2007-09-23

DDG 100 years

On September 23, 1907, started the 15th Swiss Correspondence Championship, in which Andreas Duhm opened three games as White with 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.e4 dxe4 4.Nc3. Evidently, those games are the first recorded Diemer-Duhm Gambit games; the opening was named almost a half a century later by Emil Josef Diemer.

For a little-known gambit, a second cousin of the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit, the DDG is doing fine nowadays. Since 1995, the DDG has been made known both online and offline:

  • Brause by Steffen A. Jakob has been playing the DDG at Internet Chess Servers.
  • Several thematic DDG e-mail tournaments have been organized.
  • DDG variations have been analyzed on discussion boards.
  • Articles on the DDG have been published in the magazines of Tom Purser (Blackmar-Diemer Gambit World) and Tim Harding (Chess Mail).
  • The DDG has been briefly covered in the books of Tim Harding (Four Gambits To Beat The French), Eric Schiller (Unorthodox Chess Openings, Gambit Chess Openings) and Sarah Hurst (Chess on the Web).

Happy 100th birthday! Long live the DDG!

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Congratulations!!! J I celebrated with the oldest bottle in my collection: a 1966 Rioja. My chess was not worth much after that. My 'memorial game', a blitz against Mephisto, achieved a draw only. Van der Meulen,B - Mephisto, 23.09.2007: 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.c4 Nf6 4.Nc3 Nxe4 5.Nxe4 dxe4 6.a3 Nc6 7.Be3 Be7 8.f3 Bh4+ 9.g3 Bf6 10.d5 Ne7 11.fxe4 exd5 12.exd5 Bxb2 13.Ra2 Bc3+ 14.Bd2 Bxd2+ 15.Rxd2 0-0 16.Bd3 Re8 17.Ne2 Bf5 18.0-0 Bxd3 19.Rxd3 Qd7 20.Rdf3 b5 21.Rxf7 Rf8 22.Rxf8+ Rxf8 23.Rxf8+ Kxf8 24.Qf1+ Kg8 25.Nf4 bxc4 26.Qxc4 Qd6 27.Qb5 c6 28.dxc6 Nxc6 29.Nd5 Kh8 30.Nb4 Qd1+ 31.Kg2 Qd2+ 32.Kh3 Qh6+ 33.Kg2 Qd2+ 34.Kh3 Qh6+ 35.Kg2 Qd2+ ½-½
Bernd van der Meulen (NL)