Kolty gives a simul!

It was set to take place at the old Emporium, in the heart of downtown San Francisco. So that day me and my grandmother were getting on the bus to take us down there.

It's a little hard nowadays to believe how big an event that match was. It was after all front page news--reported extensively by both the press and TV. It was in fact so huge that even my parents--who had very little interest in chess at all--discussed it. Incidentally, our household was very much in Spassky's camp (since we were sure that all of Fischer's hyperactive antics had only made us an embarrassment to the rest of the world).

The whole of the Emporium it seemed had been taken over by chess. As soon as you walked through the door, you were surrounded by the game. The thing I remember most though was the colossal hollow-plastic set that greeted one at the entrance, on some sort of 1970's shag-rug version of a giant chessboard.

Kolty was there too of course. This great craggy-faced old guy (for so he seemed to me at the time)...the first master I had ever seen in the flesh.

It was not to be a blindfold simul after all but a sighted one. Unfortunately though I wasn't able to play him. He took a break just as we got there, and so I sat down at the table (or tables) in the midst of the latest batch of challengers as we faced Peter Grey, a USCF Expert (or so the sign proclaimed--not that I really knew what any of that meant at the time of course).

I lasted perhaps 20 moves. I was at least aware of notation by then so I was able to write down the score of the game--in descriptive notation naturally (and fairly unambiguously too!). :D All I can remember now is that at one point I offered up a BxPch...only without there being anything behind it.

I recall my opponent pausing for a second after my "sac" too...no doubt with that little chill you get whenever you suspect the kid you're playing might just in fact be a genius in disguise. "A move only a grandmaster or a duffer would make..." Oh well, he maybe thought I was a GM for a moment anyway!

I also recall an older fellow behind me saying to my grandmother: "He's good!" I can only hope he was trying to hit on her (because there was no way I ever would've qualified as good back then). :)

And I actually got to say something to Kolty myself. I guess time was running short (probably because there were so many others clamoring to get a seat in the simul that the organizers felt the need to speed things up); at any rate, after a certain point GK came down the line for a swift adjudication. When he pronounced my game a win for my opponent, I offered up a move (another one of those "How about this?!" moments).

And he came up with a response instantly--and with a scowl. Thinking back, I have to chuckle about it; after all, I was probably a queen down or something ridiculous...but I still remember being amazed at his instant grasp of these things.

Incidentally, many many years later I would find myself riding up an elevator to a local tourney with that very same Peter Grey. Did he remember me? Nope...not really. :)