The Bamberg herald. [volume] (Bamberg, S.C.) 1891-1972, 1920-12-09
THE CHILD PRODIGY.
Samuel Rzeeszewski, Nine Years Old,
Beats All Corners at Chess.


player, the lad who has met many Of
the most expert players in the world,
and who has never yet been defeat
ed in a game by one of them. The
boy has created q sensation not only
in chess circles, but among the peo-
pie generally, who are always inter-
ested in prodigies.
Little Samuel Rzeszewski was born
in a. small town near Lodz, Poland
The ebb and flow OF the war made it
possible to obtain an education, al
though in recent months he has been
taught to read and write a little
but this is since he had demonstrated
his invincible powers as chess play
or.
Samuel was five years old when he
played his first game of chess. His
father was fair chess player, and the
child, skylarking about the room,
used to mischievously upset the board
and in order to interest the youngs-
ter enough to keep him quiet, his
father taught him the moves.
One night as the boys father was
playing a game of chess with a neigh
bor, Samuel suddenly suggested a
move which was so radical that his
father refused to make it, and apollo
getically explained to the visitor that
the child had no experience and no
attention should he paid to his silly
suggestions.
Samuel made no remarks, but
watched his father play5 and when he
had lost the game the child recon-
structed the chessmen on the board,
played his own suggested move and
showed how it could not possibly fail
to win. He was five years old then.
From that time on the boy beat his
father at every game and all of the
neighbors who came to the house.
So far as can be ascertained, none
of the boys ancestors were chess
players or notable in any other ach-
ievements. Aside from his extraor-
binary igeuius at chess, there is moth
ing unusual or remarkable about
Samuel. He is in all other respects
normally bright, healthy child. He
likes foot ball, can box little, eats
the usual things, sleeps ten or eleven
hours and is especially interested in
his new bicycle. He has one brother
and two sisters wh6 are not remarka-
Bile in any way and who do not play
chess. Little Samuel is less interest
ed in chess than in anything else. AS
a matter of fact, the game bores him
and he never asks to play it. But
when the board is set and the child
is led UP to it he plays swiftly and
without hesitation. Each move he
makes seems to him the only posi-
BILE move, the inevitable one, and he
has no choice in his mind or misgiv-
ings.
Samuel is unable to tell how it is
that he knows the move which he un-
erringly makes. There seems no 9TH
er play possible, he says, and he
makes it. He thinks it curious that
his opponents do not always make
the same play that he always sees to
be the only correct play, and he
wonders why his opponents do not
always foresee that he will make the
play that he does make. The moment
his opponent makes a play, Samuel
instantly recognizes whether it is a
false play or the only possible cor
rect play.
It is said that it makes no differ
ence to the child how many chess
boards are in the room. He can
walk around and around naming
the move on each board that he comes
to without the necessity of studying
the move or recalling the previous
moves.
twenty-five boards were set up in
Paris in long rectangle. On the
outside of the boards 200 or 800 of
the oldest champion chess players
crowded around. Samuel was lifted
into the enclosure, and walking from
one board to the other the child made
his moves swiftly and without hesi-
tation. He won every game in spite
of the earnest concentration of his
skilled opponents. Quickly this boy,
who was then eight years old, out
matched the gray haired chess ex-
perts of Europe.
The same feat was repeated in
London and other European capitals.
In one match where he was playing
33 games at once the judges award
ed one game out of the the 33 to an