Newswink 13 · 1 July 1981 – North American Tiddlywinks Association

Document Metadata

Publication title: Newswink
Whole number: 13
Publisher: North American Tiddlywinks Association
Publication date: 1 July 1981
Number of page sides: 23
Editor: Rick Tucker
Preparation: Typewritten with handscripted headlines pasted onto sheets
Production: Photocopied in black and white on 8½” by 11″ white paper.
NATwA archives artifacts: Original typewritten pages with paste-up illustrations; original printed copies; digitized images of original printed copies.
Date updated: 17 August 2022

To do:

(2022-08-17) Restructure elements in Elementor Pro to have article sections and #hashtag-ids for each section
(2022-08-17) Add tw-divider widgets between articles
(2022-08-17) Add table of contents in Toggle widget
(2022-08-17) Add list of people mentioned
(2022-08-17) Add abbreviations used

An official publication of the North American Tiddlywinks Association
1 July 1981 · Edited by Rick Tucker

Evolution of the Rules

by Charles Relle

What makes modern Tiddlywinks the interesting game it is? In my view there are three elements, that of partnership, the fact that first place outscores second and third, and the squop and desquop element. In the Cambridge Thesis of 1955-6, all these are present. The scoring system was different: game points were 5-3-1-0, and squopping continued to the end of the game. The free turn rule had not been formulated. There was of course, no time limit. When an Oxford club started, it did not adopt squopping. In 1958 some experimental games were played between Oxford and Cambridge, and later that year the first ever Congress was arranged. At this the rules were revised, The 4-2-1 scoring system was adopted, and free turns limited. There was [note: continued on page 15] also a provision that if during free turns a player potted all his free non-squopping winks, he had with his next turn to free at least one wink, not necessarily his opponent’s. This was later written out of the rules. There was no compulsory time limit, and in games with a time limit, five rounds were not played after time.

It is interesting to reflect on the old ‘timeless’ game. Nowadays you can win by a pot-out, or by potting more winks than your opponents, or by covering them completely. This is a slight simplification, but broadly true. Then, you could only win by a pot-out. Therefore your strategy was directed only to a single conclusion, whereas now you work to one of several possible endings, but the necessity to pot out had consequences of its own. You could play pot-squop, even if the opponents did not. You might win outright, or if your potter was squopped, chances to rescue him often came when the opponents in their turn tried to pot out. If they made a mistake you were back in the game. Nevertheless, failure in a pot-out attempt could make things easy for opponents who played carefully and did not have to worry about a time limit. Playing double-squop against a much inferior pair you could of course gain control, separate one colour and pot it, but a match between equal opponents was a hard battle. Often you would try to pot some of the opponents’ winks to try to gain a numerical advantage on the mat. When both sides adopted this strategy, accuracy in potting and squopping became more and more important, for sometimes each colour was reduced to three or four winks, and a player in a position to make a sudden dash for the pot was all the more likely to succeed. Mistakes were punished immediately rather than eventually.

The advent of double squop in the 1959-60 season made time limits in matches a necessity, and focussed attention on the desquop rule. Cambridge took its stand on the provision in the Thesis that ‘follow through shots are quite permissible’, thus in a pile you could play first your own free wink and then any other. Cambridge saw the xylophone shot as a partial counter to the menace of double squop, whereas Oxford’s view was that in a pile you could play your own top wink and no other. It was Geoff Wilsher of Cambridge who in 1960-1 suggested the compromise that is the present desquop rule. The Oxford-Cambridge match of 1961 was played to a 35 minute time limit with no rounds after time. This system worked quite well for about a year, but there was a general unease about the game during this period that manifested itself in various ways. Peter Downes, who was running Etwa virtually single-handed at the time, proposed a radical change in the nature of the game: you got another turn whenever you potted or squopped, and any squopped wink was returned to its base instead of being immobilised. This variation was universally rejected. Nevertheless, there was a widespread feeling that the game was becoming too negative.

The seasons 1961-2 and 1962-3 saw the prevalence of double squop to the extent that potting almost ceased, and simultaneously the rise to prominence of the London University club. Bristol in 1961-2 broke the Oxford and Cambridge domination of the game, and London’s leaders, wanting to make their own mark, adopted a policy of winning at all costs. In particular, if they had a winning position, they would simply cease to play and wait for the time limit. Total stagnation of the game in more ways than one was threatened. Two measures, familiar enough to us, were brought in to counteract this threat. A potted wink was, from January 1963, to count 3 time-limit points instead of 2 as previously. This made it more profitable to pot at least some winks. At the [note: continued on page 16] Congress of June 1963, which I attended, the innovation of having 5 rounds after the time limit was accepted, but the refinement of making the rounds end with the player who won the squidge-off came later. Two points need to be made to complete the story to the end of 1963. One is that it was firmly settled that however many of your own winks you sent off in one turn, you lost only the subsequent turn. Previously the rule was one lost turn per own wink sent off, though I cannot remember its ever being applied. The other is that Peter Downes called the 1963 Congress to set up a proper Etwa committee and lawmaking body and give Etwa a constitution. His own zeal and efficiency made Etwa too big an organisation for him to run by himself, and it is due in no small measure to his wisdom and foresight that organised Tiddlywinks exists today.

The next changes came in 1965: in the main they were definitions or affirmations of existing practice, but two changes affected the general course of the game. Now the player who won the squidge-off ended the rounds, ‘a decided advantage’ as the Etwa document E3 remarked. The point transfer in potted out games also came into effect. It was described as an experiment, but it has stayed with us. From 1965-70 people were, I think, most concerned at Congresses with playing the game and setting up an efficient international organisation. Tiddlywinks existed in all four home countries and regular contact with America seemed unlikely. Mine was one of the few voices in favour of allowing for correspondence and meetings with America. In fact, an Iftwa constitution and secretary-general came into being in April 1970, but not long afterwards British Tiddlywinks was confined to England and contacts with America had not properly begun. The only change in the rules of the game was the provision that if you sent one or more winks off the mat you lost your next shot, not your next turn. This in fact conformed with accepted practice and came into force in April 1967.

From 1970 to 1975 I was in exile in Carlisle and it was not until mid-1977 that I began to play [a]gain, so my account of these years is based on written sources and surmise. Winking World has no serious mention of the rules until May 1973. Why? I suspect Etwa was becoming more cost-conscious and did not want to reprint the rules. Also there was a recurrent demand for more Tiddlywinks and less talk at Congresses, and this was put into effect. But this fact, and the American tour of 1972, pointed up ambiguities and differences in interpretation, so that by 1973, to quote Winking World 22, ‘the inadequacy of the rules had been felt for some time’. Before the Etwa Congress of 1973 Jonathan Mapley had drawn up a set of proposals, incorporating some ideas of his own. On the whole the Congress decided to keep the rules as they were, accepting better definitions of existing practice, and rejecting innovations. A committee of three was set up to rewrite the rules incorporating all the changes. This committee consisted of Jonathan Mapley, Alan Dean, and ‘Bungy’ Wells, a lawyer. The resultant document was an amalgam of the rules as they were before with extensions attempting to cover all situations, and of certain Etwa directions, such as that which required the surface to be smooth, hard, and horizontal. In their search for unambiguous definitions these rules sacrificed intelligibility to an unacceptable degree, and it was tacitly or openly decided that they would not be supplied with new sets of winks as they would repel new players. In my opinion this decision was wise. These rules are, however, still in force. Another attempt has recently been made by Etwa to rewrite the rules.

The groundwork has again been done by Jonathan Mapley, and the proposals have been discussed by Etwa and worked over by a committee consisting of Jonathan, Keith Seaman, and myself. It is inappropriate, of course, for me to comment on these proposals in this article.

From this survey you can see three stages in the development of the rules: an experimental stage, lasting until the Congress of 1958, when the main body of the rules was universally established; an adjusting stage, lasting until 1965, which catered for new approaches to the game; and a refining stage, lasting until the present day, which has had to deal with the discovery and definition of new situations. This brings the story up to date: what conclusions can be drawn from it? The first is that players are overwhelmingly content with the rules as they are, or as they imagine them to be. The [note: continued on page 17] second is that all players think they know what the rules are, but most of them do not. The third is that any discussion of the rules by any large number of people produces chaos. This may not be apparent from my narrative, but it is true. The rules are a whole body with many members and it is only when they are seen as such that they can be satisfactorily formulated. What do players want from the rules? Something like this: a set of unambiguous provisions that cover all the situations we have encountered and can foresee, and that are simple and clear enough to be understood by beginners at first reading.

Do I see any problems for our legislators to tackle in the future? Yes, one, certainly that of time. A few players do take too long to play, both before and after the time limit and they hold up a whole tournament again and again by doing so. This is a very grave disservice to the game, for it drives away by sheer boredom new players more surely than a whole series of 7-0 defeats. If we cannot devise a method of speeding up slow players within the framework of the rules, we should refuse to accept entries to tournaments fror them.

Tournaments to Come

After having gotten some reasonable feedback from various sources, the following major tournaments have been scheduled for the up and coming season:

Oct 10-11 Semi-unstacked pairs @ Haverford

Nov 14-15 Funtinentals @ Ithaca

Dec 5-6 Boston local tourney, leaning toward Open pairs
Feb 20-21 Continentals @ KIT

Apr (to be decided) Pairs @ Ithaca

May 29-30 Singles @ to be decided

These are the primary tournaments and it is assumed that there will be others, particularly in Boston (like a Halloween tournament & the Silver Squidger) and New York (Dragon Cup). At this time the formats for some of these tournaments is somewhat in doubt but here is a general idea of what will happen:

Semi-unstacked Pairs

This cleverly named tournament has your basic pairs format but there won’t be any superstar pairs. It hasn’t been determined if this rule will be strictly enforced or just strongly implied. Sunshine hopes the strongest pairings will be on the order of Larry-Fred or Sunshine-Carl.

Funtinentals

7 or 8 game match based on gangs of 4. Right now we may get as many as 9 or 10 quads so the scheduling is somewhat in doubt. It might be a Swiss format or just moliminously random scheduling against other quads you want to play against. If the weather is good on Saturday we might play only 5 games then and a few more Sunday in order to get in some non-winking activities on Sat. This is strictly a fun tournament and anybody violating this rule will have their career stats deperitively razed.

Boston local

If people want, we can have a Boston Open Pairs to take the place of the defunct Canadian Invitational Fairs. England seems to get a good turnout for these types of tourneys so maybe we should have more of them. Any strength pair is OK; this gives a chance to see other pairing[s] than will appear in April. Other formats could include a pick-up teams or simply something like the Easterns usually is. (= 5-way pot-squop, anyone? =)

Continentals

It looks like a split A B division, with 4 teams in the A and the rest in the B. The A division will have 4 teams of 6 with the affiliate system in effect. Each A team is allowed 3 affiliate players if they want (Sunshine says that in the old days the largest team you could have was 9 winkers for 6 playing at a time) and these people are free to rotate in, allowing the other A people to rest or play in the B.

In effect, this means teams of 9 or less, with 6 playing at a time. When the 3 A players are not competing in the A division they could either sit out or play B games. This may create timing problems between the A & B divisions which will have to be worked out.

At this point, based on what happened at last year’s Continentals and people’s general feelings, it looks like the 4 A teams would be Alliance, Relix, MIT, and either Chickens or an old Somerville revival plus Sev & *. There should be at least 4 B teams: the Galoots, some of Chickens, some Toads, and at least one Ithaca-based team. The B division is primarily a fun division, and if those teams want to do something other than strict team play that’s fine. I think this format should allow everyone to get in the right blend of fun and competitive winking and still determine a team champion.

Pairs & Singles

If we get about the same number of entries as this year then the format will probably remain a full round-robin plus a playoff. Dave keeps bringing up the knockout format for one of these tournaments, but the TKOs are extinct. Similarly, I haven’t heard that much interest in totally separate A & B divisions. It seems that if people come to these tourneys they want at least some games against the inexsuperable. If we start getting more than 12 entries, then the format probably will go to 2 divisions with an eventual split to A & B.

I have tried to get as much feedback as I could in setting up dates & formats. Hopefully most of NATwA’s desires are reflected in the schedule. Tell me or Sunshine if anything is objectionable. The dates should be considered fairly inflexible.

The Larry Kahn Story

by Sunshine

Larry first spotted winx in the MIT freshman catalogue. He came to Cambridge in the fall of 1971 knowing that he wanted to become a winker (and also to change from a nerd into a person). Thus, winx joined his two other established loves—bridge (since early 60s) and Frisbee (late stage of high school). ‘I imagine that given an infinite amount of money, I could be happy doing nothing but these three things for the rest of my life’.

Larry’s rookie season was an unexceptional one, his 3.60 ppg was only the 9th highest amongst NATwA rookies. He did manage to score 51 points in the B division of the ’72 Continentals. Breaking 50 seemed insignificant at the time (the total was surpassed by other B division stars such as Ross Callon, Scott Hirsh, Dave Lockwood, Craig Schweinhart, & RG [Roger Jenkins]) but it was the first of a record 10 straight (1972 through 1981) 50+ Continentals. In Larry’s second and third seasons he played almost entirely with a faster rising star — Dave Lockwood. Larry enjoyed playing with Dave … ‘We were the same type of people—but I’ve mellowed since then.’ It was in April 1974 that Dave & Larry inflicted the first 7-0 defeat in the careers of Bob Henninge & Ferd [Wulkan]. Larry traces his interest in winx statistics to his personal rivalry with Dave as they started to receive recognition and moved up in the NATwA rankings. Much of NATwA still saw Larry as only part of Dave & Larry despite his obvious talent. Severin Drix remembers being quite upset [note: continued on page 18] losing to the pair in 1973 when they indulged in macho/vulgar/insulting chatter and behaviour. ‘I saw Larry as the complete antithesis of what a human being should be.’ In the 1974 Singles Larry was disappointed in his last place finish in a tough field of 7 even though he did defeat Sev and *.

Bridge took up more of Larry’s time at MIT than did winking. ‘There were more bridge players and they were more accessible.’ With the formation of an MIT ultimate team, Larry also spent much time on the Frisbee field (see Newswink 9, page 7). His Frisbee specialties include distance and golf. Larry is naturally talented with plastic disks.

In Larry’s last year at MIT (1976) he nearly led the team (with his regular partner, Rick Tucker) to an upset of the powerful Zoo. Larry considers coming close with the underrated team as his best moment in team competition (even though his next team—Renaissance—would capture three straight team titles). Larry had earned some admirers in the last two seasons. * now considered him NATwA’s best shooter (still a little work on strategy) and much fun to play in informal singles games. Larry had also won over his former critic—Severin. A number of interesting/high skill level/enjoyable games had left Larry and Sev with a mutual appreciation of each other’s abilities and approach to the game. They already had agreed to be part of the future powerhouse Renaissance and were considering playing in the 1976 Pairs as well. Larry was undecided between Sev and Dave until the now infamous Dave-Tina incident at the 1976 BIT pushed Larry to Sev and changed the course of NATwA history. The pair would win 3 straight NATwA titles. Their record, against mainly top competition, is an incredible 51-10-2 for a 5.12 average. In their first match together—the 1976 Pairs—stellar play by Sev offset a rare poor Larry performance in the last game to varely [sic, should be barely] win the championship. After one of many bad shots, Larry was heard to exclaim ‘I’m playing like horsemeat’. The nickname (helped by a T-shirt of the same name) has stuck.

Larry was now finished at MIT, with BS and MS degrees in Ocean Engineering (his childhood in Miami had left him with a love of the ocean),and was off to Washington DC to start his professional career. After a summer of nonwinking in the not so distant boondocks, Larry reappeared in the fall of 1976 to post an obscene 6.25 ppg at the Westerns and has rarely been contained ever since. Through the 1981 Singles Larry has a streak of 25 straight matches above 4 ppg, has averaged 4.92 ppg the last 5 seasons, and easily snatched his 4th NATwA ppg crown this season. In the 1977-78 season Larry threatened Bill Renke’s till then seemingly unapproachable record of 5.38. However, a late collapse at the Singles dropped Larry from 5.44 to 5.10 and from a 5 point lead in the match to third place. Though disappointed, he was not psychologically destroyed. ‘It would have been nice to have won, but I know I’d win the title eventually so I saw no reason to worry about it. I felt worse winning my first Pairs when I played badly in the final game’ (and earned his nickname) [note: continued on page 19]

The summer of 1978 did supply two highlights of Larry’s winking career. Sev & Larry, after dominating NATwA for three seasons had decided to part company and capped off their career, part I, by defeating the English champions (Keith Seaman & Alan Dean) for the World Pairs title. And during a practice at home, Larry would lower the 12 small winks from 3 feet record (see Newswink 11, page 6) from 23 to 21, a feat perhaps comparable to Beamon’s smashing the world long jump record by nearly 2 feet at the Mexico Olympics.

A new and less publicized nickname surfaced on the England trip—Igor, as in Igor unchained—Dr. Frankenstein (Sev) unleashing Igor (Larry) on opponents.

Larry also did well on the Frisbee field in 1978. He captured the Washington distance championship and also made it into the Smithsonian exhibit in a picture demonstrating Frisbee technique. In England he managed to throw 7 Frisbees simultaneously to
7 winkers at a distance of over 20 yards.

A lackluster 1978-79 season taught Larry that he could not get away with not practicing. He has rebounded well, staying around 5 ppg the last two seasons, winning two Pairs titles and the 1980 NATwA Singles crown (& 1981, too). Winning the Pairs with Arye Gittelman meant a lot to Larry as it was his first title as the leading strategist of a pair. However, Dave defeated Larry in a classic battle to keep Larry’s hands off the World Singles title. Larry has since gained some revenge by defeating Dave in winning the 1981 Dragon Gup and the 1981 Singles (look out Dave, if you get by Jon Mapley).

Larry has played nearly 2/3 of his nonsingles games with three partners—Dave Lockwood (all-time pair leaders in games & wins), Rick Tucker (4 Continentals, a 47-17 record therein), and Severin Drix (4 Pairs titles). Rick finds that ‘playing with Larry raises my own level of play. Larry makes the flow of the game quick and enjoyable.’ Playing together in the 1981 Continentals was their first match together in 5 years. Rick commented that ‘Larry’s approach to the game, his style is much the same except that now he is much more concerned about not upsetting opponents and not dwelling on negative moments.’ Sev says ‘Larry is confidence inspiring and relaxing—not just because of his awesome shotmaking ability—it[‘]s the combination of his ability and relaxed approach to the game. Larry is not just feeding his ego with his accomplishments, and has a genuine appreciation of good play, whether his own, his partner’s, or his opponents’. He is psychologically unconvoluted. He may hide behind a crude mask at times but he is quite sensitive and responsive to beauty. Just watch him around plants. (ask his philodendron, a companion since 1975.)

How does Larry approach winking? ‘I just like to play with good partners and opposition to have fun. I’m competitive and like to win, but I want my opponents to have a good time when I’m doing it.’ Sunshine feels that this is an accurate picture of Larry the winker. ‘Larry is the player I most enjoy being stomped by.’ Larry most enjoys informal high-quality winx (like quick 10 games of singles with * on his visits to DC). He feels he could develop a slow/methodical strategic approach to the game and learn to coordinate it with his technical skills to perhaps improve—but that he would not enjoy the game as much as he does now. Some of his most enjoyable winx moments come when he pots winks off of piles from seemingly impossible positions (proving Jon Mapley’s ‘No Wink Unpottable’ theory) or when he makes one of his frequent 3 foot squops on cue (one of the most frightening sounds in tournament play is Sev telling Larry to ‘squop that wink’), Larry does not know how to explain his miraculous shooting ability but he does have a winkx [sic, should be winx] roll theory. Something about the ratio of the diameter of wink to diameter of squidger affecting the amount of surface area of the squidger making contact with the wink and thereby determining roll potential (see Larry for details). Research in this area may have been inspired by his record-making performance in the 1978 Pairs when he sent 4 straight squidge-ins off the table. Asked if he had any remaining goals in winking, Larry responded that ‘I’d like to be in Ithaca sometime when it’s not precipitating.’ Ithaca has not been unkind to Larry on the mat—he has a career 4.87 PPg in Ithaca games. Larry intends to always be a winker.

Since moving to Washington, Larry has been more involved with NATwA affairs, contributing as much as he could in a nonwinking center. He has written a number of articles for Newswink over the years, and now that Rick and Fred Shapiro have moved to the DC area, he is even more active on the paper (besides being featured in this article). He also has spent a lot of time [note: continued on page 20] experimenting on winx equipment. In 1974 at the Marine Ocean Laboratory he first worked with polyvinyl chloride (PVC) for squidgers. In 1978 he devised a method for dewarping winks (and also for creating a ‘Pringles’ set) and more recently, Larry has dewrinkled mats. He considers himself an expert on the physical properties of winx equipment. He personally uses 8 different squidgers: Big Mama for bringins/pile destruction and for potting squop-style, a Schiller thin for most potting, a Tucker thin poker chip or a 1″ thin for boondocks, a PVC thin edge for most squop shots, a 2″ extra thin for medium range big wink squops, a 1″ PVC for shots near the cup and for Bristols, and an old grainy green for potting big winks and small nurdled winks. His 9″ cylindrical squidger was ruled illegal before he had a chance to find its optimal use when Dave broke a wink using it to smash a pile. Larry loses only 3 Frisbees (of the over 100 in his bedroom) in playing Frisbee golf—perhaps this shows winx’ priority over Frisbee in Larry’s life.

Larry essentially took over the SecGenship (with some pushing and standard PBTT help from *) before this year’s Continentals when it was necessary that someone coordinate matters so that there could be a Continentals. The Congress in Haverford confirmed Larry’s position. Larry would like to see NATwA get much larger to the point of leagues, money, sponsors, and travel options. His favourite team was Renaissance but felt the team was too strong to continue on—though he would have enjoyed playing against similarly talented teams. However, his goals as SecGen are much more limited and, hopefully, realistic. Larry would like to solve the equipment problems and continues to research this area. He also wants to help revive winx interest in veterans and to attract more novices (see Newswink 12, page 1). He has started a policy of letters to team leaders in an attempt to establish an active communications network, something missing in NATwA the last few seasons. Let us hope that he will not fall prey to the curse that has struck down all but one SecGen over the last 8 years (only Red Scarf escaped from the disease of lessened activity and enthusiasm).

And what of Larry’s current non-winking life. Larry sees himself as an independent individual and feels that people should be responsible for themselves. He is strongly against government control of individual freedom of choice. He feels one should be able to do whatever one wants as long as it does not hurt anyone else. This is the philosophy he brings with him to SecGenship.

Larry has settled (at least for now) in the Washington area. He enjoys his work (computer simulations of ships/cable systems/ anything that goes in the ocean). If he ever gets around to doing his thesis, he will complete an MS in Mechanical Engineering. He has recently bought a townhouse in Montgomery Village, 15 miles north of DC. Larry still plays bridge ‘for enjoyment, not master points’. He feels he does not have enough time to go to major tournaments to sit inside for a whole weekend. The game has long appealed to him (20 years) with its fast-moving, analytical, and complicated play. Larry would like a chance to compete in a NATwA bridge event and sees himself as a contender for top ranking (Larry and MP were unable to attend the 1980 NH bridge event taken by TDl). Frisbee is still a major part of Larry’s life, supplies a physical outlet, but, again, he does not have enough time to pursue the tournament circuit. It seems that winx has won out over bridge and Frisbee. On the personal level, Larry would like to eventually settle down in a long-term relationship (but not get married until the tax laws are changed) with someone who shares an interest in at least 2 of his 3 favorite games.

—

WANTED: Pictures, Drawings,
Humor, Insight, Locations.

EDITOR: Rick Tucker
2701 WOODEDGE ROAD
SILVER SPRING
MARYLAND 20906
USA

1981 ContinenTales

by Fred Shapiro

I have to begin this year’s Continentals article with an apology to Mr. Bill Gammerdinger, who complained with justification that I didn’t give him enough credit in describing the last game of the 1980 Continentals in last year’s article. His 5th round pot-out in that game, though not a source of great pleasure to me personally, probably ranks as the pre-eminent clutch performance in NATwA history.

The 15th NATwA Continentals convened at Haverford College, Pennsylvania on February 14-15, 1981. This, the first “Third World” Continentals site since Toronto in 1971, was arranged by co-woy Beast [David Solomon], whose initiative in organizing the Continentals in a very pleasant and central location merits all of our appreciation.

The championship had been expected for some time to be a Relix-Alliance battle. The Relix had added free agents Tim Schiller and Ferd [Wulkan] and unretiree Dave York to last year’s photo-finish victors. Pairings of Bill [Renke]-Bill [Gammerdinger], TDI-Ferd (A); and Tim-Charles [Frankston], Scott [Hirsh]-Dave Y (B) resulted in what was obviously the strongest B quad ever assembled. (Format was biquadrophenic, with the A scores multiplied by a weighting factor of 1.5.)

The Alliance came to its initial Continentals one player short. The nucleus of Dave Lockwood, Larry Kahn, Joe Sachs, Rick Tucker, and Fred Shapiro had been augmented by Paul Mailman and their own high-priced free agent, Martin Ross, but efforts to get an 8th person to show up had been in vain. Various negotiations ended in the decision that an Ithaca person would not be picked-up and that a 1/3 penalty had to be incurred for singles play in the B quad.

The Relix opened up a lead on Saturday which stood at 8 5/6 points at the end of the day. A highlight of the day’s winks was the announcement that Bob Henninge and Sue Crapes[‘] 5-2 win over Arye Gittelman and David desJardins was the 5000th NATwA game. (Was Bob in the 1st NATwA game?) It was obvious that Relix’ B quad was overwhelming its opposition, and that the penalty-ridden Alliance faced an uphill struggle.

On Sunday morning the Alliance’s fortunes seemed to take an upswing. MIT, with its mismatched B quad following orders to take 30 seconds for each shot, turned in a strong score against Relix, losing by only 37½-32½. This had the effect of closing the Relix-Alliance gap, so that at the end of the round-robin the Allies had moved into a 4 3/4 point lead.

All indications now pointed to a classic head-to-head playoff between the contenders, but all indications were wrong. Alliance B got the win over Relix A that they thought would wrap it up (Martin 5 1/2, Mr. Sluggo Show [Bill Renke and Bill Gammerdinger] 1 1/2), but Relix B showed Alliance A that they could beat strong opposition too, winning 3 of 4 games and outscoring the vaunted super-quad 15-13. As always, the Relix proved to be a very talented and very classy team, and worthy NATwA team champions. For Bill Renke it was his 6th Continentals triumph (these are real numbers, Severin [Drix]), for Ferd and TDI their 5th, and for Tim Schiller, Scott Hirsh, and Bill Gammerdinger their 4th. (Other 4 time winners include Joe, Bob [Henninge], Jeff Wieselthier, and Severin Drix.) For Allies Rick and Fred it was their 4th straight second-place, with Rick notching a record 5th lifetime second. The Dragon snapped his string of 5 straight NAC [North American Championship] 3rds.

Old faces not seen for a while were popping up everywhere. Dave York hadn’t played in 2 years, Martin in 3, Tim in 4. Paul Mailman had played a handful of games in the past few years, but it was his 1st Continentals since 1972. What with Fred, Ross Callon, Carl Chenkin, MP Rouse, Brad Schaefer, Lyle Hodgson, and Beast Solomon all having made comebacks of one sort or another recently, the “unboondocking phenomenon” mentioned in last year’s article seems to have become a major force in NATwA’s hopefully continuing vitality.

FINAL TEAM STANDINGS (1½A+B)
1 Relix               230 1/6   + 55 = 285 l/6
2 Alliance            234 ll/l2 + 29 = 263 ll/l2
3 MIT                 176
4 Chickens            156 2/3
5 Elementary Penguins 141 3/4
6 Toads               110½

LEADING SCORERS
Joe Sachs                        10-2 60½ 
Larry Kahn & Rick Tucker          9-3 58 
Scott Hirsh & Dave York           9-2 52½ 
Tim Schiller & Charles Frankston  9-3 56½

*’s BLEPHAROSPASMISTS

Ross ) sleeps a lot, grows green things, writes term papers for the government, novice land baron, collects Galoots, allergic to cigarettes, sleeps a lot ( Callon

Arye ) former MIT student, into Ping-Pong, guitar, and fancy Chinese cooking ( Gittelman

Lyle ) senior office assistant and meandering crotchety fuzzling puzzball ( HodgsonKen ) future Prime Minister of Israel, gameshow hopeful, unpublished novelist, tall ( Moraff

Matt ) bikes, writing, lightning hitches, has left ear pierced ( Sola

Doug ) operations research, music listening (hopes to be humming Dead tunes on Wall street), the outdoors ( Young

John ) D & D, programming ( Reppy

Pang-To ) soccer/volleyball, plans to go to med school ( Hsu

Ed ) lives in IHS auditorium doing lighting, also skiing elsewhere ( Morse

Jim ) lives in IHS computer room ( Butler

Sam ) dressing up for winx matches ( Pottle

Bill R ) applications analyst in banking world, avid European vacationing photographer, now #777 on new softball team, tired of the Dead, still living in basement dungeon but with an Apple micro for company ( Renke

TDI ) systems analyst, married homeowner in Patriots country, tournament bridge player, job hunter

Dave Y ) optical QC inspector, stained glass and picture frames craftsperson, #1 NATwA candlepinner, still truckin’ ( York

Tim ) independent software consultant, Fresno homeowner, outdoors enthusiast — climbing, spelunker, swim down the Colorado ( Schiller

Charles ) top secret government programmer, rest of profile information is classified ( [Frankston]

Scott ) silicon valley job hunter ( Hirsh ) now San Franciscan job lander

Bill G ) San Antonio economist, urban cowboy ( Gammerdinger

Jim ) mechanical engineer for Aramco in Saudi Arabia.plays high stakes poker and indoor sports to stay out of desert ( Marlin

Ferd ) socialist revolutionary working as clerical union organizer, outdoorsy fun-loving communard ( T. Bull

Don ) hexagon simulations games (Fox

Donannan ) plans for Nova Scotia and leaving N.H.

Nan ) poet ( Brady

Dave L ) Pan Am economist, winking’s media personality, philosopher, and hurried/harried world traveler ( Lockwood

Joe ) Pan Am programmer, devoted husband, Stamfordite, dormant volleyball ref, sensible world traveler, getting into bicycling ( Sachs

Rick ) DC air traffic control automation, winx journalist and visual history researcher, getting used to new eyes ( Tucker

Larry ) see elsewhere for details beyond Frisbee, bridge, and ocean engineering ( Kahn

Fred ) major OED contributor (making winx terms famous), linguistics journalist, moving from hospital law to law librarian work, recently married ( Shapiro

SUNSHINE >|< SUNSHINE >|< SUNSHINE —

Rich ) aspires to be a robot builder (Mech eng grad school), known to be a marathoner (winx & running) ( Steidle

Martin ) Chicago apprentice broker on mercantile exchange ( RossRaul ) DEC educator, married Maynardite ( Mailman

Sev ) Mecklenburg homeowner, enjoys quiet country life and real music, IHS teacher, into philosophical development ( Drix

MP ) teaching Baltimore accent to foreign students, cards & Judo, contemplates leaving Ithaca ( Rouse

Beast ) curator of Henry museum, hosts winx matches, future psychoneuropharmacologist, avid ratkeeper, would-be Grand Wazoo of Haverford chemistry department. ( Solomon

Dean ) attraction to archaic artifices, mystical modal (morbid) meanderings, reluctantly well-trained shrink, Watertown homeowner ( Solomon

Moishe ) aging retread, into long-distance bicycle riding & reading (

L ) ‘hired brain’ programmer, suburbanite, arcade enthusiast, searching for a gamelon (

Jake ) social planner for Jewish Federation in Miami, happily encumbered by family life, not going to Japan, guitar ( Solomon

Carl ) optioned by N.Y. Yankees to E. Lansing farm team, future marriage counselor, former songwriter and cripple, Yiddishist, often retired winker, hopes to be recalled to big team in next 2 years ( Chenkin

* ) play-think-and-visit lifestyle, hitchhiker-interviewer-historian, thinking of Ohio, slowly learning food, … companion, reading-riting-rithmetic (

Bob ) building/community design, dance, not yet illiterate ( Henninge

mary ) freelance coöp organizer, into the rural country life, once upon a time musician, sworn off professions, therefore hobby of being a truck driver ( kirman

Mac ) curious & curiouser, much car mechanics, keeping cool professionally ( McAvoy

Sue ) preventive medicine, outdoors fun, dance ( Crapes

Big ) lumber maker, woods walker, nothing esoteric, sense of humus ( Placier

Paul ) electronics, 4th member of winx clan, seeking experience ( Henninge

Marg ) artistic creations (kite painter, dulcimer building), first winking mother, Tai Chi, gentle optimist ( Henninge

1980-1 SEASON BY FRED SHAPIRO

  GAMES         WINS           POINTS          PPG (25 g)

1 Dave L 56   1 Dave L 41    1 Dave L 254½   1 Larry   5.02
2 Arye   48   2 Larry  36    2 Larry  231    2 Dave L  4.5446
3 Larry  46   3 Arye   30    3 Arye   194½   3 Ross    4.5441
4 Joe    38   4 Joe    26    4 Joe    165½   4 Joe     4.36
5 Rick   36   5 Ross   25    5 Ross   154½   5 Bill R  4.25
6 Ross   34   6 Sev    19    6 Rick   126½   6 Sev     4.06
7 Sev    31   7 Rick   17    7 Sev    126    7 Arye    4.05
8 Bill R 26   8 Bill R 15    8 Bill R 110½   8 Ferd    3.90
9 Fred   25   9 Ferd   13    9 Ferd    97½   9 Rick    3.51
  Ferd   25  10 Fred   12   10 Fred    87   10 Fred    3.48
                Brad   12

Minutes of 1981 NATwA Congress

At “The great founders’ hall” Haverford College, Haverford PA. 14 February 1981.

Congress (sort of) convened at 19:41 in a meeting room next to the playing hall.

Arye announces resignation effective 10 minutes from announcement time. Larry is pronounced Sec-Gen by railroading @ 19:42.

Larry opens discussion of England trip. Those with chances of going should fill out blue questionnaire and contact one of Dave-L, Larry or Bill-R. There will be at least a World All-Stars and a Manchester Open played in England [and] maybe other tournaments.

19:44 Equipment recap of Newswink 12 article. Probably around 1700 cups left. Larry got some sample felt for mats from a US supplier. It arrived too stiff, but by process of wetting down and rolling out Larry changed its character. Matt tried it and is very enthusiastic. (Bill-R: “Well if someone named Matt says its good, it must be..”). Cost is about $6 per mat not counting shipping costs. MP asks about durability, the new material is hard to comb, the weave might get disturbed. Larry has 5 which he might distribute. These mats don’t appear to have grain. Still more worries about durability. Bill-R says this is not the time to be picky, we currently have nothing, ought to order 10 or 20. Larry might be willing to process 20 more. Describes process: “When you put a mat in water it sort of soaks up the water. Don’t lift then by one side or they’ll stretch. Soak on a board. Takes 3 or 4 days to dry..” Bill-R moves to purchase 10 immediately. Charles thinks more people should try them tomorrow. MP moves to purchase if no serious complaints from trials on Sunday. So moved. Passes. What price? Bill-R: $8, Dave-L: $10, English mats are 8 quid nowadays. No clear resolution.

19:50 Ferd wonders if Oakbyte basement still has 1000’s of winks. Rick & Arye say they definitely picked them up last year, should now be in MIT small activities office. Anyway, the new winks are lousy. Edges are square, haven’t been tumbled enough. Also, little greens have awful ripples on surface. Can Joe and/or Dave check out the West German supplier of mushroom winks? Who else uses Walmsley’s winks? (Besides tiddlywinks). Walmsley’s has moved to Northern Ireland. Not too much prospect for our puny buying power to influence improvements in their process.

We are out of squidgers?? -Larry. Bill-R says lots of lousy squidgers available to be thinned etc. MIT has only 20 squidgers left. Bill-R has 50-100 lousy ones.

Joe says mushroom winks are better, Dave-Y may be able to get address of mushroom winks manufacturer from store in Needham. There are probably 15 sets in plastic boxes still for sale. Sev speaks about trying to manufacture winks ourselves like we did for cup. Someone (Mailman?) contributes that tiddlywinks in German is pronounced Flo-Umphen, someone should tell the sec’y how that’s spelled.

Spring tournaments: 2nd annual silver squidger tournament 3rd weekend in March (the 21st) – 6 games one day at MIT. Might be a Rick thin squidger given away as prize like last year. Same format as last year: rotate pairs as much as possible. Schedule is made in secret; Ross has a computer program; someone else will setup the rank ordering and the computer program will set up the schedule based on rank ordering.

Is there going to be a BIT? No interest? BIT looks dead. Dave-L suggests April 25-26 for pairs (last weekend in April), the English pairs is May 2-3. Some MIT people say it would be good for them. Sev might have a wedding that weekend (no, not his own, he says he’ll know when that one is).If not the 26th then the 11th. [It ended up being April 11 since Sev’s wedding was the 25-26].

Locations. Pairs & Singles should be in Ithaca or Boston. Farm prefers a southern location: Washington, Baltimore or Haverford. Beast says Haverford is probably available. Larry mentions possibility of Smithsonian. Singles is fixed at Memorial Day weekend, May 23,24. No sympathy for using up Dave-L’s and Joe’s 3 day weekends. Washington for singles if Larry can get Smithsonian. Location for pairs undecided after votes nearly even among Boston, Ithaca and Washington.

20:21 Regional coordinators: Ross & Doug stay on as East and West. Joe points out that a North South division might be appropriate nowadays. Reminds people not to leave the NY/Washington people out of communication paths.Rules: Dave-L & freeing rule: “Anytime a pair is due to free and fails to free, the opponents have an option to free the wink of theirs which is squoppeJ by the least number of winks. The freeing shall be accomplished by moving the squopping wink off the wink to be freed.” Motion passes 17 to 13.

Dave-L: tournament singles games shall be 20 minutes and pairs games 25. Pair vs. singles 25 minutes. Passed by acclaimation [sic, should be “acclamation”]. Fred points out that the rules in effect in NATwA are the Sachs rules as amended by published minutes of various NATwA meetings.

20:35 Bill-R proposes 20:45 adjournment – voted down!

Length of games: *: tournaments are taking longer for same number of games. Congress agrees on 9:30 AM starting time for Sunday’s games. Team captains should try to have match sheets prepared one round in advance of play. Penalty for late show Sunday will be that opponents get to squidge-off at 9:30 and then start using 30-second rule on opponents.

Joe proposes games have 8 points to them.. ignored.

Tim rails against weighting of A vs. B division scores.

Larry and Beast are congratulated for tournament arrangements. Rick is congratulated for another fine Newswink. The boondocked winkers are congratulated for their distance traveled.

Larry proposes changes to get “established” winkers back into game. Sev proposes 2nd at pairs or something. Fred wants Newswink contributions from some of the “incredibly opinionated” people in NATwA (Sev, Mary, and TDI (TDI?) at least were mentioned).

Free agents: idea of committee assigning teams? Too much variability in who can be expected to show up. Not much support in general for the idea. Tribunal of Larry, Sev, and Ross about constituting teams.

Severin proposes some radical ideas. Abolish regionals, have two continentals, an earlier “fun” continentals around November and the traditional competitive or “serious” continentals at the traditional date (Washington’s birthday weekend for the uninformed). Also move the pairs to October to replace the HOTT. Most people need feel they time to think about such a radical proposal.

Far east: Tim says 2nd FFET tournament may happen in next 9 months. In addition to Tim, Charles, Rich, Chuck, Dave-L and Joe, others such as Arye, MP, TDI and Martin may be interested.

Tim asks for NATwA endorsement for an OFWADS team member who is running for Mayor of Fresno. Chris Peterson is officially endorsed for the for [sic, should be: “”] office or [sic, should be: “of”] Mayor of Fresno by NATwA. He promises a wink in every pot.

Motion that next Continentals be held in California. Passes.

Meeting adjourned at 21:00. Minutes taken by Charles Frankston.

In a Singles Bound by Larry Kahn

It was Larry Kahn all the way in the 1981 Singles as he rolled to a 10½ point win, the largest margin since Severin Drix’ 1975 victory. In a triumph for run and gun winks, Arye Gittelman overtook Dave Lockwood in the last round to grab 2nd, leaving Dave in (another) 3rd, Sev 4th, and Pam Knowles 5th.

Only 9 players showed up for the tournament at MIT (23-24 May 1981), as our rival organization, NATwimp, continues to expand.In addition to the final five, Ferd [Wulkan], Brad Schaefer, Rick Tucker, and Fred Shapiro came and played tough against the heavies. The lower-seeded players showed considerable improvement over previous efforts, making the field a respectable one.

It was a tournament of inconsistency, as players would have one good game followed by a rather poor one. I was able to see portions of some games and was amazed at the alternation of great shots and lousy ones. Larry was the exception, consistently losing to Arye but stomping everyone else. By the end of the complete round-robin, Larry had an 8 point lead over Dave and 9½ over Arye. Sev had managed to struggle into 4th, 2 pts ahead of Pam. Since there was a significant drop to 7th (Ferd in 6th wasn’t playing Sunday), the finals were expanded to 5.

Things were breaking right for Larry (with a 1st round bye) as Sev took Arye 6-1 and Dave only got 4 from Pam. Two rounds later, it was all over as Larry ground out 6s over Sev and Pam and had an insurmountable lead with 2 games to go. 2nd through 4th were still close, and in the last round Arye took Pam 6-1 while Dave narrowly escaped yet another zero in a 6-1 Larry pot-out.

The 20 minute time limit was definitely noticeable when playing against the more methodical players; otherwise it wasn’t bad. Larry had the only 7, and the loss of 5 minutes at the end of the game probably cut down a lot of controlled blitzes. Incredibly, we were able to complete the full 9 match rounds in only 8 hours on Saturday, including lunch. Chess clock winks is on the way.

Interesting notes: Larry completed his tournament finish distribution: in his previous 6 Singles he had ended up (not in order) 7, 6, 5½, 4, 3, and 2. 8th next year? Fred actually won this match since he beat Brad who beat Pam who beat Dave who beat Sev who beat Ferd who beat Rick who beat Arye who beat Larry. 34 out of the 46 games were 6-1. In a Sev-Larry game there was a pile that encircled the cup halfway and touched it at all points. Sev tied Sunshine in total games @ 555, Dave tied for 2nd in wins @ 357, Ferd regained 3rd in points @ 2219½. and Larry finally caught Bill Renke for 6th in wins and points.

There were lots of random games throughout the weekend as the NATwimp contingent showed up at various times. All in all, it was a very smooth running tournament, hopefully enjoyed by all.

Larry Kahn     10-2 6l½ 5.125 bef playoff (7-1 42½)
Arye Gittelman  8-4 51  4.25              (5-3 33)
Dave Lockwood   8-4 46½ 3.875             (6-2 34½)
Severin Drix    7-5 45  3.75              (5-3 30)
Pam Knowles     4-8 34  2.83              (4-4 28)
Ferd            3-5 26  3.25
Brad Schaefer   3-5 23½ 2.94
Rick Tucker     2-6 18  2.25
Fred Shapiro    1-7 16½ 2.06

—

… The Dragon brought a new white mat from England which was played on for tournament games … several winkers hadn’t noticed that it was from a new source … it appears that the mat shortage has been solved.

Fresno Frolic

News Flash!! – An as-of-yet unnamed tournament will be held in Fresno on August 15, 198l. All winkers are invited and it is hoped that given sufficient lead time several eastern winkers can attend. I am going to have it well organized and well publicized. Novice winkers will be accommodated and encouraged to play. Spread the word. More formal and detailed invitations will be forthcoming. — Tim Schiller

—

For all you Tiddlywinks Bibliography freaks, I refer you to page 269 of the April 1981 issue of Playboy. Our noble game gets its second Playboy reference, this time in Little Annie Fanny. (Tim Schiller)

The San Andreas Effort

Joe’s statement rolled down the table like a runaway green wink.

Charles, sitting on Joe’s left, slowed his intake of ox tail stew to a single orifice.

Next to Charles, Dave cringed as if suffering from underwear that was three sizes too small.

At the end of the table, Scott was caught with a mouthful of wine but nevertheless exploded, “You bastard!”

Those of us on the other side of the table silenced our conversations, wiped the equally distributed wine from our faces, and turned towards Joe.

Joe repeated himself for the sake of those of us who hadn’t heard him the first time and for you readers who never heard him at all.

“Several years ago,” Joe said softly, “when I was just a budding winker, I found out that Scott was the only active player who had never lost a 7-0. I vowed that some day I would be the one to administer it.”

Dave muttered something to the effect that he had also made the same vow. Charles quickly reminded him that he had certainly helped.

This notable game climaxed the Second Far-Eastern Tournament held March 21 at Stanford University. The format was one of four rounds of two games each. Partnerships were rotating and chosen in a semi-random manner. One table always had two novices paired with two experienced winkers while the other game had two experienced pairs.

The format proved to be quite even. After two rounds, all eight players each had a win and a loss. For the tournament, five of the nine players finished at .500.

The final game on the experienced table pitted Dave and Scott against Joe and Tim. By rounds Dave and Scott had been methodically squopped out for a solid 6-1. In the 4th round Joe and I suddenly realized that I had six winks free (including one on a double and another squopping a nurdled wink). A pot-out seemed possible. Although not serious about potting out, I potted four winks for practice and double-boondocked the double. In the fifth Joe potted a wink and did a double-boondock.

After potting my fifth wink I looked at Joe and asked, “Well, do we really want to do this?”

Joe looked at Dave, who seemed to be oddly fascinated with his navel, and began to develop a demonic smile. “Do it!” he commanded. Not daring to buck a possessed Joe, I did.

At this point the 7-0 seemed certain. Dave and Scott had several winks at the edge of the mat and one nurdled. Joe, on the other hand, had his five remaining winks 3″ from the pot.

But Joe had become transformed into a Mr. Hyde and he had other plans for his now suffering victims. Those plans included pain, misery, three forms of mental anguish, and an evil ride on the roller coaster of hope and despair. Following each miss by the opponents, Joe would also “miss”. For 15 minutes he toyed with them mercilessly. The silence was deafening as Dave sweated and tried so hard to avoid “the thing he despises the most”.

Finally, after Dave’s last wink had bounced out of the pot on a 12″ try and Scott’s last wink was poised only 3″ out, Joe finally potted his two last winks and it was over.

As Scott said later, “I always knew I would lose a 7-0 some day but I always figured it would be with a novice as a partner. Not the World Singles champion!”

Joe won the SFET while Tim placed a close second. The first place award was a free trip to New York on Pan Am.

For those of us boondocked on the west coast, the gathering of this many winkers and the level of play provided was very welcome. We hope that we can continue on with more such gatherings.

BY TIM SCHILLER

—

A belated apology to Moishe, NATwA’s aging retread. It seems that after the 1970 Pairs, Moishe was specially aged to take part in an old-timers’ MIT vs. Cornell match. We forgot to de-age him.

What is the record for most points during an eight game losing streak? … 23 by Moishe with 6 3’s and 2 2½’s.

Tiddlywinks in Literature

BY Charles Relle

To a great extent we owe our literary heritage to the Greeks and to the Bible, and as a student of Classical Literature, I have always been disappointed that the Greeks did not have a word for Tiddlywinks, and that if the game existed at all among them, it died out at an early stage when it was tactically undeveloped. ‘Potter contends against potter’ says Hesiod (c. 750 BC) at Works and Days 25, shewing no appreciation of the risks involved in an early attempt to pot out. Tiddlywinks is not clearly referred to more than once in the Old Testament Literature of the Biblical Hebrews. The people exclaim to Elisha at 2 Kings V 40 ‘0 thou man of God, there is death in the pot’, thus stating for the first time a strategic truth that was not apparent to Hesiod. The New Testament provides no clear allusions, but the prophetic words of Revelation XII 7 could well have referred to the American tour of England in 1978: ’And the Dragon fought, and his angels, and prevailed not’.

Turning to English Literature, we see that by the time of Shakespeare Tiddlywinks had become the civilised way of settling disputes. In Henry V, IV, i, 8 we read ‘I dare not fight, but I shall wink’, and in the same play there is a suggestion of an emergent champion in the phrase ‘the winking of authority’. The devastating effect of a sudden pot-out is noticed at Othello II, iii, 78: ‘England, where they
are most potent in potting’. Nevertheless, squopping had been recognised by Heywood, who writes in his Proverbs II, 5» ‘The weaker goeth to the pot as all men see’. References in Shakespeare to Tiddlywinks are, however, mostly of a casual type, such as ‘Wink now’ at Henry VI Part II, II, i, 211, or ‘I had rather wink than look upon them’ in The Two Gentlemen of Verona V, ii, 4. Chacun à son goût.

Much later we see that squopping had died out, but the game is played in a much tenser atmosphere: thus Fitzgerald in the Rubáiyát writes ‘What, did the hand then of the Potter shake?’ and puts as succinctly as can be the winker’s ultimate identity crisis: ‘Who is the Potter then, and who the Pot?’

From epigraphical sources I have found one relevant inscription much used in Staffordshire: ‘Pots are made of what we potters are’ — clay of course, and therefore dust. But potsherds are notoriously durable, and so are the modern plastics: this provokes the alarming question: is Lockwood non-biodegradable?

Lifetime Leaders, Each Tournament

BY Larry Kahn

West (25 g)            East (40 g)
Larry   36- 4   5.58   Bob    46-19-1 4.55
*       30- 7-1 4.88   TDI    41-22   4.31
Sev     48-15-2 4.78   Bill R 67-33-1 4.30
Joe     24-10   4.57   *      57-29-2 4.22
Dave B  53-23   4.33   Bill G 51-29   4.18
Bob     17- 8-1 4.27   Ferd   61-37-1 4.17
mary    24-14   4.19   Dave L 40-22-2 4.13
Moishe  24-11   4.17   mary   30-23   4.04
Bill G  17- 8   4.13   Larry  23-14-2 4.01
                       Craig  46-32   3.94

Cont (75 g)            Pairs (40 g)
Larry   80-26-1 4.668  Ross   44-14   4.88
Tim     69-21-1 4.667  Sev    90-29-2 4.64
Dave L  74-31   4.47   Bill R 47-21   4.60
Bill R  76-33   4.44   Larry  69-26-1 4.54
Ferd   100-49-1 4.36   Bob    64-34   4.27
*      102-42   4.35   Dave L 60-34   4.12943
Bob    111-55-1 4.22   Ferd   51-32-2 4.12941
Rick    64-29-1 4.l6   TDI    25-16-2 3.99
Sev     80-49-3 4.14   *      60-46-2 3.82
Bill G  77-50   4.12   Joe    39-34-1 3.60

Singles (40 g)
Dave L  74-27   4.56
Larry   51-25   4.40
Sev     73-43   4.20
Bob     39-26   4.09
Jim M   26-21   3.99
Joe     33-28   3.78
*       30-25   3.76
Ferd    30-26   3.54

This past season Brad Schaefer (110) and Ken Moraff (104) became the 43rd and 44th members of the 100 Game Club. Waiting in the wings are John Reppy (99), Beast Solomon (91), Lyle Hodgson (84), and Paul Mailman (75). There were no new members of the 50 Game Club, but Sam Pottle (49) fell just short.

—

Who is the leader in wins in games played without a partner in non-singles tournaments? … possibly Dick Henninge, who was 7-3 solo in the 1969 Continentals.

Squop-Top Kahn

This is my second article on winks technique, a companion to the potting guide (see Newswink 11). That article was easy: in potting the wink either goes in or it doesn’t, and the technique can be physically described in detail. Squopping is another matter entirely. While in open field squopping you either make it or you don’t, there are various degrees of success, like either totalling the wink or just getting a hairline squop. Also, when you shoot into a messy pile, who knows what will happen? You shoot the wink and take your chances.

I find squopping to be as much a mental effort as a physical one. Sometimes I get the feeling that there must be other forces at work other than just plastic and felt, especially when I find myself in squopping streaks where I just don’t miss. As for giving advice, all I can do is outline some of the basic physical aspects and try to describe some of my experiences.

As far as squidgers go, thins are far superior to the regulars. I doubt that PVC is all that much better than other plastics —
I just started using it partly by accident and I’ve gotten used to it over the years. Rick Tucker’s thin poker chip squidgers are excellent and I probably would use one of them if I didn’t have the PVC (10% commission for the endorsement).

For open field squops, I usually end up bouncing the wink onto the target, although I get a large percentage of flop-around squops also. I think a large part of being lucky is just a matter of getting a high percentage of your shots very near the target area. After that, it’s just a matter of chance (I think). Pile shots are mainly experience? I don’t practice these a lot, most of of my experience has come during games. In practice games I’m always trying difficult shots for future reference.

It’s important to approach your shots with confidence. No use trying it if you don’t think you’re going to make it, is there? I tend to employ a high-risk, high-gain approach to my game because its fun and when I’m playing well it’s difficult to defend against. However, you can get into trouble and perhaps a somewhat more cautious approach may be better for others. I’m still refining my game and I don’t think I’ve ever played in a match where I felt I played better than 75% of my potential (the 1976 Westerns).

One important thing is not to let a few bad shots hurt your subsequent game. I blow shots just like everyone else and sometimes I think it affects my partner more than it does me. The only thing you can try to do is make it up next time because whatever happened, happened.

As far as miracle shots and 3 foot squops, I don’t have any explanations. I’m not convinced that I do these more frequently than other winkers—maybe just at the right times more often. Sometimes I can visualize what I’m trying to do and then it happens, but occasionally I just shoot a wink and get an accidentally incredible result. When that happens (unless it’s really gross) I just let my opponents think I planned it that way. Keeps them wondering what will happen next.

If there is one difference between my game (sometimes Sunshine’s, from what he says) and other winkers, it’s that I’m not afraid to try a shot when I sense that it’s going to go. I’d rather get the opponents worried about how to react to my shots than worry about what I’m going to do after I miss. It’s a lot more fun that way. Of course, you have to be confident in being able to extricate yourself from bad. positions you get into. I know Dave Lockwood, especially, disagrees with this approach, and for him maybe it isn’t right. There are lots of winks styles and his appears as good as any.

I have little else to add in the way of advice. I am happy to discuss squopping, potting, or anything else if you just ask (except during a game, of course). The level of winks play has been increasing ever since I got into the game, and there’s still lots of room for improvement, so keep on squopping.

—

Beast Solomon has played in 5 Continentals on 5 different teams.

—

Ross Callon, during a 6-1 blowout at the hands of Larry Kahn & Sev Drix during the 1981 Pairs: ‘It was like God playing
against a dead fish.’

What is a NATwA Tournament?

The Secretary-General, Mr. H. Meat, has constituted Sunshine, Rick Tucker, and Fred Shapiro as the NATwA Statistics Committee.
This committee has adopted the following criteria for “official” NATwA tournaments, which are printed for the guidance of those planning future tournaments which they would like to “count” statistically.

Criteria for Official NATwA Tournaments

To be official, a tournament must meet the following criteria (subject to the qualifications below):

The tournament must be open to all NATwA members except if it is a team tournament for which only certain teams are eligible.
Adequate notice must be given to NATwA as a whole. “Adequate notice” cannot be defined in exact terms, but in general it means that team captains should be informed of the time, site, and format at least one month in advance.
There must be a minimum of five players for a singles tournament or eight players for a non-singles tournament.
There must be a minimum of eight games played.
The participants must agree at the beginning of the tournament that they intend it to be official.

The NATwA Statistics Committee shall have the power, by majority vote, to interpret the above criteria, to decide whether a given tournament has satisfied the criteria, and to rule in appropriate cases that a tournament failing to meet the criteria nonetheless will be deemed official. The last kind of ruling should be reserved for rare instances where it is thought to be in the best interests of NATwA to encourage certain kinds of tournaments, such as scholastic tournaments or tournaments in boondocked areas. The S[t]atistics Committee shall also have the power to rule, in cases where the recognition of a tournament would tend to undermine the integrity of NATwA statistics, that such a tournament will not be recognized although technically qualifying under the criteria above. Finally, the Statistics Committee shall have the power to recognize some of the games on a tournament scoresheet while
not recognizing others, to add games omitted from a scoresheet and to verify that the scores listed are accurate. Such alteration of the tournament record as given by the scoresheet should only be done after consultation with the Tournament Director and in appropriate cases with the players involved.

—

Beast Solomon has played in 5 Continentals on 5 different teams.

—

Ross Callon, during a 6-1 blowout at the hands of Larry Kahn & Sev Drix during the 1981 Pairs: ‘It was like God playing
against a dead fish.’

—

What player has the largest favorable discrepancy between table and floor games?

… mary, whose floor average is 4.83 compared to 3.45 on table games.

Dragon’s World Hit List

1. Larry Kahn
2. Dave Lockwood
3. Jon Mapley
4. Nigel Knowles
5. Severin Drix
6. Cyril Edwards
7. Alan Dean
8. Charles Relle
9. Arye Gittelman
10. Pam Knowles
11. Joe Sachs
12. Ross Callon
13. Bob Henninge
14. Keith Seaman
15. Sunshine
16. Bill Renke

Pair Nonpareil

by Larry Kahn

Two streaks were on the line at the 1981 North American Pairs championship in Ithaca, 11-12 April. Could Sev [Drix] & Larry, reunited after 3 years, take their 4th title in 4 attempts? And could Larry keep his record string of 18 straight Ithaca appearances with rain or snow intact?

It looked ripe for an upset. Larry didn’t like the way he had been playing & had machined a new squopping squidger from the original PVC rod. Sev had been a turkey all season but had recently received a [Rick] Tucker thin poker chip squidger that felt good. Dave [Lockwood] was revamping his whole game, Bill [Renke] was erratic. Apparently Arye was playing well, trouncing Ross [Callon], who couldn’t squop an ant with a manhole cover.

Maybe this was the year for John [Reppy] & Ken [Moraff] or Joe [Sachs] & Rick. Other pairs looking to put a bite on the biggies were Beast [Solomon] & MP [Rouse], Sam [Pottle] & Ed [Morse], and Jim [Butler] & Steve [Hsu] (plus Pang-To [Hsu]). As for the other streak, it had been beautiful for 2 days with a sunny weekend forecast.

The format was the usual round-robin, with a top 4 playoff. On Sunday, a video crew from the WHEP-Scranton/Wilkes Barre PM Magazine arrived for some excellent coverage. The 1st 2 rounds were uneventful as the top 3 seeds did not play each other. Sev-Larry took an opener over Joe-Rick 6-1 in a well-played game. In the next round Joe-Rick beat Bill-Dave 5-2 as a missed shot in rounds opened the door.

The 3rd round saw the first big matchup: Sev-Larry vs. Ross-Arye. Ross-Arye gained an early lead with 2 semi-protected triples. Larry didn’t like the looks of it, so he came over the cup with a big wink, bombed the 1st triple and squopped the 2nd. From there on it was all downhill for Arye & Ross, who commented to *, “It’s kind of like God playing against a dead fish”.

As rounds progressed, John-Ken got a tie from Sam-Ed, Dave-Bill again failed against a top pair as they fell to Ross-Arye, and Beast-MP put up a tremendous struggle against Sev-Larry but finally fell 6-1. In general, Sev was actually playing pretty well, both Dave-Bill and Ross-Arye were off & on, Joe-Rick played well but scored not so well, and Larry seemed to be playing up to form.

As the first day came to a close, Ross-Arye finished well with a 7 as Dave-Bill and Sev-Larry engaged in a tough struggle. In the 5th round of the game, Dave-Bill could sit for 4 but Bill had a reasonable pot-out chance that would be a likely 7 if he made it. Since they needed the points, Bill went for it, got 5 in but missed the 6th (a tough pot). Now all Sev’s winks were free and he ran 5 to tie Bill to get at least 4 in the game. The score remained at 3 as Larry missed a short squop for the 5. Pre-playoff scores were Sev-Larry; Ross-Arye minus 5; Bill-Dave minus 8; Joe-Rick minus 14½.

On Sunday the finals moved to Upton Hall as the TV people showed up. Other random games were also played. Joe-Rick continued to play well but still got only 1 from Sev-Larry. Dave finally got his potting untracked and blitzed against Ross-Arye but subsequent feeble potting by all left Dave-Bill with a 5. In the next round it was Larry’s turn to display his feebleness as he repeatedly missed his 6th wink. Eventually, good play by Sev maneuvered that pair into the unusual position of 5 winks of each color in, 2 single squops, and Ross-Arye with 10 free turns. Incredibly, Sev-Larry escaped with an important 2 as Ross-Arye made severe strategic & technical errors. Meanwhile, Bill-Dave set up their stretch drive with a 6-1 over Joe-Rick.

Bill-Dave now needed a 6 for a tie. Dave had an initial blitz attempt thwarted when he missed, Bill came in from the line, squopped the Dave wink, and Larry squopped the double from 4″. The game settled down to a very interesting strategic battle, with Sev-Larry able to come up with key squops when they needed them. Bill-Dave struggled against the point differential but finally went down 6-1 in a very well-played game. Meanwhile, Joe-Rick continued to do well against the other playoff teams and eked out a 4-3 win. The 3 enabled Ross-Arye to take 2nd place.

There was excellent film coverage during the final game, although the finish was anticlimactic with no potting. A 6th round pot satisfied the TV people & several winx songs were sung by everyone.

So it goes in the books as another win for Sev-Larry. Sev has now won an obscene 7 out of 12 Pairs tournaments as he keeps mooching off of good partners. Dave played in his 500th game, both Bill & Larry got their 300th wins, Ross got his 1000th point and Arye got his 100th win. Beast continued his fine organization efforts by getting us some excellent TV coverage. Hopefully the show will go national; otherwise it’s a trek to Scranton with a VTR.

Finally, it rained most of the weekend, keeping Larry’s streak alive. He is considering renting himself out to farmers this summer if there is another drought. Nothing like an all-expense-paid weekend at the Veggie Hotel in downtown Mecklenburg.

Final standings:

                                            Playoff
                                  Pts  W-L  Pts  W-L
Larry Kahn-Sev Drix                41  7-0   55  9-1
Ross Callon-Arye Gittelman         36  6-1   46  7-3
Dave Lockwood-Bill Renke           33  4-3   45  6-4
Rick Tucker-Joe Sachs              26½ 4-3   32½ 5-5
Ken- Moraff-John Reppy             23  3-3-1
Sam Pottle-Ed Morse                16  2-4-1
Beast Solomon-MP Rouse             12½ 1-6
Steve Hsu-Jim Butler & Pang-To Hsu  8  0-7

Missive

26 Canadian Avenue
London SE6 U.K,
4th June 1981

To the editor of Newswink,

I quote from the article “Rambling Dave Raves/English Singles ’80” the last two sentences. “With attendance reaching these levels in singles play, we must work out better ways of handling the format. Twenty games in two days is TDM.” Does TDM stand for ‘too damned much’? I assume that it does.

How many games should an ideal tournament have? I should say about thirty, but most players are too lazy to get up early enough for that. However, let us consider conditions in England. Tournament entries are not likely to get smaller, so what should we provide in a two-day tournament? A reasonable chance of playing on the second day, or why should anyone set aside a whole weekend? Also, a fairly large final pool: this is so that the strongest players all affect the result directly, and so that the rest can play a consolation tournament if they wish. Twenty games is not too many: this is the view of old and young alike. He come together to play Tiddlywinks, so why not do so?

Why not do so? A good question: the tedious part of any tournament is being held up by the needless and thoughtless—and even deliberate—slow play of a very few players. Here I am labouring a point that I have made before, but I think it very important that the majority of players should not be held up between games for long periods, and that if severe measures are necessary to ensure continuity, they should be taken.

I turn to the letter from Anthony Lloyd. It is full of the half-truths and distortions that keep historians in business setting the record straight. I am enclosing an obituary which is more sympathetic to him than Lloyd’s view. The source is The Pauline of July 1963, for Willis was indeed at St Paul’s School (as was Field-Marshall, not General, Montgomery).

However, Willis did not have an exaggerated or peculiar upper class accent, nor is such an accent typical of the products of St Paul’s, which is in fact my own school.

He was not instrumental in setting up either the Cambridge or the Oxford Tiddlywinks Clubs, nor was he connected with the Goons match. There was, however, a congress, not a tournament, in Cambridge in 1958, at which Willis was present, but Prince Philip was not. At this congress Willis was made Etwa’s secretary-general. I do not know how this came about, but I think he was known to Peter Downes who was at Cambridge at the time.

Willis was in fact a Congregationalist, not a Baptist. In England the Congregationalists have since linked with the English Presbyterians to form the United Reformed Church, but the Baptists are a separate church. As to Willis’ sexual orientation, I do not know what it was. I merely observe that it is easy enough to charge with ‘a homoerotic bent’ one who was unmarried, worke[d] for, and therefore among, boys, and is now dead and unable to defend himself.

Yours sincerely,
Charles Relle

(= Willis’ obituary from The Pauline should appear in Newswink 14=)

Casiometric Suggestions

by Sunshine

I “believe that the 30 second rule is all too often abused and has significantly and negatively affected the style of play in many matches. The rule, instituted in 1976, was designed to allow for strategic discussions without severely reducing the number of shots in a game. However, in recent seasons, the rule has fostered (in many players) an attitude of lack of concern of slow play—the clock will stop so it does not matter if one takes 31 or 50 seconds or even longer on every shot once a close game develops. The result is many slow games and long, draining matches. When we can keep to a schedule of a game an hour we are pleasantly surprised, even though not so many years ago a pace closer to 45 minutes a round was possible. Matches proceed at the speed of the slowest game of any given round and the 30 second rule and the attitude it allows can provide very slow games.

I am not advocating compulsory lightning (reflex) winx. In the absence of a feasible chess-clock style timing option, I recommend a change to a rule that could keep the advantage of the 30 second rule (assurance of a good number of shots) without encouraging a general slowdown of play. I suggest that instead of stopping the clock repeatedly, that at 25 seconds the shooting pair be given notice that a shot should be taken in the next 10 seconds. If no one was watching the clock, the 10 seconds notice would be given at the time that under the current rule someone would think of stopping the clock. Each pair would be allowed 3 time outs prior to rounds. At 35 seconds if the shot has not been attempted, the delinquent pair would chose between a time out or a loss of turn. Hopefully increased clock watching would not prevail, that no one would call out an obnoxious 10-9-8-7-…, that the shooter be given the benefit of the doubt in close calls at the 10 second passing. That there would be few lost turns, only some number of rushed decisions between roughly equivalent options and a relaxed use of time outs for major decisions such as blitzing or reorienting after surprising or major changes in the balance of the game. And, most importantly, that the impetus to shoot within 35 seconds would encourage faster play just as the current rule allows for slow play.

The time outs would apply only to regulation time; rounds would proceed as they do now (or perhaps with 1 time out for rounds for delays of over 3 minutes). Also, the time out could be called at any time during the 35 seconds by the shooting pair. Thus, as 25 minutes approaches, a pair that has not used up its time outs could run the equivalent of football’s 2 minute drill by not using up any time on their turns.

Perhaps the above rule could be used for (part of) one of the fall tournaments on an experimental basis. I would not predict that this rule alone would drastically speed up games but it could help, and it could start a trend away from even slower games.

St. George?

In brief: on Friday the 13th of March, so I hear, Dave Lockwood once again defended his World Singles title, defeating Pam Knowles in a London pub. Game scores: 6-1, 5-2, 6-1, 4-3, 2½-4½, 7-0 = 30½-11½. Pam gained the right to challenge by taking 1st in the 1980 North American Singles. Next up is Jon Mapley, the 1980 English Singles champ, who challenged the Dragon in February 1980 (see Newswink 10). Waiting in the wings for the victor of this July match is Lawrence Alan Kahn, an unknown from Bethesda, Maryland.

Awards Half-Page

by FRS [Fred Richard Shapiro]

CO-WOY: Beast Solomon

Although he trails * and Ferd in fraction of life spent as a winker, he will become, in September 1984, the first person to have winked for most of his life… Completed his score distribution with record “speed”, achieving all non-ridiculous scores in his first 58 games… Spending the 1979-80 school year at Cornell, he was the catalyst in revitalizing the dying Cornell team, which defeated Moosewinks in the Westerns (round-robin) in an historic upset… WOY award earned for his efforts in singlehandedly organizing the Haverford Continentals, a welcome change from the Boston-Ithaca monotony and a boost for NATwA’s growing southern tier.

CO-WOY: Tim Schiller

In an era of comebacks, his was one of the most dramatic… After four years of boondockment, he showed up at the Continentals to play a major role in Relix’ victory… He then organized the Second Far-Eastern Tournament… Promises another, “as-of-yet unnamed tournament” in August 1981… Track record of attracting winks publicity while at MIT and in California is impressive… Arye considers him a pivotal figure in winks history as the person who brought back thin squidgers from England in 1972… He and Larry Kahn are the two who are almost always among the top scorers at the Continentals.

PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Larry Kahn

After a 58-point Continentals and decisive victories in both the Pairs and Singles, there is no need to justify this award… Larry’s 5.02 season ppg was his second above-5 ppg in a row, a feat never before accomplished in the modern era, and represented his fourth ppg title in five years… Mr. Meat is the first three-time winner of the Player of the Year award… At this point, he may be the most dominant winker, on the mat and off, since Bill Renke’s halcyon days (1972-3)… After the office being vacant for almost 2½ years, NATwA finally has a Sec-Gen.

The Year in Review

by Larry Kahn

It was a lousy year for veggies as Heat dominated the winks scene. Larry Kahn just missed the triple crown when Alliance came in second to Relix’ two A quads at the Continentals. Dave Lockwood had a great 16-1-1 start in the fall tournaments but was unable to hold off Larry for the PPG crown. A strong showing the North American Championships (NACs)—total ppg slightly over 5—gave Larry an unprecedented 4th PPG crown for his 5.02; next was Dave (4.545) and Ross Callon (4.544). Over the past 5 years Larry’s record is a disgusting 179-51-3 (4.92).

It was not a good year for tournament attendance but hopefully a stronger power structure and pre-season tournament schedule organization will help us next year. Record low numbers of games were set at a lot of fall tournaments, a trend we will put an end to next year, particularly since we’re not having these tournaments next year.

In the NACs, Relix won again with a bunch of high-priced imports; Sev & Larry reunited after 3 years for the Pairs & the rest of NATwA still hasn’t caught up to them; and in the Singles Larry avenged last year’s question mark (= asterisk in the record books =) by stomping to a 10½-point win over Arye Gittelman (who, oddly (= portentously =) enough had the only 2 wins over Larry) and the rest of the field.

Lots of interesting things happened in the lifetime stats. In total games, Sev & Sunshine are tied with 555. Dave vaulted to a tie for 2nd in wins (with Sunshine) & after an endless chase Larry finally passed Bill Renke for 6th, both getting their 300th wins at the Pairs. Ross got his 1000th point, and it will be a close race between Larry and Bill to 2000 since they are both within 25. Bill fell below a 4.5 ppg for the 1st time in I don’t know how long & Larry replaced him for 3rd place by moving up to 4.52. Other interesting stats are on the way. For instance, out of the top 25 players in games, only 5 have played at least 60% of their games in the NACs (Continentals, Pairs, Singles). Who are they?

Career Stats

Through 1981 Singles
The 100th NATwA Tournament

games tour                   W   L  T  points ppg
  555 74 Sunshine           357-192-6  2306⅚ 4.l6
  555 6l Severin Drix       377-170-8  2455½ 4.42
  526 63 Ferd               332-188-6  2219½ 4.22
  525 56 Bob Henninge       332-190-3  2217⅙ 4.22
  5l6 62 Dave Lockwood      357-157-2  2268⅙ 4.40
  440 56 Bill Renke         304-134-2  1976½ 4.49
  439 51 Larry Kahn         310-124-5  1984  4.52
  396 52 Moishe             185-2O8-3  1351  3.41
  395 50 Joe Sachs          232-160-3  1571⅚ 3.98
  365 48 Rick Tucker        178-181-6  1228⅓ 3.37
  329 36 Bill Gammerdinger  196-132-1  1321½ 4.02
  315 38 Mary Kirman        154-156-5  1100⅓ 3.49
  298 40 Charles Frankston  136-160-2   972  3.26
  289 36 Fred Shapiro       129-158-2   931½ 3.22
  286 38 Don Fox            146-137-3  1048⅓ 3.67
  280 31 TDI                164-111-5  1104½ 3.94
  247 29 Dave Barbano       144-102-1   925⅓ 3.75
  236 28 Jim Karlin         129-105-2   907⅙ 3.84
  233 29 Craig Schweinhart  137- 94-2   914⅓ 3.92
  221 27 Ross Callon        166- 54-1  1022⅚ 4.63
  217 28 Scott Hirsh        136- 77-4   886½ 4.09
  209 36 L                   97-107-5   699⅙ 3.35
  205 29 Nan Brady          109- 95-1   743⅓ 3.63
  203 30 Dean Solomon        95-108     705⅙ 3.47
  200 26 Arye Gittelman     112- 87-1   756⅓ 3.78
  199 25 Tim Schiller       147- 51-1   909  4.57

View From Third

By Dave Lockwood

Having finished 3rd in the ’81 Singles, I have now achieved the bronze medal in 7 of the last 8 NACs (North American Championships). Alliance’s 2nd place finish in the ’81 Teams is the only exception in the streak that runs back to the Renaissance victory in ’79. While not satisfied with these finishes, my successes in the World Singles provide solace in this NAC victory drought. In addition, with the help of some excellent partners (Alan Dean & Nigel Knowles), I won the ’80 & ’81 London Open Pairs Championships.

At the same time, I have seen the Champions come & go. (Although currently Larry seems to keep on coming[.]) Sev & Joe in the ’79 Pairs, Sev in the ’79 Singles, Larry & Arye in the ’80 Pairs, Pam (and Larry) in the ’80 Singles, Larry & Sev in the ’81 Pairs, and Larry in the ’81 Singles, Not to mention those nationwide, ringer-packed Relix teams of ’80 & ’81. Being 3rd has its advantages as 3rd is a force to be reckoned with but not the leader of the pack that everyone tries to knock off. Unfortunately, due to my previous successes, players still take great pleasure at knocking me off… which may explain why I end up 3rd!

Hopefully, I will be able to overcome my present lull and become more of a factor in future NACs. So be warned, Champions, the Dragon’s still around!

A Statistical Summary of World Singles

Only 9 players have participated in the first 11 World Singles Championships—Bill Renke, Alan Dean, Severin Drix, Keith Seaman, Sunshine, Dave Lockwood, Jon Mapley, Larry Kahn, and Pam Knowles. On July 10, Jon will become the fifth player to participate in his second World Singles match. Dave Lockwood has played in 7 (his 8th will be against Jon). Severin has played in 6 (wins against Renke, Seaman, *, and Lockwood, & two losses to the Dragon). Bill has a win (against Dean) and a loss (Drix), while Alan has too crushing losses (to Renke and Lockwood).

The shortest matches have been the Dean matches. Each was 5 games—World Singles 1 & 7. The longest matches, requiring the full 7 games, have been WS5 (Drix-Lockwood), WS6 (Lockwood-Drix), and WS10 (Lockwood-Kahn). Six of the eleven matches were decided in the 6th game. A win in 4 games has yet to occur (although in the last 4 games of the Dean matches, Renke & Lockwood each took 25 of the 28 points). The lowest point total is 6 by Alan Dean in W31. The highest point total is 30½ by Dave Lockwood against Pam Knowles in WS11. The lowest possible winning score, 24 2/3, was achieved in WS8. The highest normally possible winning score, 31½ has not yet occurred.

Ithaca NY has hosted more World Singles matches than any other location. (four – WS4, 5, 6, 9). London and Southampton, England have each been the site of 2 World Singles. The 3 World Singles Champions have all been US citizens. Four Britains have failed in five attempts to win the WS. With Jon Mapley’s challenge to the Dragon, the streak could well be broken.

Severin has played Dave 3 times, losing the last 2. However, he still leads Dave in head-to-head wins, 11-9. Jon’s upcoming match with Dave will be only the 2nd rematch in WS history.

Dave seems to get better in the late stages of his matches. In the final Dave has outscored his opponents 32-3.

The 1st WS was in 1973. Since then only 2 years have seen more than 1 WS—2 in ’77 and 3 in ’80—and no WS occurred in ’75. 1981 should end with 2 or 3 WS matches.

Puzzle

by Rick Tucker

Most of the clues are easy, but the challenge is to fill the pseudo-hexagon. Put the 1st letter of the answer to clue x in triangle x, and each subsequent letter in an adjoin[in]g triangle. Words may loop. Prize to the 1st correct solution received by me by mail or person. Void where prohibited, taxed, or licensed. Contest expires upon the appearance of Halley’s Comet or when I get a NAC, whichever comes first. (Rick Tucker/2701 Woodedge Road/Silver Spring Maryland 20906 USA).

—

1 once ate Trix cereal. _ _ _

1 played in most tournaments by far. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
2 acronymic team of past. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
3 Jonathan _ _ _ _ _ _ .
4 The Supreme Dean. _ _ _ _
5 inventor of the game & originator of the name. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
6 get a wink out. _ _ _ _ _ _
7 Cannonball SecGen. _ _ _ _ _
8 cozy up closer. _ _ _ _ _ _
8 aka the pot. _ _ _
9 feed the pot. _ _ _ _ _
10 Pres. of Ilkeston Toys. _ _ _ _
10 what's the _ _ _ _
11 essential instrument. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
11 cover-up. _ _ _ _ _
11 bring in from the line. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ - _ _
11 _ _ _ _ _ Mabbitt.
12 jeu de _ _ _ _ .
12 plink. _ _ _
11 co-founder of 1st Tw club. _ _ _ _ _
13 put too close for comfort. _ _ _ _ _ _
14 rag. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
15 _ _ _ _ _ _ Philip Silver Wink.
16 original official winks supplier. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
17 move a pile. _ _ _ _ _
18 clean your winks with a _ _ _ _ _ _ pad?
18 vertical English city. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
18 a _ _ _ _ _ _ too far.
19 said "We look to tiddlywinks to get us back to the primeval simplicity of life". _ _ _ _ _ _
19 against stupidity, the _ _ _ _ _ themselves contend in vain.
20 World Singles resident. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
21 Sultan of squop. _ _ _ _
22 go between the mat and a wink. _ _ _
23 wink’s revenge on squidge-in. _ _ _ _
24 23 years old this year. _ _ _ _
25 15 years old this year. _ _ _ _ _ 
26 name of the game. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
27 a good way to get a mobile wink. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
28 made famous by Life magazine in 1962. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
29 bash for #31. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
30 eating french fries while playing winks is _ _ _ _ _.
31 _ _ _ _ _ _ Washington played here.

Solution to puzzle.

North American Tiddlywinks Association