Jackson Whipps Showalter
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| Jackson Whipps Showalter |
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| Association |
 United States
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| Born | February 4, 1860 Minerva , Kentucky |
| Died | February 6, 1935 Lexington , Kentucky |
| Best Elo rating | 2676 (September 1897) ( historical rating ) |
Jackson Whipps Showalter (born February 4, 1860 in Minerva , Kentucky , † February 6, 1935 in Lexington , Kentucky) was an American chess player .
Life
After attending Kenyon College in Ohio from 1875 to 1878, he became a student at the Kentucky Military Institute , where he graduated in 1881 with a Bachelor of Arts . For the next five years he worked as a cowboy on his father's farm on the Nueces River in Texas . He then returned to Kentucky and began focusing on the game of chess at the age of 25. He achieved his first tournament victory at a regional championship in Cincinnati .
Showalter was a teacher and therefore only took part in chess tournaments during the school holidays . Here in the course of his career he repeatedly succeeded in winning against the strongest chess players of his time, such as Wilhelm Steinitz , Géza Maróczy , Harry Nelson Pillsbury , Frank Marshall , Michail Tschigorin and Jacques Mieses . He often challenged chess masters to duels. Here he defeated David Janowski , Adolf Albin and Norman Whitaker .
In 1888 he became the American national chess champion for the first time and held this title until 1897 until 1897, when Samuel Lipschütz was reigning champion. In the years 1897 and 1898 he played in two matches against Pillsbury for the American national championship and lost in both cases. After Pillsbury's death in 1909 there was a duel between him and Marshall for the open national championship title. When he suffered a significant defeat here, he largely withdrew from tournament chess with a few exceptions.
At the beginning of the 20th century he played in several European tournaments. In 1904 he finished 5th in the Cambridge Springs championship (out of 16 participants).
Then he took a chess break. In 1915 he made a comeback. In 1926 he finally retired from tournament sports.
In chess circles he was nicknamed The Lion of Kentucky , once because of his hairstyle ( lion's mane ), but above all because of his sharp game.
Showalter was married and his wife Nelly was also a good chess player.
Web links
- Replayable chess games by Jackson Whipps Showalter on chessgames.com (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Showalter Dead; Chess Master, 75 . New York Times, Feb. 7, 1935, p. 19.
- ↑ Harry N. Pillsbury, Chess Genius, dead . New York Times, June 18, 1906, p. 6.
| personal data | |
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| SURNAME | Showalter, Jackson Whipps |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American chess player |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 4, 1860 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Minerva , Kentucky |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 6, 1935 |
| Place of death | Lexington , Kentucky |