Personalia

With the first birthday greeting of this month we meet Eric Fisher from the English town of Hull, he looked back on 69 years on 7th September. The chess historically orientated Eric is "a guy well known in chess circles for his love of chess books and collecting chess items" (Internet) and as the secretary of his Hull Chess Club he has published for some years a club magazine for the members: "The Hull Chess Club Magazine" – at that time (end of the nineties) it was considered as the best of its kind nationwide.

Only one day later J. Ken MacDonald was next in line, the correspondence chess specialist from the Canadian city of Toronto completed his 59th year on September 8. The strong CC player - he has the CCCA Master title (CCCA = Canadian Correspondence Chess Association) - was appointed an ICCF Arbiter as early as 1985. At least in two cases (as far as I know) he appeared as a chess author: The Thirtieth Canadian Correspondence Chess Championship, 1974-5 (1975) and The Games of Daniel "Abe" Yanofsky (1997). You will find a photo of Ken on p. 81 of the book ICCF GOLD 50th Jubilee Celebration (1951-2001), published in 2002.

The same day our – in a double meaning – youngest member celebrated his birthday as Lawrence Totaro has just joined the KWA as a new member and with only 23 years he is simultaneously our KWA junior. Lawrence comes from the world-famous gambler’s paradise Las Vegas, according to his own words his specialty is Autograph Authentication. You will find numerous photos, autographs and chess memorabilia of maximum rarity at his website, it is worth a visit!

The next on our birthday list is a well-known figure in the German chess scene, Johannes Fischer from Berlin is now - 12th September – 41 years "young". He pursues his profession as a freelance translator, interpreter and journalist, and he should be widely known to most KWA members as an editor of the "Cultural Chess Magazine" KARL as no issue of this magazine is published without columns, contributions to main subjects, essays or reviews by his lively pen (for 18 years KARL was a club magazine of the chess friends Schöneck till it became available to the public as a quarterly magazine from No. 2/2001 onwards). You may find many additional articles by J. F. being worth reading at the KARL-online-Column. FIDE master Johannes Fischer is as well active as a chess player as he strengthens his club SC Leipzig-Gohlis in the 2nd "Bundesliga" (German Chess League). An expressive photo of "J. F. over the board" is available to you in a recommendable online review (in German only) by Harald Fietz.

Continuation on the next page!