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Boris Schapiro
Boris Schapiro (22 August 1909 – 1 December 2002) was a British international bridge player. He was a Grandmaster of the World Bridge Federation, and the only player to have won both the Bermuda Bowl (the world championship for national teams) and the World Senior Pairs championship. He won the European teams championship on four occasions as part of the British team. Life Schapiro was born in Riga, Latvia (then part of the Russian Empire) into a prosperous family of Jewish traders. They emigrated at the time of the Russian Revolution, when he was eight years old, and soon settled in England. He was educated at Clifton College and Bradford Technical College in England and at various universities, including the Sorbonne in Paris. After graduating, Schapiro joined the family horse trading and meat business and worked there until his forties, when he retired to capitalise on his love of gambling by becoming the banker of a baccarat syndicate at Crockford's gaming club in L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Contract Bridge
Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard 52-card deck. In its basic format, it is played by four players in two competing partnerships, with partners sitting opposite each other around a table. Millions of people play bridge worldwide in clubs, tournaments, online and with friends at home, making it one of the world's most popular card games, particularly among seniors. The World Bridge Federation (WBF) is the governing body for international competitive bridge, with numerous other bodies governing it at the regional level. The game consists of a number of , each progressing through four phases. The cards are dealt to the players; then the players ''call'' (or ''bid'') in an auction seeking to take the , specifying how many tricks the partnership receiving the contract (the declaring side) needs to take to receive points for the deal. During the auction, partners use their bids to also exchange information about their hands, including ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's States of Germany, sixteen constituent states, Berlin is surrounded by the Brandenburg, State of Brandenburg and contiguous with Potsdam, Brandenburg's capital. Berlin's urban area, which has a population of around 4.5 million, is the second most populous urban area in Germany after the Ruhr. The Berlin/Brandenburg Metropolitan Region, Berlin-Brandenburg capital region has around 6.2 million inhabitants and is Metropolitan regions in Germany, Germany's third-largest metropolitan region after the Rhine-Ruhr and Frankfurt Rhine-Main, Rhine-Main regions. Berlin straddles the banks of the Spree (river), Spree, which flows into the Havel (a tributary of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
World Senior Pairs Championship
The World Senior Pairs Championship is one of the competitions held as part of the quadrennial World Bridge Championships (formerly World Pairs Olympiad), inaugurated at the 8th rendition of the meet in 1990. Prior to 2005 both members of each pair had to be at least 55 years of age. In 2005, the World Bridge Federation (WBF) decided that the minimum age for a player to be recognized as ''Senior'' would be increasing one year per year, until it reached 60 years in 2010. The decision ensured that 55-year-olds who participated in a senior event in 2003 would never become ''ex-Seniors''. Results World meets commonly run for 15 days on a schedule whose details vary. In 2006 the Senior Pairs played Tuesday to Friday, the 11th to 14th days of the meet, after completion of all teams competition for seniors. There were eight sessions with 103 pairs on the first two days, 98 on the third, and 88 on the fourth. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jordanis Pavlides
Jordanis Theodore Pavlides ( gr, Ιορδάνης Θεόδωρος Παυλίδης; Iordanis Theodoros Pavlidis; 12 October 1903 – 26 February 1985)''England & Wales, Civil Registration Death Index, 1916-2007'' was a Greek-British contract bridge player who won the British Bridge League Master Pairs in 1948, the Gold Cup in 1949, the European championship in 1954, and the Bermuda Bowl in 1955. He also represented Britain in the European championships of 1955. Pavlides was the sixth member of a winning team whose other members were Terence Reese, Boris Schapiro, Kenneth Konstam, Leslie Dodds and Adam Meredith. He was born in Athens, lived for a while in France and Germany, before settling in London in 1935. He became a British subject in 1951.Peter Hasenson (ed), ''British Bridge Almanack'', 77 Publishing, 2004, , p214. He died in Westminster Westminster is an area of Central London, part of the wider City of Westminster. The area, which extends from the River Thames t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adam Meredith
Adam Theodore "Plum" Meredith (16 June 1913 – 30 January 1976) was a British professional bridge player and world tournament champion.Truscott (1976) Early life Meredith was born in Bangor, County Down, Ireland, (now Northern Ireland), to Hugh Meredith and Olive Christabel Margaret Meredith (''née'' Iles).''Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014''. Social Security Administration.Hasenson (2004) pp. 208–209. Reprint of an obituary written by Terence Reese in 1976 titled ''Adam Meredith 1913–1976''.Ramsey (1955) pp. 122–132 Little is published about his early life, excepting that he was well educated.Manley (2010) p. 229 Fearlessly honest, he refused to claim his ill-health from severe asthma and acute diabetes as a basis to avoid military service for World War II and instead registered as a conscientious objector. Initially allocated to work as an ambulance driver and ARP warden, he was petitioned against by those who objected to working with "conchies" (conscientious ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Leslie Dodds
Leslie William Dodds (2 February 1903 – 1975) was an English international bridge player and, by profession, an import-export merchant, from London. He was a member of the British team which won the Bermuda Bowl in 1955. In his youth he was a chess player, and famous for feats of memory and mental calculations. Bridge career Dodds' first partner in post-World War II top events was Eddie Raynes, who became, by royal warrant, shoe-maker to the Queen. Then he partnered Kenneth Konstam: together they formed one of the finest partnerships in British bridge. They played in the British Bermuda Bowl victory of 1955, and in the European Championship victories of 1948, 1949, 1950 and 1954. Dodds also represented Britain in the first Bermuda Bowl (1950), and the European Championships of 1952, 1953 and 1955; won the Gold Cup in 1938, 1949, 1956, 1960 and 1961 and the Master Pairs in 1955. His bidding system was CAB, one of half-a-dozen natural systems developed in Britain during the 1930 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kenneth Konstam
Kenneth Walter "Konnie" Konstam (born Adolf Walter Konstam; 25 February 1906 – 21 May 1968) was an English international bridge player who won seven international titles. In 1955 he played on the only Great Britain team to win the Bermuda Bowl (the world championship) and he won more European Bridge League open championships than any other British player. Konstam, educated at Oundle School, was employed for a time as a stockbroker in the London Stock Exchange. He was for many years an executive of the De La Rue company, which made playing cards, postage stamps and banknotes (the playing card business was eventually sold to Waddingtons). He served in the British Army during World War II, reaching the rank of Major. His fluent French qualified him to act as Liaison Officer to the French Army after D-Day.Ramsey, Guy. 1955. ''Aces All''. Museum Press, London. p. 65 ''et seq.'' Bridge career Konstam was a key member of the London-based Great Britain bridge team which won th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iain Macleod
Iain Norman Macleod (11 November 1913 – 20 July 1970) was a British Conservative Party politician and government minister. A playboy and professional bridge player in his twenties, after war service Macleod worked for the Conservative Research Department before entering Parliament in 1950. He was noted as a formidable Parliamentary debater and - later - as a platform orator. He was quickly appointed Minister of Health, later serving as Minister of Labour. He served an important term as Secretary of State for the Colonies under Harold Macmillan in the early 1960s, overseeing the independence of many African countries from British rule but earning the enmity of Conservative right-wingers, and the soubriquet that he was "too clever by half". Macleod was unhappy with the "emergence" of Sir Alec Douglas-Home as party leader and Prime Minister in succession to Macmillan in 1963 (he claimed to have supported Macmillan's deputy Rab Butler, although it is unclear exactly what his rec ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gold Cup (bridge)
The Gold Cup is the premier open British contract bridge competition for teams of four. (Teams may comprise up to six players but only four take part at any one time.) It was first contested in the 1931/32 season, making it one of the oldest contract bridge tournaments anywhere. The event was run by the British Bridge League through 1999 and subsequently by Bridge Great Britain, a newly formed not-for-profit organisation. Except for 1933/34 the format has always been single-elimination (knock-out). The 2019 Gold Cup was the 82nd. There were eight annual competitions before 1940 and 74 more have been completed since its resumption in 1946.Archives: Gold Cup Roll of Honor Bridge Great Britain. Retrieved 2013-12-17. Currently there are eight rounds to handle as many as 256 entries, with at least 3 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Terence Reese
John Terence Reese (28 August 1913 – 29 January 1996) was a British bridge player and writer, regarded as one of the finest of all time in both fields. He was born in Epsom, Surrey, England to middle-class parents, and was educated at Bradfield College and New College, Oxford, where he studied classics and attained a double first, graduating in 1935. Life Reese's father, the son of a Welsh clergyman, worked in a bank until he transferred to his wife's family catering business. Reese said "I played card games before I could read".Reese (1977), p. 1. As a small boy, when his mother "issued the standard warning about not talking to strange men, my father remarked that it was the strange men who should be warned against trying to talk to me". Reese's mother Anne ran a hotel near Guildford, and with it a bridge club, so Reese played in the earliest duplicate matches, ''circa'' 1930. Whilst at Oxford he met some serious bridge players, amongst whom were Lt.-Col. Walter Buller, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Auction Bridge
The card game auction bridge was the third step in the evolution of the general game of bridge. It was developed from bridge whist in 1904, possibly by 1900. Auction bridge was the precursor to contract bridge. Its predecessors were whist and bridge whist. Auction bridge trick scoring, bonus scoring, and penalty scoring are radically different from contract bridge, and there is no concept of vulnerability in auction bridge. Bidding rules are nearly the same, although in contract bridge bidding, many complex artificial bids and bidding systems have evolved. Origin It is not certain to whom auction bridge should be credited. A letter in ''The Times'' (London), January 16, 1905, signed by Oswald Crawfurd, describes auction bridge as first played in 1904, while a book by "John Doe" (Francis Reginald Roe), published in Allahabad, India, in 1899, puts forward auction bridge as an invention of three members of the Indian Civil Service stationed at an isolated community, designed as a th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oswald Jacoby
Oswald "Ozzie", "Jake" Jacoby (December 8, 1902 – June 27, 1984) was an American contract bridge player and author, considered one of the greatest bridge players of all time and a key innovator in the game, having helped popularize widely used bidding moves such as Jacoby transfers. He also excelled at, and wrote about, other games including backgammon, gin rummy, canasta, and poker. He was from Brooklyn, New York and later lived in Dallas, Texas. He was the uncle of activist and author Susan Jacoby, as well as father of James Jacoby, an author and world-class bridge player in his own right. Early life Born in Brooklyn to a Jewish family, he was taught to play whist at the age of six and played his first bridge at ten. During World War I, he joined the army at 15 by lying about his age but spent most of his time there playing poker. Dropping out of Columbia University (where he was in the class of 1922) as a math major to become an actuary, he became the youngest person ev ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
