|
Andor Lilienthal 1911-2010 |
 |
|
Friday, 14 May 2010 10:47 |
 Andor Arnoldovich Lilienthal passed away on May 8, 2010, in Budapest, Hungary, only few days after his 99th birthday. In his long career, he played against ten male and female world champions, beating Emanuel Lasker, José Raúl Capablanca, Alexander Alekhine, Max Euwe, Mikhail Botvinnik, Vasily Smyslov, and Vera Menchik. Before his death, he was the oldest living Grandmaster, and the last surviving person from the original group of Grandmasters awarded the title by FIDE in 1950.
Lilienthal was born on May 5, 1911, in Moscow and moved to Hungary at the age of two. He played for Hungary in three Chess Olympiads: Folkestone 1933 (scoring +7 = 6 − 0 as the reserve, the fifth player on the team), Warsaw 1935 (scoring +11 =8 −0 on second board), and Stockholm 1937 (scoring +9 =6 −2 on first board, leading his team to the silver medal). He won the individual gold medal for his board (reserve and second board, respectively) at the 1933 and 1935 Olympiads, and had the fourth-best result on first board in 1937. His total score in the Olympiads was a remarkable 75.51%.
Emigrating to the Soviet Union in 1935, Lilienthal became a Soviet citizen in 1939. He played in the USSR Chess Championship eight times. His best result came in the 1940 championship, when he tied for first with Igor Bondarevsky, ahead of Smyslov, Paul Keres, Isaac Boleslavsky, Botvinnik, and 14 other players. He qualified for the Candidates Tournament once, in 1948.
He retired from tournament play in 1965 and returned to Hungary in 1976. His last tournament was Zamárdi 1980, where he finished sixth in the B group, scoring +3 =11 −1. In a 2005 article, Slobodan Adzic wrote that Lilienthal was still active, in good health, driving his car, and writing articles for chess magazines.
Source: Wikipedia
|
