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Chess was front page news and on the cover of Time Magazine in the summer of 1972 when American Bobby Fischer challenged world champion Boris Spassky of the Soviet Union. Fischer, 29, had been prominent on the chess scene since 1958 when he won the U.S. championship just before he turned 15. The Soviet Union had dominated international chess for 25 years, but Spassky was bamboozled by Fischer's unpredictable openings. Fischer clinched the 24-game match, held in Reykjavik, Iceland, after 21 games with a record of seven wins, three losses, and eleven draws. Fischer's victory generated tremendous interest in the game in the United States. Known as the 'Fischer Boom,' membership numbers in the U.S. Chess Federation reached their peak in the following two years. The eccentric Fischer never defended his title. He opted to resign as world champion in 1974 when not all of his 64 conditions to defend against Anatoly Karpov were accepted by chess' governing body. Since then Fischer has been a recluse. He did make an appearance in 1992 to play his old rival Spassky in a specially arranged match in Yugoslavia. (This violated UN sanctions against Yugoslavia at the time.) Fischer won the match and proclaimed he was still the legitimate world champion. Despite having Jewish ancestry, Fischer is an anti-Semite and a passionate Holocaust denier. Fischer called a Manila talk-radio station to applaud the 9/11 terrorist attacks in a profanity-filled rant. Fischer now lives in Iceland where he was granted citizenship.
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Bobby
Fischer
Boris
Spassky
chess
Added: 12th December 2007
Views: 215
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Posted By: Lava1964 |
 
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Hazel Court, an English actress who co-starred with the likes of Boris Karloff and Vincent Price in popular horror movies of the 1950s and '60s, has died. She was 82. Court died early Tuesday of a heart attack at her home near Lake Tahoe, daughter Sally Walsh said Wednesday. While she had a substantial acting career both in England and on American TV, Court was perhaps best known for her work in such films as 1963's "The Raven." She co-starred with Price, Karloff and Peter Lorre in director Roger Corman's take on the classic Edgar Allan Poe poem.
Corman directed her in five movies. Like other "scream queens" of the era, Court often relied on her cleavage and her ability to shriek in fear and die horrible deaths for her roles. "The Premature Burial,""The Masque of the Red Death,""The Curse of Frankenstein" and "Devil Girl from Mars" helped propel her to cult status and brought her fan mail even in her later years. 'She'd probably get over 100 pieces of fan mail a month and she would reply to every single one,' her daughter said.
Court had finished an autobiography, "Hazel Court - Horror Queen," which will be published in Britain.
Tags:
hazel
court
horror
scream
queen
hammer
films
roger
corman
boris
karloff
vincent
price
christopher
lee
peter
cushing
Added: 17th April 2008
Views: 128
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Posted By: Naomi |
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