Knievel’s hard work had finally earned him some attention. When he was well enough to start jumping again, the crowds and the financial rewards were bigger. He had taken to adding another car to each jump, and was up to sixteen when his luck dipped again on July 28, 1967 in Graham, Washington. After recovering from a severe concussion, he tried again the next month at the same place. Unfortunately, it was the same result. This time he broke a wrist, a knee, and two ribs.
Knievel finally made it onto television as a guest on the Joey Bishop Show later that same year. As his fame grew, so did the sizes of the crowds who payed to see his exploits.
Knievel kept jumping higher and longer, and announced his intention of jumping over the Grand Canyon.
In 1971, he sold over 100,000 tickets to back-to-back exhibitions at the Astrodome. Later, ABC offered to broadcast his jumps on Wide World of Sports, and that’s where most of us Boomers were exposed to Evel Knievel. His first WWoS jump was on November 11, 1973, successfully clearing 50 stacked cars at the LA Coliseum.
Despite his more and more spectacular jumps, the crowds clamored for the Grand canyon leap. However, the US government refused to allow such a thing to take place on the publicly-owned site. So Knievel opted to find private property somewhere that would make for an equally spectacular show.
On a flight back from one of his shows, he flew over the Snake River. He eventually leased 300 acres near Twin Falls and commenced setting up a launching ramp.
The jump was scheduled for Labor Day 1972, but test launches of the steam-powered motorcycle prototypes had them landing short of the far canyon rim.
Knievel finally commanded the tests to be stopped, and set the actual jump for September 8, 1974.
ABC was unwilling to shell out the bucks Knievel wanted for live broadcast, so the event was seen in movie theaters that had contracted to receive closed-circuit feeds of the jump.
The rocket-powered bike took off and seemed to have plenty of power to reach the other side. Unfortunately, bolts were sheared off due the massive acceleration and the parachute deployed early. Fortunately for Knievel, it wasn’t ripped apart by the still-accelerating rocket or he would surely have plunged to his death. Instead, the rocket was gently lowered into the canyon where it landed in the edge of the water, another lucky break. He could have drowned had it hit deep water.
Most of us saw it a week later on WWoS.
Knievel eventually retired to his Florida home. His youthful exploits taxed his health in his later years. He contracted hepatitis C from a blood transfusion (given after a crash) and ended up getting a liver transplant. Earlier this year (on April Fool’s Day), he announced that he had found religion. On November 30, his worn out, beaten up body finally gave out at the age of 69.
Here’s to Evel Knievel, one of our Baby Boomer memories who will be forever known as the king of the daredevils.
On November 30, 2007, Robert Craig “Evel” Knievel, Jr. passed away. His death at an advanced age would have been a surprise to many television viewers of ABC’s Wide World of Sports in the early 70’s. They were convinced he would die at the end of one of his stunts gone awry.
He was born in Butte, Montana in 1938. At the age of eight, he saw a Joie Chitwood Auto Daredevil Show. He was entranced by the performance, and decided at an early age that he wanted to make a living being a daredevil himself. Knievel became a teenager prone to getting in trouble. Dropping out of high school after his sophomore year, he went to work at the Anaconda Mining Company. Clowning around while driving an earth mover, he took down the power line that fed the city of Butte. The town was without power for several hours.
In 1956, a police chase caused him to crash his motorcycle. Knievel was hauled off to jail and thrown in a cell next to another local neer-do-well, William “Awful” Knofel. Legend has it that the jailer came up with the nickname “Evil” Knievel on the spot.
Knievel liked the nickname, but spelled it “Evel” instead.
Knievel had his hand in several activities, including rodeo, ski jumping, minor-league hockey, and his own hunting guide service that got him in trouble for his taking his clients to land that was part of Yellowstone Park.
Knievel first tried motorcycle jumping for dough about 1965. Putting together his own exhibition, he rode a few wheelies before a modest crowd, then made a twenty foot jump over two mountain lions and a big box full of rattlesnakes. His rear wheel caught the edge of the snake box, but he still landed successfully.
He loved the concept of being a motorcycle daredevil, but saw that he needed to hire more acts. He also needed a sponsor. Bobby Blair, a Norton motorcycle dealer, came on board and supplied bikes.
The first traveling show for Evil Knievel and His Motorcycle Daredevils was in Indio, California in January 1966. It was a big success, and he soon had other exhibitions booked. The next one, in February of the same year at Barstow, caused the end of the traveling troupe. Knievel was to jump over a speeding motorcycle coming straight at him. Mistiming his leap, the bike smashed into his groin (OUCH!) and hurled him fifteen feet into the air. He was hospitalized and had to quit performing while recovering. His traveling show disbanded.
When he was well enough to perform again, he began traveling solo, jumping over things. There were other motorcycle daredevils out there doing the same thing, so to separate himself from the competition, Knievel began jumping over cars.
At each performance, more cars would be added. He had been successfully jumping since his Barstow incident, but his luck ran out on June 19, 1966, in Missoula, Montana. An attempted jump over twelve cars and a cargo van. He came up just a bit short and broke his arm and several ribs. Back to the hospital.
Tomorrow, tune in for Evel Knievel’s story, part 2.
Once upon a time, Americans were entertained by vaudeville. Every town had at least one theater that might show silent movies and double up as a stage for live performances. Performers would travel from town to town doing their thing for small, eager audiences. Their specialties might be circus acts, music, dancing, comedy, stunts, acts of mental prowess, acrobatics, and in one unique case, a man who would swallow water followed by kerosene and regurgitate it onto a miniature building. The kerosene would come up first, setting the building on fire, followed by the water putting it out.
Small town America ate this stuff up. And even though vaudeville was killed by talkies in the 1930’s, an entertainment columnist by the name of Ed Sullivan knew that there was still a market for it in the fledgling television market.
So on June 20, 1948, CBS gave him a chance to prove his point. He did, for twenty three years.
Originally called Toast of the Town, the show soon simply became known as Sullivan. It became a solid anchor for CBS to dominate Sunday nights for many years. And it also became a part of our culture, a show that literally had something to offer to everyone in the family, regardless of age.
Perhaps its ultimate genius can be summed up by this simple fact: it was one of a very few shows that my television-spurning father never missed.
The Beatles’ first appearance on Sullivan
Ed was a man of fierce convictions. He fervently believed that entertainment should also be innocent, and ensured beforehand that any acts he booked knew that going in. If you crossed the line Ed drew in the sand, you were blacklisted.
In an unfortunate misunderstanding, that happened to comedian Jackie Mason. He was doing a comedic bite where he was flashing fingers. Ed thought he flashed THAT finger. He was barred from the show.
The footage of the bit exists, and it clearly shows that Mason never made an obscene gesture. But Ed thought he did, case closed. Mason went so far as to file a libel suit against Sullivan. A year an a half later, Mason was invited back and Ed publicly apologized. That placated Mason, who dropped the suit. But he still never appeared on the show again.
Spinning those plates!
Mason’s career took a hit. Ironically, the Doors used a similar situation to enhance their popularity.
Ed insisted that they not use the phrase “girl we couldn’t get much higher” in singing Light My Fire. Jim Morrison tentatively agreed. Then once he started singing, he changed his mind. He looked Ed straight in the eye and sang the line intact. Ed glared back, and a legend was created. Doors fans loved it.
I still remember the hodgepodge of acts, including the plate spinning guy. He would spin about thirty plates at the ends of sticks, adding them and keeping them spinning one at a time. It was great fun, and when I get busy multitasking at work, I refer to it as “keeping all the plates spinning.” The Boomers I work with know exactly what I’m talking about.
Sullivan was savvy enough to let the acts speak for themselves. He would give brief intros, then step back and let them do their thing. His stiff style and distinctive voice were much imitated by class clowns and professional impersonators alike.
He also featured black performers when it cost him advertising dollars to do so. Sullivan, who was aware of the prejudice received by his Irish ancestors, declared early on that the show would be open to all performers regardless of race or nationality.
It would be nice if the reality-TV obsessed networks would recall what a consistent success the Sullivan Show was. America still has a taste for vaudeville.
The date was November 24, 1971. A man on a Boeing 727 flying from Portland, Oregon to Seattle passed a note to a stewardess. The note said “I have a bomb in my briefcase. I will use it if necessary. I want you to sit next to me. You are being hijacked.”
Thus began the only unsolved airplane hijacking in US history. The man called himself Dan Cooper. He had done his homework, and had a plan to escape from the plane without getting caught. In fact, some speculate that he did just that, although the prevailing thought seems to be that he failed to survive his 10,000 foot parachute jump into a driving rainstorm.
The note demanded $200,000 and four parachutes. Once the actual existence of a bomb-looking device in a briefcase was established, the money and the parachutes were gotten together. The money, $200,000 in twenties, had all serial numbers recorded. Once the goods had been sent to the Seattle airport, Cooper gave the pilots permission to land.
Cooper had them dim the inside lights to deter a possible sniping. The plane taxied to a remote end of the runway and one person was instructed to deliver the ransom.
Cooper then had the 36 passengers released, and also had meals brought for the flight crew. The plane was refueled and then took off, with Cooper and the four-person flight team.
Cooper wanted to fly to Mexico City at an altitude of 10,000 feet at a slower-than-normal speed. But the pilot informed him that the plane would be sucking so much fuel at the low altitude that they only had a range of about 1,000 miles. So Cooper had them fly to Reno. When they crossed SW Washington, the crew felt a pressure change and saw a warning light come on. Cooper had dropped the rear-facing stairs at the back of the plane. A few minutes later, they heard a bump as the stairs bounced up against the plane as Cooper leapt from them. The crew flew on to Reno and landed.
Upon landing, the plane was rushed by the FBI, who confirmed that it was short one very significant passenger. Thus began a manhunt which continues today.
Twenty dollar bills found in Washington in 1980, with the serial numbers given to Cooper
The SW Washington area was combed by the authorities, who found no trace of Cooper, his parachutes, or his cash. The area was quite wild and woolly, so searching was difficult. Cooper was smart enough to jump out during a rainstorm, making it impossible for tracking Air Force jets to see his parachute, so the area to be searched was quite large in scope.
Authorities interviewed a man by the name of D.B. Cooper, but quickly determined that he was not their hijacker. However, the name D.B. Cooper was repeated on newscasts and other media so many times that eventually Dan Cooper “became” D.B. Cooper.
Evidence of Cooper was finally found in 1978. A placard showing instructions for deploying the 727’s rear stairs was discovered. It was from Cooper’s plane.
But the real breakthrough discovery was made in 1980. Eight-year-old Brian Ingram found 294 bundled twenty dollar bills in shallow water in the Columbia River. The bills were badly deteriorated. And they had serial numbers which matched those of the ransom.
Did Cooper survive? Nowadays, most doubt it. His backup chute was a dummy, and the design of his main chute was such that only an expert could land without getting injured.
Cooper is popular nowadays. He’s been featured in books, movies, TV shows, and the town of Ariel, Washington has an annual D.B. Cooper festival. Periodic findings of evidence put his name back in the news. For instance, in 2008, a parachute was discovered, but determined to not be his. Plus, his overall congenial treatment of the passengers and flight crew, and the fact that nobody was killed in the hijacking, make him almost admirable.
Perhaps you might be able to relate to today’s memory, perhaps not. Anyhow, here goes.
When I grew up in the 60’s and 70’s, I was quite fascinated by collecting insects. It was not unusual to find somewhere in my bedroom a collection of unfortunate victims impaled through their thoraxes with straight pins and attached to a board of styrofoam with little labels containing childish scrawl as to what their species was.
Of course, I had my Field Guide to the Insects to assist me in noting the subtle differences between, say, the Chinese and praying mantids.
It helped that from the age of nine onwards, I lived out in the country. So many a summer day was spent with my collection jar looking for insects who would be immortalized by having their carcasses mounted on my styrofoam board to be proudly shown to any kids who would visit.
I was just fascinated by bugs in general. I would capture many a honeybee or firefly to be confined in a mason jar with holes punched in the lid. A handful of grass and clover flowers would accompany them, of course, and some lived for days before they either passed or were granted a reprieve by me.
Bug collection
But gathering bugs for collections was a different matter. You would need a collection jar which would double as a killing jar. When you got back to the house, you would drop an alcohol-soaked cloth in with the bugs to cause their demise.
Once the little critters were belly-up, it was time to impale them and double-check the Field Guide so they could be properly identified, complete with scientific name.
Luna moth
Of course, the collections were fragile, so they would require rebuilding every year. No problem. there were always lots of bugs around.
I discovered that parking lots were amazing places to find exotic insects to add to my collections. They also had the added bonus of already being dead. Giant water bugs, Goliath beetles, rhinoceros beetles, and beautiful moths could be found beneath the big lights which had lured them to circle endlessly until their death from sheer exhaustion.
One morning I stepped out into the yard to find a gorgeous luna moth lying in the grass. I don’t think I ever saw anything so beautiful in my life (with the possible exception of Annette Funicello). I had seen photos of the beautiful insects, but had not yet seen one in real life. I proudly added the moth to my current collection of the time.
I don’t stick bugs to a board anymore, but I still enjoy strolling through parking lots when my wife and I walk our two schnauzers. I frequently spot big insects lying on the pavement that still give me a little thrill to see. My wife smiles patiently while I explain to her how rare it is to actually encounter giant water bugs.
It was the penultimate rivalry in boxing in the decade of the 60’s. Motormouthed Olympic champion Cassius Clay vs. quiet Sonny Liston.
Clay had won gold in the 1960 Games at Rome. Liston had become the heavyweight champ by Knocking Floyd Patterson out in the first round in 1962. The next year, he did it again. In the first round.
Liston was sort of an “preincarnation” of Mike Tyson. He had been arrested some nineteen times, was illiterate, and distinctly antisocial. Raised in abject poverty in Forrest City, Arkansas (named after the founder of the Ku Klux Klan), he ended up relocating as a teenager with his mother to St. Louis, where he had his first run-in with the law. Armed robbery.
He was later incarcerated for breaking a police officer’s knee and stealing his gun. In 1960, while Clay was winning gold, Liston was testifying before Congress in a probe of organized crime’s alleged control of professional boxing.
Liston had been widely rumored to have gotten himself involved with the mafia. It seemed a natural fit for a young man who had long been turning to illegal means to solve his problems.
In the first fight with Clay, Liston refused to come out for the seventh round. The world was outraged. The cries of fix were quick off the typewriters of sportswriters, and the tongues of commentators. It was widely assumed that Liston had taken a dive.
A second fight should put the matter to rest, or so boxing authorities thought. A match was arranged for Boston in 1964. Ali’s needing surgery to repair a hernia delayed the bout. Then late in the game, it was discovered that the promoters didn’t have a license to fight in Massachusetts. A May 25, 1965 match was quickly scheduled for Lewiston, Maine, in a small auditorium.
Is this starting to sound strange yet? Hold on, there’s more.
A tiny crowd of less than 2500 fans (think a high school football game) watched Liston hit the canvas in the first round. What they DIDN’T see was the punch that landed the knockout.
TV replays of “the phantom punch” seem to confirm that Liston wanted no part of defeating Clay, for whatever reason. Palindromically named Sports Illustrated writer Mark Kram claimed that Liston told him years later “That guy [Clay] was crazy. I didn’t want anything to do with him. And the [Black] Muslims were coming up. Who needed that? So I went down. I wasn’t hit.”
What really happened? We’ll likely never know. But Clay, later Muhammad Ali, was one of the greatest of heavyweight champs. He was certainly capable of beating Liston on even terms. But whether or not he actually did so will be fodder for debate for many years.
The decade of the 60’s is renowned above all for its protests, particularly of non-Caucasian races demanding an end to being treated as second-class citizens.
But what was going on in small-town America, the little burgs where many of us Boomer kids grew up?
Miami, Oklahoma was my hometown, as regular visitors of this site are well aware. And while we had a large percentage of American Indians, as did practically every other town in the Sooner State, I don’t recall seeing any black people while I was growing up.
Many communities that were located outside the deep south had sundown laws. The idea was that non-whites were welcomed during the day, but had best be out of town by nightfall.
Sadly, Miami joined the rest of Ottawa county in implementing a sundown policy. Black faces were rare all over the four-state area, comprised of the corners of Kansas, Missouri, and Arkansas that were close to the northeast corner of Oklahoma. In all likelihood, blacks were shunned pretty much everywhere outside of the larger communities like Tulsa and Joplin.
Black American civil rights leader Martin Luther King
The effect was that many of us white kids were greatly confused by the civil rights struggles. There simply was no such issue in our quiet little hometown. We were completely unaware of the sinister reasons why not. In fact, I didn’t learn about the concept of sundown communities until I was out of high school.
Kids in the first or second grade usually reflect the racial views that they heard growing up. Thus, some of my classmates professed a strong dislike of blacks. That was genuinely baffling to me (and many more of my friends), seeing how we hadn’t ever had any in town to get to know.
When Martin Luther king was assassinated in 1968, I can remember, sadly, a few kids expressing glee. Not me. My mom reacted with nearly as much shock and sadness as she did to JFK’s death, and I knew that I had no business being happy about such an event.
By and large, even though the dreaded “n-word” was used pretty liberally, the crowd I hung out with was pretty colorblind. While being called the dreaded epithet was an insult, we still admired the Willie Mays’, the Bob Gibsons, and the Lou Brocks of the sports world.
In 1968, as I have mentioned in a previous entry, we took a trip to Florida. We drove back through Mississippi, and it was there that I encountered my first (and only) white restroom at a gas station. There was a colored one as well, much dingier and smaller than the one that I was privileged to use.
Indeed, it was obvious to this eight-year-old kid that the white bathroom was probably cleaned on a daily basis, the colored one once a week or so. While the situation was probably a source of great comfort to the station owner, it was very unsettling to me. I wanted to get out of town as soon as possible, before there was any trouble.
I finally had an idea of what all of the marches that were being shown on the nightly news were all about. And while I didn’t angrily respond to any kids who expressed racist views, I didn’t join in with them, either. In fact, I remember my own crowd being quite open to the idea of any “colored” kids joining us for play. However, Miami continued to have none.
I could have been raised to refer to members of other races in with less-than-complimentary terms. My mother was brought up by a Texas hill country lady who used racial epithets in normal conversation with absolutely no trace of self-consciousness, just like her own mom did. However, my own mother broke the chain, and any use of derogatory racial nicknames by myself would result in as hard a beating as if I had let loose with an obscenity.
Apparently, other neighborhood kids were raised the same way. Many of us would look around to see if anyone in authority was listening before insulting each other with the n-word.
So I’m happy to have grown up naive about what all of the fuss was about in racial equality. But I’m certainly not proud of the reason that my town had no blacks living in it.
A Jan. 16, 1957 file photo shows Greg Cox, left, 7, in Altamont, Ill., as he looks at his friend Jon Douglas, 6, through the doorway while he recovers from mumps.
First of all, my DSL internet connection is dying fast. Next Friday, I get on cable, along with screaming 15 MB speed. but in the meantime, since working on the web under present conditions is pure torture, today’s column will be it for Boomer memories this week. Things should be back to normal by next Monday.
One of the reasons that we Boomers are so tough and resilient despite the various curve balls that life throws at us is because we had to endure multiple rounds of epidemic ailments when we were kids. These diseases were expected, even welcomed, as rites of passage that provided evidence that we were, indeed, growing up.
The goods news about mumps, chicken pox, and rubella measles was that once we went through the agony, that was it. We were provided with lifetime protection against future infections by our wondrous immune systems. So we knew, as we sat there in agony from itching, fever, and overall pain that once it was over, it was OVER!
But that didn’t provide any short-term relief. No, the only solace we received was that at least we were getting out of school. The very unlucky among us got infected in the summer. There was absolutely no good news about that.
Toddler with Chicken Pox
I remember having chicken pox. The evidence of the latter is found in occasional scars located on my 49-year-old physique. Why are they there? Because I didn’t listen to my mom, of course. She told me not to scratch, but I just couldn’t help it.
Obviously, most of us couldn’t help it. The majority of Baby Boomers have chicken pox scars.
There is really nothing unattractive about them. I remember having some heart-rending crushes on a young lady or two who had the telltale marks of a chicken pox infection of the 1960’s.
The infection lasted about a week, as I recall. Mom was working as a schoolteacher, and dad had his own job, of course, so I spent the week over at Terry Michael Browning’s house.
Such were the easygoing arrangements our parents had with each other. If one mother was unable to stay home with a sick child, she would trade out with other moms who would have sick kids of their own someday that needed watching.
Dennis the Menace advertising Rubella vaccine in 1970
Mumps were another agony that I recall having. My salivary glands swelled to the size of baseballs, or so it seemed. Any sort of movement was sheer agony, and the only relief that was available was orange-flavored Bayer Children’s Aspirin, which, as we all know today, will instantly kill any child who takes it. At least I was led to believe such when my own kids were small in the 80’s. Interesting, though, that we were given the little white pills by the millions in the 50’s and 60’s and survived.
The relief that aspirin provided was negligible, and my only alternative was to suffer. The good news was that the suffering didn’t last as that with chicken pox. It was a couple of days, as I recall.
Then there were the three-day measles. Also known as German measles and rubella, as much as a fourth of my second-grade class was out at once with the ailment.
As far as I know, I never contracted it.
Rubella was bad news for pregnant mothers who had never had the disease as kids. Their babies were born with defects, or were miscarried. Thus, this disease was aggressively fought by the medical research community in the 60’s. The first rubella vaccine was made available in 1969, and I can recall many posters at school announcing the need for us to get vaccinated. Maybe that’s why I never got the three-day-measles.
Vaccines against chicken pox and the mumps were developed later, with the result that our own kids and grandkids may have never experienced any of the big three rites of passage that we Boomer kids faced.
Obviously, not EVERY memory we had as kids was one we that want to relive.
An older Joe Namath, still basking in the glory of the third Super Bowl.
“The Jets will win on Sunday, I guarantee it.”
Those words by Joe Willy Namath now ring in infamy. However, they are given just a tad too much emphasis.
You see, the words weren’t spoken at a press conference. They were an off-the-cuff response to a Colts fan’s heckling. And while they were recorded by a reporter, they weren’t widely publicized until after Super Bowl III, when the Jets saved the concept of the Super Bowl by whipping the Colts. BTW, as I write this column, I offer a hearty congrats to the Colts, who are about to appear in their first Big Dance since 1971.
The AFL had been formed in 1959, the same year as Yours Truly ;-). The NFL didn’t pay it a lot of mind. After all, it had managed to outlast feeble attempts to upset its monopoly on the gridiron three previous times, each time by American Football Leagues.
But this incarnation had staying power. Lawsuits were filed by both sides as they competed for the public’s attention. The suits served the interest of the upstarts, getting them much-needed publicity.
Even though the NFL prevailed in court, a lucrative five year deal with NBC put the AFL on solid financial ground, and its popularity and profits continued to grow. By 1967, the NFL had quietly agreed to welcome the AFL teams under its oversight, forming National and American conferences that continue to exist today. And they also agreed to have a season-end showdown between the conference’s champions. The Super Bowl seemed an appropriate moniker for such an auspicious event (although it didn’t officially get the name until Joe’s game).
But the first two matches were far from competitive. Green Bay, with Bart Starr at his peak, destroyed Kansas City and Oakland in the first two games. Public interest was dwindling. How could we ever sell thirty seconds of commercial time for two and a half million bucks at this rate?
Enter Broadway Joe. The Jets felt like they matched up well against Baltimore, who would later become an AFC team themselves, making rematches in the Super Bowl impossible. But on January 12, 1969, the impossible happened. The heavily favored Colts fell to the Jets 16-7.
The next year, interest was high as once again the AFC prevailed (no predictions from Len Dawson, though). Kansas City beat Minnesota, once again in an upset. And in 1971, Baltimore, now an AFC team themselves, beat Dallas. Three in a row for the upstarts! In fact, they led the series.
The Super Bowl would from then on be the most eagerly anticipated sports event each year, although sometimes merely for its commercials, in the case of the John Elway-led-Bronco shellackings of the 90’s.
But we can all thank Broadway Joe Namath for putting the Super Bowl on the front burner.
Many of us Boomers grew up with chess sets in the house. Many of these were cheap plastic jobs imported from Japan. Some of us had prestigious cast or carved versions. But odds are that all of us, when sitting down to take on one of our youthful opponents, fancied ourselves to be the great Bobby Fischer, the world’s household name among competitive chess players of the 60’s and 70’s.
The first competitive chess tournament whose winner would be declared Europe’s best player took place at London’s Great Exhibition of 1851. Of course, you were aware that it was Adolf Anderssen who won, with accusations of unfairness by a defeated player, Howard Staunton.
I know, you never heard of them, but it’s interesting that the very first competition would be marred by the same controversies that would dog the sport throughout the 20th century.
For many years, it was Germany who spawned chess champions. In 1921, Cuban José Raúl Capablanca began a reign which lasted for eight years. He was eventually deposed by Alexander Alekhine, a French-Russian who would be a harbinger of the future of chess and its domination by those blasted Commies.
On October 17, 1956, a thirteen-year-old named Bobby Fischer took on master player Donald Byrne and defeated him in what a chess publication called “The Game of the Century.” Perhaps it was, but few outside of the chess community were aware of it.
That was about to change.
Boris Spassky, left, and Bobby Fischer, being interviewed before the big match
Fischer’s chess playing days began in May, 1949, with a set bought at a Brooklyn candy store. The six-year-old and his sister had to read the enclosed instructions to learn how to play. Fascinated with the game, Bobby began reading books documenting old games in order to digest the strategy involved. In 1951, eight-year-old Bobby began frequenting the Brooklyn Chess Club, where his education continued to be fed by master players. He joined other New York City clubs before his victory against Byrne put him on the map as one of the world’s elite players.
Two months shy of his fifteenth birthday, Fischer became the youngest US Champion in chess in 1958. The timing of the tournament also gained him the lifetime title of International Master.
Chess has a biannual tournament called the Olympiad, which is held in different countries. The US was a sporadic participant prior to the rise of Fischer, but he represented his country in matches in 1960, 1962, 1966, and 1970. His best finishes were silver in 1960 and 1966. The latter match took place in embargoed Havana, and Fischer was forced to play remotely, adding time delays as moves were communicated back and forth. This no doubt added to the pressure as he came up just short of winning the whole shebang.
In 1960, Fischer lost the championship match to Boris Spassky at the Mar del Plata (Argentina) tournament. Despite a strong dislike for Russian communism, he became lifelong friends with his rival Spassky.
As it would turn out, Fischer’s matches with his friend would be legendary, and would capture the world’s attention like the game had never before done in its history.
Fischer began competing in Candidates Tournaments, which would determine the players for the World Chess Championship. He had become famous enough by 1962 that Sports Illustrated interviewed him after losing out in that year’s competition at Curaçao. He accused the Soviets of playing to draws so that they could save their energy to concentrate on him. He claimed that the format of the tournament made Soviet collusion impossible to stop, and announced that he would never play in one again. The World Chess Federation was listening, and replaced the tournament format with a one-on-one situation that would make collusion impossible.
Thus, the door opened for a single talent to overcome a nation of talents.
However, Fischer didn’t take advantage right away. Instead, he concentrated on US tournaments and exhibitions. His fame grew, and earned him a profile and a cover picture on LIFE magazine in 1964. Sports Illustrated also did another feature article on his mowing down the opposition in that year’s US Championship.
In 1970, Fischer decided the time was right to go for the World Championship. He had achieved enough fame in the US that the media payed close attention as he began his quest. He competed in many big-name tournaments where doing well would get him to the big Championship match of 1972. He won often, and became a common name in the sports pages, a place unaccustomed to reporting on chess.
Fischer made it to the Big Show, and it came down to him and his pal Spassky at Reykjavik, Iceland. The matches went on from July to September, and ABC’s Wide World of Sports was there to show it to us breathless Boomers and our parents.
Finally, Fischer defeated his Russian opponent, and the first United States World Chess Champion began his reign. The US media went nuts, and Fischer was offered (and turned down) millions of dollars for endorsement deals. He did appear on TV, though, particularly on one Bob Hope special with Mark Spitz.
In 1975, Fischer failed to show up to defend his title, beginning a long withdrawal from the public eye. In 1992, he played his friend Spassky again in Belgrade, Yugoslavia in an exhibition match which earned him the wrath of his country. Yugoslavia was under a UN embargo (supported by the USA), and this match put him in direct violation of it. Prior to the competition, Fischer held a press conference and literally spit on the order that forbade him from participating.
After defeating Spassky yet again, he was now forced to live outside the US, or else face the legal consequences of his actions. He disappeared from public view again, and died in January 2008 in Iceland.
Fischer leaves a legacy of brilliance, obstinance, eccentricity, and some unfortunate anti-Semitic remarks, particularly painful to hear in the light of his mother being Jewish. He even wrote a friendly letter to Osama Bin Laden days after 9/11/2001, comparing their estranged statuses from the US and their shared hatred of Jews. Ecch.
But lest we forget, he was once the toast of the country. he also managed to put the pastime of chess firmly into the public eye, and that legacy will, it is hoped, outlast the decisions he made late in life.
BTW, if you haven’t seen it, I heartily recommend watching Searching for Bobby Fischer. It’s a warm movie that will leave you feeling good.
Knievel’s hard work had finally earned him some attention. When he was well enough to start jumping again, the crowds and the financial rewards were bigger. He had taken to adding another car to each jump, and was up to sixteen when his luck dipped again on July 28, 1967 in Graham, Washington. After recovering from a severe concussion, he tried again the next month at the same place. Unfortunately, it was the same result. This time he broke a wrist, a knee, and two ribs.
Despite his more and more spectacular jumps, the crowds clamored for the Grand canyon leap. However, the US government refused to allow such a thing to take place on the publicly-owned site. So Knievel opted to find private property somewhere that would make for an equally spectacular show.
