Samuel Gold (July 2, 1835, Kővágó-Örs, Zala,

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– November 9, 1920,

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) was a Hungarian physician, journalist and composer of

chess problem A chess problem, also called a chess composition, is a puzzle created by the composer using chess pieces on a chessboard, which presents the solver with a particular task. For instance, a position may be given with the instruction that White is t ...

Biography

He was born into a

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

family in Kővágóörs, a town located on the shores of

Lake Balaton Lake Balaton () is a freshwater rift lake in the Transdanubian region of Hungary. It is the List of largest lakes of Europe, largest lake in Central Europe, and one of the region's foremost tourist destinations. The Zala River provides the larges ...

. He learned playing chess at the age of 15 during his years spent in a high school. In 1857, he departed to Vienna for following the courses of a medical school. Gold published his first chess compositions in the '' Budapest Vasárnapi Újság'' and the '' Wiener Illustrirte Zeitung'' in 1857. He became a chess editor for the '' Der Osten'' in 1864, and later for other newspapers, among which the '' Allgemeine Sport-Zeitung''. In 1883, he published his collection of ''200 Schachaufgaben'' (Vienna, 1883). Since 1887, he was the first and only chess teacher to

Carl Schlechter Carl Schlechter (2 March 1874 – 27 December 1918) was a leading Austro-Hungarian chess master and theoretician at the turn of the 20th century. He is best known for drawing a controversial World Chess Championship match with Emanuel Lasker. Ea ...

in Vienna. He arrived in America on December 11, 1892, and immediately published two chess problems in the ''

New York Sun ''The New York Sun'' is an American conservative news website and former newspaper based in Manhattan, New York. From 2009 to 2021, it operated as an (occasional and erratic) online-only publisher of political and economic opinion pieces, as we ...

''. Gold remained in New York for the rest of his life. He died in

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at the age of 85, and was buried (funeral from the chapel of Saul Rothschild, 159 West 120th St.) in the presence of a small group of Hungarian relatives and friends in the evening of November 11, 1920.

References

Jewish chess players Sportspeople from the Austrian Empire Chess players from Austria-Hungary American chess players Chess composers Hungarian Jews Emigrants from Austria-Hungary to the United States American people of Hungarian-Jewish descent People from Veszprém County 1835 births 1920 deaths {{US-chess-bio-stub