Chess Olympiad Package

Source: Chess Review, Sept. 1964, p. 258.

Mr. Herbert Halsegger notifies us that Chess Review had a full-page advertisement for a round-trip visit to Israel for the chess olympiad of 1964. Are there any other examples of such "package deals"? 

An Atypical Advertisement

 

Source: Sunday Star, 10 January 1926, Gravure Section (no page number)

The following is part of an advertisement for yeast as a cure-all from the Sunday Star, brought to our attention by Mr. Herbert Halsegger. It is interesting since chess is sometimes used in advertisements as a metaphor for a difficult task which the product helps achieve (e.g., cigarettes help one's concentration in chess), or as a metaphor where the product is seen as the winning side of a chess game, it is not often one gets advertisements with testimonials where the product was heard about over the chess board, as in this case! 

Chess - the Activity for Old, Sick People! Join Today!

The above is an advertisement for the Maccabi health insurance, asking for volunteers to help with old people who need friends and help in their home. Why is it that chess is rarely seen as played among younger people in ads? The top players, if nothing else, are all young. 

Advertisement

 

The state of chess funding in Palestine can be gleamed from this advertisement, brought to our attention by a frequent correspondent. It is by the 'Chess section, Ha'poel physical exercise union, the Histadrut' about a chess tournament to take place in 1937 in Netanya. The official advertisement (with the stamp, 'advertising tax paid') was actually hand written in pen. 

Street Advertisements

 

The above street poster from 1961 was brought to our attention by a frequent correspondent. It advertises both a lesson about opening traps and a simultaneous display (the next day) in the lecture hall in the Philip Murray cultural center in Tel Aviv. Both were given by Dr. Menachem Oren, Israel's first chess champion. 

"A Chess Players' Center"

 

On chess's increasing popularity we can learn from the following advertisement in Ha'yarden (August 11th, 1939, p. 9). It notes that the Ya'akov coffee house and restaurant in Tel Aviv has a "first rate kitchen," a "cool and breezy garden" (quite important in Tel Aviv in the summer before air conditioning!), and is a "center for chess players." 

More Chess Ads -- a Double Issue

Credit: Shachmat, Oct. 1964 (exact page?)

We add here, to our chess advertisement page, the following from the Oct. 1964 Shachmat.

It has two chess-related advertisements: one for avocados, 'the delicacy of kings', and another for Amcor's televisions. The interesting point is that at the time -- 1964 -- there was no Israeli television broadcasting, although it was clear that they will begin in the near future (the first broadcasts were in 1966).

But Amcor's TV were chosen (as the ad notes) as the close-circuit TV used to broadcast the games in the Olympiad -- as noted before in this blog, see, e.g., the 'Television' tag.

The First Live Chess Game in Palestine.

Source: National Library of Israel web page, brought to our attention by Moshe Roytman.

As the advertisement says, the first live chess game in Palestine was performed on April 24th, 1924 (NOTE: a somewhat earlier game, in March that year, took place in Tel Aviv. Check this blog's post from June 29th, 2019). Here is an ad for this extravaganza, reported (for example) in Ha'Sachmat, the journal of the Emanuel Lasker Chess club (Jerusalem), vol. 1 no. 4, pp. 61-62:  

On the fifth day of Passover a live chess show was set up by the E. L. Chess Club in Jerusalem. The show was part of the “national Passover festivities” and took place in the large sports arena in Beit Hakerem [a Jerusalem neighborhood]. A huge crowd was present. The 32 pieces were members of the E. L. chess club members wore original Jewish costumes, made by the members of “Bezalel”. The show was managed by club member Aryeh Pappo, who put much energy into it. The show, which gave great satisfaction to the audience, was very successful.

It is not clear why the ad says '40 persons' in special dresses will be there, given that there are, of course, only 32 pieces. Perhaps this is some advertisement "puffing". Interestingly, the name of the players or of the game result is not given in the advertisement, leaving the report of players to  Ha'Sachmat (ibid), which reported that the 'show managers' were Pappo, White, and A. Diskin, black. The use of the word 'manager' instead of 'player' and the neglect of mentioning the players in the advertisement make it likely that the performance was a reenaction of a famous brilliancy or some other pre-scripted event, not a genuine game. 

A "Life Chase" Match

Credit: The National Library of Israel "Time Travel" web site

A contributor to this blog had reminded me that Israel's national library, apart from a large physical collection of chess materials in rare magazines, etc., also has them on their web site. Entering 'שחמט' (Sachmat, chess) or 'chess' (in English) does indeed find quite a few items -- although, for this particular item, one needs to look for 'chase', not 'chess', for obvious reasons. Here, we have an advertisement for the live chess game between Marmorosh and Rubinstein.

One wonders whether more people came to 'Hapoel graund' to watch the chess game or the 'foot-ball' (i.e., soccer) game. One may also wonder about the number of typos and factual mistakes (Rubinstein was not, of course, the 'world chase [chess] champion'). This is especially surprising since, according to the item's description, it was printed in Ha'aretz press -- that of the most important newspaper at the time in Mandatory Palestine -- and is also of exceptional quality in terms of color and technical printing quality for the time.

Alla Kushnir Memorial Lecture, 28 10 13, Tel Aviv University

Source: www.scoopweb.com 

A quick note: there is going to be, tomorrow, a memorial lecture in the Gilman building in Tel Aviv University, room 496, starting at 18:30, in memory of Alla Kushnir -- or, as she later became known, Prof. Alla Kushnir-Stein.

P.S.

It seems that there is another Alla Kushnir -- a Ukranian belly dancer. At least that's what the search engine says.

Advertisements

Our frequent correspondent, Moshe Roytman, informs us of he following ad [top]  from "Der Moment", a Yiddish-language newspaper, on Oct. 13 1913, declares the publishing of the "first Yiddish chess magazine" edited by Salwe and Kreichek (my phonetic spelling and promising contributions from Emmanuel Lasker, Akiba Rubinstein, and others. Another ad for the same magazine - below - from Nov. 19 1913 notes that the latest issue has an article about King Solomon [sic!] and the Wonder of Chess". Mr. Roytman informs me that a total of three issues were published in Oct.-Nov. 1913.   

Only in Israel

Ad for the Novag chess computer. Shachmat, Nov. 1996 (inside front cover)

For the "only in Israel" file: Traveling chess sets and, later, computers existed (and were advertised) for decades, if not centuries, all over the world. But probably only in Israel does the advertisement say proudly (inside the grey-colored banner above the computer's image): "portable computers for travel and reserve army duty".

Interesting Chess Advertisement

Source: Ha'Tzophe [Israel], 28.10.1957.

Chess motifs in advertising are quite common, but this ad -- for Ariston Cigarettes -- is quite exceptional. The position on the board is a stalemate, and the ad (lower left, small text) explains (non-standard terms used are sic):

Black conquered a piece with his queen. But in this way he made White's king face stalemate. White is not in check and cannot move. The game was stopped as a draw.

It cannot be often that advertisements with chess motifs actually show a diagram with a meaningful position -- let alone one that demonstrates stalemate (as opposed to checkmate, or perhaps the array). Ironically, the motto of this chess-themed advertisement is, 'Ariston: Always the Victorious Champion!'.