posting. Welcome, again - and many thanks for visiting! - Rick] 

Hit Me With Your Best Shot

I recently received an email from Bill Wall, noting "I looked at your last two articles on 'not Nxe5' and since you had one of my c3 games, that now left d3 and O-O to try.  So I tried them both in one game..."

Wall,B - Guest2507113 
PlayChess.com, 2013

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ 

4...Kxf7 5.0-0 d6 6.d3 h6 7.h3 Nf6 

Some contemporary Jerome Gambit players, perhaps aided by computer evaluations, have opted not to make the second sacrifice, 5.Nxe5, in what was once called "Jerome's Double Gambit." 

These "modern" Jerome Gambit variations leave White "objectively" better off than do the "classical" lines, but, to my mind (Rick) their lack of utter chaos makes playing the attack more challenging. Black says "hit me with your best shot."

As if that ever stopped Bill Wall.

8.c4 Rf8 9.Nc3 Kg8 10.Be3 Bb6 11.Rc1 Bd7

12.Nd5 Bxe3 13.fxe3 Be6 14.Qb3 Rb8 15.Rf2 Qd7 16.Nh4 Kh7 17.Qa4 a6 18.Qc2 Ne7 

White's pieces have been probing the enemy position. Now he sees a chance to weaken the Kingside a bit.

19.Nxf6+ Rxf6 20.Rxf6 gxf6 21.Rf1 

Threatening 22.Rxf6

21...f5?

Better 21...Ng6 22.Nxg6 Kxg6

22.exf5 Nxf5 23.d4 

The Knight is now pinned and White threatens Nxf5

23...Rf8? 

Black keeps playing reasonable moves, and they keep not working out. Bill recommends 23...Qf7 24.dxe5 dxe5 25.Qe4 Rf8 26.g4 while Houdini 3 suggests giving up the piece directly with 23...Kh8 24.Nxf5 In either case, White would still be better.

24.d5 Bf7 25.Rxf5

Threatening 26.Rxf7+, winning the Queen 

25...Kg7

Threatening 26...Bg6, pinning Rook and Queen. If 27. Nxg6, then 27...Qxf5 and Black is winning.

26.Qf2 Qe7? 27.Rf3

Threatening 28. Nf5+, forking Queen and King 

27...Qg5 28.Rg3 Black resigned

One Thousand Days

Today this blog reaches one thousand consecutive days of posting. We've covered a lot of ground since the first day, June 10, 2008.

From the first published analysis of Alonzo Wheeler Jerome's opening, to the latest games available, we've been there.

From the pipe dreams of having an article on 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ published in the well-respected magazine Kaissiber, to the far reaches of Jerome's Double Gambit seen as a Martian invasion, it has been fun to exercise imagination to its fullest extent.

Tournaments have been chronicled, history corrected, mysteries uncovered, and loose ends tracked down.

There have been a few interviews, not nearly enough.

The opening has faced skepticism and worse, as well it should, given its many refutations.

On the other hand, IM Lane (who I sometimes erroniously granted the GM title to in my references) has mentioned the Jerome Gambit in his columns at ChessCafe.com and more recently in his book The Greatest Ever Chess Tricks and Traps.

The Database of games (available to all readers) has grown from 950 to almost 23,500.

According to Google Analytics, the number of countries that readers have visited from passed 100 quite some time ago. Almost 1/4 of readers have stopped here 100 times or more. One-sixth of readers have stopped here over 200 times.

What is ahead for this blog for the next 1,000 days?

More of your games, I hope. I share mine because I am familiar with them, but I post readers' when I get them. Your games are often better.

I hope to post more historical research, more tournaments, more analysis... and maybe even finally get down to writing a book on the Jerome Gambit. Now that would be a challenge!

Alas, it was not meant to be...

The March 1891 issue of The International Chess Magazine carried news of a 6-game match in Havana, Cuba between Joseph Henry Blackburne and Andres Clemente Vazquez, from March 5 to March 11.


Vazquez, current Mexican Consul General in Cuba, was an early advocate of the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+). The past and future Mexican Chess Champion's handicap game in 1876 against Giraudy was introduced in the November 1876 issue of the American Chess Journal with some fanfare

Odds givers will also find the Jerome Gambit a summary method for disposing of the neophyte. And by the way, we observe that this new opening has found its way to Mexico – An American idea in the halls of the Montezumas. Signor Andres Clemente Vazquez, the Mexican Champion and editor of La Estrategia Mexicane, has been trying the "Double" [Jerome's Double Gambit] on an amateur at the odds of Queen's Rook, and that, too, with brilliant success, as will be seen by the following game, which we copy from La Estrategia.

In 1876 Vazquez was 3-0 with the Jerome Gambit in his second match against William Harrington, games he included in his book of that year, Algunas Partidas de Ajedrez.


Of note is that in his third edition of Analisis del juego de ajedres (1889) Vazquez included (along with the Giraudy game and a Harrington game) analysis of Blackburne's 1885 crushing defeat of the Jerome Gambit played by an amateur (for the game, see "Nobody expects the Jerome Gambit!", "Flaws (Part I)" and "Flaws (Part II)").

After 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kxf7 5.Nxe5+ Nxe5 6.Qh5+ g6 7.Qxe5 d6 8.Qxh8 Qh4 9.0-0 Nf6 in the Blackburne game, Vazquez suggested that instead of 10.c3 White should have played 10.Qd8, and after 10...Bb6 11.e5 dxe5 12.Qd3 White would have had the better game. (This is the earliest incidence of this analysis that I have seen; Munoz and Munoz, in reporting the Anonymous - Blackburne game in the August 1885 Brooklyn Chess Chronicle, had simply suggested 10.Qd8)

So, in the 4th game of the Blackburne - Vazquez match, with The Black Death leading two games to one, Vazquez had the White pieces and played: 1.e4 e5

In the second game of the match Blackburne had dodged with 1...c6, a Caro-Kann.

2.Bc4 Nc6

Best authorites recommend here 2...Nf6 wrote Steinitz.

3.Nf3 Bc5

The Italian Game! And now... and now... the Jerome Gambit???

And now Vazquez moved 4.0-0 and played a delayed Evans Gambit after 4...Nf6 with 5.b4.... He was checkmated in 40 moves.

The position after the third move again arose in the 6th game, with Blackburne leading the match 4-1, and Vazquez transposed to the pacific Four Knights Game with 4.0-0 Nf6 5.Nc3, losing in 33 moves.

Alas, a Jerome Gambit game was not to be.


(It is interesting to note that Mr. Blackburne's Games at Chess, published in 1899, has the more straight-forward move order for the 4th match game: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5, etc. On the other hand, P. Anderson Graham, in his summary of "Mr. Blackburne's Successes" in the same book, refers to Vazquez as the champion of Brazil!)

Race to the Finish

With 80% (169 out of 210) of the games in the 15-player, double-round robin Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+) Thematic Tournament at ChessWorld completed, the Jerome Gambit has scored 37%.

Piratepaul (19 points out of 23 games completed) maintains his lead. DREWBEAR 63 (17 points out of 28 games), who had been first throughout most of the play, was the first to complete his games; and shares second place with Sir Osis of the Liver (17 points out of 26 games completed).

Sitting behind them are GladtoMateYou (14 points out of 24 games), then blackburne and eddie43 (13.5 points out of 26 games), and stampyshortlegs (13 points out of 17 games).

Only one player, because of the number of games he has yet to complete, has a statistical chance of topping Piratepaul's (current) 19 points: stampyshortlegs (maximum score possible - 24).

From a practical point of view, it looks like it will be a race between Piratepaul (maximum score possible - 24) and stampyshortlegs for top honors.

London Calling... Nine Months of Blog

Dear Jerome Gambit Gemeinde,

Many "thank yous" again, to all readers and members of the Gemeinde, world-wide, who have sent games, analysis, and Comments to this blog. Your support has been quit gratifying – feel free to continue contributing.

My hope is that the sense of adventure and enjoyment that embodies the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+) carries over to your chess play in general – and that if you get a chance to play bold, attacking chess, that you do so with gusto!

Certainly, playing Jerome's Double Gambit has made its mark on my games – which will continue to appear here on this blog on a daily basis, along with more Jeromiana and whatnot. (That includes more chapters from Jerome Gambit for Dummies, too.)

Thoughts About AWJ

A few days ago, Dr. Daaim Shabazz, Associate Professor of Business at Florida A&M University and host of the Chess Drum website, stopped by this blog and left a short, friendly Comment to the "A Short Break from the Jerome Gambit" post.

When I learned that Alozno Wheeler Jerome, father of the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+), had been a lieutenant during the United States' Civil war, serving in the 26th Infantry of the United States Colored Troops, I exchanged emails with Dr. Shabazz, speculating about the possiblity of Jerome being an African American chessplayer.

To have reached the rank of lieutenant in the United States' military would have been almost unheard of for a black man at that time – officers in the U.S.C.T. were invariably white men; and the rank of sergeant was about as high as the troops were allowed to advance. A black lieutenant would have to have been a military genius to have achieved such status.

Further research, though, only supported the rule, not the exception. Jerome's parents identified themselves in the national census as "white", as did Jerome and his wife in the decades that followed. Jerome was drafted into the army of the United States, something only open to white men at the time, and only later reassigned as quartermaster sergeant, to Company C of the 26th Infantry, U.S.C.T.

It is quite possible that Alonzo Wheeler Jerome played chess while in uniform, and perhaps that is when he came up with Jerome's Double Gambit. Further research on that possibility still needs to be done.

The Westminster Papers

Using Google Books to search the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+) I recently came across Volume XI of The Westminster Papers of London, "A Monthly Journal of Chess, Whist, Games of Skill, and The Drama" which had this note in its February 1, 1879 issue:

ANSWERS TO CORRESPONDENTS

CHESS

H.W.P. (Vermont, U.S., A.) -- We shall be most happy to receive some games fairly well played, in which the Jerome Double Gambit was adopted. They will be handed to our annotator in due course, and will analyse them in an unprejudiced and impartial manner.

The March and April issues which complete Volume XI have no further reference to Jerome's Gambit – and this is unfortunate, as they were the last issues of The Westminster Papers to be published.

The refererence to the chess player "H.W.P" of Vermont is also a mystery to me at this point.

Readers able to shed a light on this are encouraged to either post a "comment" or contact me via email.

Graphic by Jeff Bucchino, wizardofdraws

Doesn't anybody read this blog??

I have to wonder, sometimes... (beside the Jerome Gambit Gemeinde, of course)

After presenting the first round of ten RevvedUp vs computer games exploring the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+), predominantly the Blackburne variation (4...Kxf7 5.Nxe5+ Nxe5+ 6.Qh5+ g6 7.Qxe5 d6), I just played the following game at the Free Internet Chess Server (FICS):

perrypawnpusher - Sgrunterundt
blitz game 2 18, FICS, 12.2008

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kxf7 5.Nxe5+ Nxe5 6.Qh5+ g6 7.Qxe5 d6 8.Qxh8 Black resigns



Perhaps my opponent was just unfamiliar with the Jerome Gambit and resigned after noticing that he had dropped the Rook.
Perhaps he had read all of this blog's posts on the Blackburne variation and realized that after 8.Qxh8 White had a tricky, but better position.
Who knows?
But: chalk another win up for Jerome's Double Gambit...
(p.s. Today's is the 200th daily post to this blog. Thanks for coming along for the ride!)

To Infinity... And Beyond! (Part I)

As a chess opening, the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7?!) has a great future behind it.

Born in the post-Morphy, pre-Steinitz era, it achieved neither the deserved celebrity heaped upon the Evans Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.b4!?) nor the undeniable fanatical following awarded the Blackmar (later, Blackmar Diemer) Gambit (1.d4 d5 2.e4 dxe4 3.f3; 3.Nc3 & 4.f3).

American chess players were looking for something that they could call their own – ideally, a slashing, crashing attack where White offered material and Black, proper for the times, accepted it, with dire consequences. Alonzo Wheeler Jerome's creation was offered as one possibility.

The Jerome was discussed in magazines and analyzed in opening tomes around the world, and for a short time became relatively well-known – as a not so very good idea.

Truly the duck-billed platypus of chess openings, at least at the level of "serious" chess, the Jerome Gambit today is more of an archeological and anthropological artifact than a rusty weapon awaiting discovery, polishing and honing.

And yet... And yet... And yet...

The story of Jerome's Double Gambit is an interesting one worth telling – and soon it will be told.

(Many thanks to Dan DeHaan, who gave permission to use this fine platypus graphic – he created it for his wife Jenn's fantasy football team, the Paw Paw Platypusses!)