EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 1 NABC – Orlando, FL November 24 – December 4 Dave Treadwell Sectional December 27 - 31 UNIT 141 Sectional January 6 - 8 Unit 190 Sectional February 24 - 26 Wilkes-Barre Regional February 27 – March 5 NABC – Kansas City, MO March 9-19 UPCOMING EVENTS My First One! Cue the Applause! I am honored to serve as the Delaware State Bridge Association (DSBA) President and I look forward to working with the talented members of the Board and the many others who volunteer their time to promote our fascinating game. The DSBA’s success is dependent on all of these volunteers and you! Since more communication is occurring electronically, the DSBA has invested in our web page found at www.Unit190.org. Yes, the DSBA is also known as Unit 190. The page is full of information and includes many links and I encourage you to go and check it out. Please acquaint yourself with two links on the home page: • First and foremost is the link to join the DSBA mailing/contact list. This link is in the lower left hand corner of the home page. You can join the DSBA mailing list by clicking on the red “Click Here”. Once you complete your information, you will receive emails about DSBA events, on an average of one a month. The mailing list is Unit 190‘s way of letting you know about our celebrations, parties, news, and events. You can always opt out of receiving our emails, so try it. • The second link is in the column of yellow tabs and entitled Unit 190 Information. When you click on this you will see a blue link to the Board of Directors. Once clicked, you can see every Board member with an envelope next to their name. Click on the envelope and email a Board member with your thoughts, questions and concerns. We are here to help you! I look forward to another successful year of bridge in Delaware! DSBA President Caroline Hughes ♣♦ THE DUMMY ♥♠ Quarterly Publication of the Delaware State Bridge Association ------------------------------- November 2016 DSBA PRESIDENT’S LETTER “Nobody knows the doubles I’ve seen . . . “
Transcript
EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 1
NABC – Orlando, FL November 24 – December 4
Dave Treadwell Sectional December 27 - 31
UNIT 141 Sectional January 6 - 8
Unit 190 Sectional February 24 - 26
Wilkes-Barre Regional February 27 – March 5
NABC – Kansas City, MO March 9-19
UPCOMING EVENTS
My First One! Cue the Applause!
I am honored to serve as the Delaware State Bridge Association (DSBA) President and I look forward to working with the talented members of the Board and the many others who volunteer their time to promote our fascinating game. The DSBA’s success is dependent on all of these volunteers and you! Since more communication is occurring electronically, the DSBA has invested in our web page found at www.Unit190.org. Yes, the DSBA is also known as Unit 190. The page is full of information and includes many links and I encourage you to go and check it out. Please acquaint yourself with two links on the home page:
• First and foremost is the link to join the DSBA mailing/contact list. This link is in the lower left hand corner of the home page. You can join the DSBA mailing list by clicking on the red “Click Here”. Once you complete your information, you will receive emails about DSBA events, on an average of one a month. The mailing list is Unit 190‘s way of letting you know about our celebrations, parties, news, and events. You can always opt out of receiving our emails, so try it.
• The second link is in the column of yellow tabs and entitled Unit 190 Information. When you click on this you will see a blue link to the Board of Directors. Once clicked, you can see every Board member with an envelope next to their name. Click on the envelope and email a Board member with your thoughts, questions and concerns. We are here to help you!
I look forward to another successful year of bridge in Delaware!
DSBA President Caroline Hughes
♣♦ THE DUMMY ♥♠ Quarterly Publication of the Delaware State Bridge Association ------------------------------- November 2016
A Patty Shaughnessy, Paoli PA; Marianne McClennen, Devon PA
B Denise Ucciferro - Raymond Boutin, Thornton PA
EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 4
THE ADVENTURES OF FLUSTERED FLO By Pieter Van Bennekom
In this latest episode, Flustered Flo will try to find an effective defense against the monster hand held by her right-hand opponent, but she will fail. Her nemesis, however, Smug Sam, with his usual braggadocio and chutzpah, will tell her how he did it. East Dealer; neither side vulnerable North ♠ J 10 8 3 ♥ Q 2 ♦ 9 6 2 ♣ A Q 4 3 Flustered Flo Loyal Larry ♠ 7 ♠ K 5 ♥ J 10 8 7 6 4 3 ♥ 9 5 ♦ 10 7 ♦ Q J 8 5 4 3 ♣ 9 8 5 ♣ 7 6 2 South ♠ A Q 9 6 4 2 ♥ A K ♦ A K ♣ K J 10 The bidding: East South West North 2♦ Double 2♥ 2♠ Pass 4NT Pass 5♣ Pass 6NT All pass Opening lead: ♦10
Flustered Flo is trying hard to learn some of the best defensive tactics to get in her opponents' way. On the diagrammed hand, played at a recent Regional tournament Pairs
EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 5
game, Flo had the West hand with only 1 high-card point, but a 7-card ♥ suit. When her East partner, Loyal Larry, opened with a weak 2♦ bid and her right-hand opponent Doubled, Flo knew that North-South probably had monster hands and would surely be headed for a slam. If Flo was going to try to interfere, she would have to make the most of her hand. She remembered from one of her bridge lessons that you don't “preempt over a preempt”, so she wasn’t supposed to say 3♥. Determined to bid something, she ventured a 2♥ call. That didn't slow down North-South, as North responded to the takeout double with a 2♠ bid, South jumped straight to 4NT to ask for Keycards and, finding out her partner had one keycard, South went straight to 6NT. Flo led the ♦10, the highest card in her partner's suit, but South won with the ♦A, went to the dummy with the ♣Q, took one successful finesse for the ♠K and claimed all 13 tricks. It was a tie for a bottom score for Flo and Larry. Some other North-south pairs went for the drop for the ♠K, instead of trying the finesse, and thus made only 6NT, while some other pairs played the Slam in Spades, making 6♠ or 7♠ the same way. Top score for East-West, however, went to Flo's nemesis, Smug Sam, who had also sat West. His opponents stopped at 3NT, but took all of the tricks. "Were you just extraordinarily lucky to play that hand against the most inept opponents, the only ones not to bid slam on that hand?" Flo asked Sam, when she found him in the crowd looking at the posted scores. "No luck at all," said Sam, smug as always. "I prevented them from bidding the slam." "How did you do that?" asked Flo. "I tried my best to interfere by bidding 2♥, but they steamrolled right over me to the 6NT slam, without even slowing down." "Bidding ♥ serves no purpose," said Sam. "Instead, after South's double, I bid 2♠. North passed, and when the South player, holding the monster hand but hearing nothing from his partner, signed off in 3NT." "You can't bid 2♠," protested Flo. "You have a singleton, the ♠7." "That's exactly the point," said Sam. "They called the director on me, and the director said they’d have to watch me for the rest of the tournament. But he also told me privately that it was one of the gutsiest and most effective psych bids he'd ever seen." "Your gall leaves me speechless," said Flo. "My opponents said more or less the same thing," said Sam, as he strutted away. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tamara Miles CONGRATS to the new Life Master!
EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 6
SPOOKY NOOK REGIONAL
October 31 – November 6
Top DSBA Award Winners
1. 67.95 Rick Rowland 2. 43.90 Ala Hamilton-Day 3. 29.35 Edward Maser 4. 26.38 Randall Berseth 5. 23.16 Terry Patton
6. 22.49 Christopher Marlow 7. 22.37 Paul Amer 8. 22.28 Kurt Engleman 9. 21.00 Samuel Amer
10. 20.60 Francis Taylor, Jr.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF BIRITCH
By Stephen Herrmann
Originally called Biritch, denoting an announcement, since players would announce or herald their
auction, bridge was derived from Russian Whist. Books on Whist date back to the mid-1700’s, while
the first book was written by none other than Edmond Hoyle, entitled Short Treatise.
In 1857, the English began playing Whist in a “duplicate” method to eliminate most of the luck
associated with the deal of the cards while the Americans, in 1883, had begun playing inner-club
matches. A duplicate board, originally called a Kalamazoo tray and invented in 1891, held the cards
separately so that different players could replay the identical hands. The idea was to eliminate change
and to reduce luck, thereby providing a truer test of skill.
Early accounts indicate that in 1903, some of the British civil servants stationed in India created a
method of bidding the trump suit, and coined the term “auction bridge”. A later account indicates that
auction bridge dates back to 1894, with Turkish or Russian origins from Plevna perhaps developed
during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-1878.
Bridge was introduced into New York society in 1893, using formal rules that had been recently printed
by Henry Barbey. While on a cruise, the American multi-millionaire, Harold Vanderbilt, introduced
exciting scoring bonuses in 1925, and auction Bridge became known as “contract bridge.”
The number one and two bestsellers in 1931, both bridge books written by Ely Culbertson, were The
Culbertson Summary and The Blue Book. Just like many Americans, President Eisenhower played
bridge regularly on Saturday night with top experts and attended national bridge tournaments, when
possible. President Eisenhower enjoyed bridge just as much as golf, and he was considered an excellent
player.
In the 50’s and 60’s, Charles Goren, known as “Mr. Bridge,” developed and popularized the game even
further. Goren appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1958 and was dubbed “The King of Aces.”
The Time article explained the basic rules and proclaimed bridge the “United States’ No. 1 Card Game.”
EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 7
1. 40.23 Rick Rowland 2. 27.36 Samuel Amer 3. 25.84 Richard Popper 4. 20.64 Steven Blomstedt 5. 19.61 Jonathan Baumel
6. 19.15 Marie Filandro 7. 19.15 Peter Filandro 8. 15.63 David Venetianer 9. 14.80 Pat Tylander
10. 14.47 Barbara Rhoades
Jean Brown CONGRATS to the new Silver Life Master!
WILMINGTON SECTIONAL
September 16 - 18
Top DSBA Award Winners
1. 22.61 Jeff Ruben 2. 11.96 Richard Popper 3. 11.42 Lois Stuart 4. 11.42 Jess Stuart 5. 7.72 Randall Berseth
6. 5.95 Mark Henderson 7. 5.69 Ala Hamilton-Day 8. 5.59 Melody Henderson 9. 4.43 Eileen Sandstrom
10. 4.40 KarenPollak
HUNT VALLEY REGIONAL
August 15 – 21
TOP DSBA WINNERS
1. 26.47 Barbara Rhoades 2. 25.29 Richard Popper 3. 16.49 Deborah Purbrick 4. 16.49 Andrew Purbrick 5. 13.14 Jeremy Xu
6. 13.14 Fred Gillespie 7. 11.53 Peter Wise 8. 11.53 Linda Szilagyi 9. 9.60 Mary Boyd
10. 9.60 Gail Levy
EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 8
“Now, how do you wanna play? Honest?”
Chico Marx in Animal Crackers (1935)
“NOT HONEST”
An older couple were playing and during the bidding on this one hand, the woman, quite noticeably,
placed her hand to her chest. Afterwards, the husband said, "I led a heart, just like you asked." She
responded, "No, I was telling you that I had a bust."
A friend tells a story of when he was playing bridge back in his university days. He had just sat
down at a table and accidentally kicked one of his opponents. He turned to him and said, “I’m so sorry.
I thought you were my partner.” At the 1975 Bermuda Bowl a pair of Italians, Gianfranco Facchini and
Sergio Zucchelli, communicated by playing footsie under the table. In the aftermath of their mischief,
boards now run beneath the table.
Two years ago, at the d’Orsi World Senior Bowl in Bali, Michael Elinescu and Entscho Wladow,
both of Germany, were found guilty of using a system of coughs to communicate to each other their
hands. Both men, who have been banned from playing together for life, are physicians.
More recently, Boye Brogeland had enlisted a Swedish player, Per-Ola Cullin, to crack a cheating
code. Cullin noticed that the board on which players pass their bids—a trap door at the bottom of the
diagonal screen opens enough for players to perform integral rites of play—was placed at certain spots
on the table to indicate preferences for an opening lead (e.g., if Fisher or Schwartz wanted his partner to
lead with diamonds, the board is placed on the middle of the table).
Boye Brogeland also led the charge against another top-ranked pair, nicknamed Fantunes. “The
evidence that Fantoni and Nunes threw their cards down either vertically or horizontally corresponding
to what types of cards they held is indisputable,” said Chris Willenken, a professional player.
PHILADELPHIA REGIONAL AT VALLEY FORGE
June 27 – July 3 TOP DSBA AWARD WINNERS
1. 61.77 Rick Rowland 2. 28.07 Mark Henderson 3. 24.62 Marie Filandro 4. 24.62 Peter Filandro 5. 24.22 Francis Bizzocco
6. 24.22 Janelle Gmitter 7. 18.34 Ala Hamilton-Day 8. 17.99 Francis Taylor, Jr. 9. 11.71 Melody Henderson
10. 10.14 Jeff Ruben
EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 9
ADVANCEMENT IN
RANK
JUNIOR MASTER
James Doherty Theresa Doherty
Mark A Nehra Alan B. Palmer
CLUB MASTER
Joan M. Carson Catherine S. Conaway
Edee C. Fenimore Joan T. Fultz Sugi Hayes
Benjamin M. Schenkel
SECTIONAL MASTER
Anne Bartel James C. Hart Peggy Sander Brenda Vogel
Yvonne R. Watson
REGIONAL MASTER
Karen C. Storms Joan H. Youse
NABC MASTER
Carol A. Niebler Donald Pyne
BRONZE LIFE MASTER
Karen Pollak John B. Strange
SAPPHIRE LIFE MASTER
Bernard E. Rehberg
“Director Please!” ACBL Tournament Director Sandy Cerato ([email protected])
HESITATIONS, QUESTIONS, and ACTIVE ETHICS
CREDIT: Larry Cohen and Chip Martel
ACBL Law 16 on Unauthorized Information, provides that no player may base a call or play on extraneous
information from partner: After a player makes extraneous information available to his partner by an action such
as a remark, a question, a reply to a question, an unmistakable hesitation, unusual speed, special emphasis, tone,
gesture, movement, mannerism, an unexpected alert or failure to alert or any other action that suggests a call, lead
or plan of play, the partner may not choose, from among logical alternative actions, one that could have
demonstrably been suggested over another by the extraneous information.
What this long sentence means is that it is UNETHICAL to take advantage of your partner’s tempo or questions.
When your partner takes 75 seconds to pass, you are not entitled to know that she has a problem. It is your ethical
duty (your obligation) not to take advantage. If you have marginal action, you must bend over backwards to do
what is counter-indicated. Just because your partner hesitates, however, you are not automatically required to
pass, but must take the normal/obvious action as if there had been no break in tempo.
A
DV
A
NC
E
M
EN
T
IN
RA
NK
A
DV
A
NC
E
M
EN
T
IN
RA
NK
“If you were me, how would you have played that last hand?”
“Under an assumed name.”
EDITOR: ALA HAMILTON-DAY 10
A note from the DUMMY Editor . . .
To these pages, I welcome Pieter Van Bennekom with Flustered Flo, and Stephen
Herrmann with his short historical article on Biritch. I solicited Director Sandy Cerato to
write a column on Active Ethics because of my irritation with some players who
“coffeehouse.” For kudos and compliments, my email address is [email protected].
![355 2x 3x 4x 5x ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ 3 4 KEILA – Human Rogue [3] : Before combat, Roll 1d6: (3-6) Escape Monster [4] : May ignore Servant encounter after reveal.](https://static.documents.pub/doc/80x56/56649d195503460f949eec88/355-2x-3x-4x-5x-3-4-keila-human-rogue-3.jpg)
