AThe Danville Register Danville, Virginia Tuesday, September 14, 1965 - Page 8
Bobby Fischer Competes In Chess Tourney By Phone
U.S. Champion Denied Permission To Visit Havana
Havana, Cuba (AP) — Yugoslavia's Borislav Ivkov is leading the Capablanca International Chess Tournament here but the conversation is about the invisible man—Bobby Fischer, the United States champion from New York.
The onetime boy wonder of the chess world was denied permission by the U.S. State Department to come here. So he decided to play anyway from New York, sending his moves via a telephone-teletype hookup from the Marshall Chess Club in New York to the grand ballroom of the plush Havana Libre Hotel.
Cuban officials and Prime Minister Fidel Castro were delighted to have Fischer in the 30-day tournament which has drawn some of the best players in the world. Fischer, however, warned that he would withdraw from the tournament if Castro and the Cubans made political capital of his participation.
The story was headlined here and the phantom player has become the key figure in the tournament. His match with Ivkov was broadcast move-by-move over Havana radio. That 10th round match Friday was adjourned but the Yugoslav won it Sunday night when Fischer resigned on the 54th move.
Interest in Fischer is so high here that a girl working in the tournament's press office said that one afternoon she received 237 telephone calls, 236 of them asking about the Fischer match and the other a wrong number.
After 12 rounds, Ivkov is in first place with 10 points. Russia's Vassily Smyslov is second with 9½ and Fischer third with nine. Then comes Russia's Ewfim Geller 8½ and Holland's Johannes Donner eight.
The undefeated Ivkov captured the lead Sunday when, after beating Fischer, he defeated Cuba's Eldis Cobo in 50 moves. Fischer, in his 12th round match, defeated Hungary's Istvan Bilek in 40 moves.
