Bill Wall's Chess Blog

  19 th century chess – Nov 8, 2020 2001 A Space Odyssey – Nov 8, 2020 Abrahams, Gerald – Nov 8, 2020 ACM computer chess – Nov 8, 2020 Actresses and chess – Nov 11, 2020 Addict, chess – Nov 14, 2020 Addison, William – Nov 7, 2020 Advertising and chess   - Nov 8, 2020 Age players learned chess – Nov 18, 2020 Ajeeb the automaton – Nov 8, 2020 Alekhine, Alexander – Nov 8, 2020 America, early and chess – Nov 12, 2020 Anderssen, Adolf – Nov 6, 2020 Anecdotes, chess – Nov 10, 2020 Annoy your opponent – Nov 15, 2020 Antarctica and chess – Nov 7, 2020 Archaeology and chess – Nov 8, 2020 Armed Forces chess – Nov 7, 2020 Asimov, Isaac and chess – Nov 8, 2020 Astronauts and chess – Nov 7, 2020 Astronomy and chess – Nov 12, 2020 Athletes and chess – Nov 10, 2020 Atwood, George and chess 0 Nov 11, 2020 Automobiles and chess – Nov 12, 2020 Bans in chess – Jan 11, 2021 Baseball and chess – Nov 7, 2020 Bedlam and chess – Nov 12, 2020 Benefits of c

  Yuri Nikolaevich Sakharov ( Ю́рій Микола́йович Са́харо ) was born on September 18, 1922, in Yuzovka (Stalino since 1924, and now Donetsk, Ukraine since 1961).   Other sources have him born in the village of Vlasovka, Voronezh Oblast, Russia, over 300 miles away. His father, Nikolai Matveevich Sakharov (1881 – 1937), was an official in the Donbass mining industry in Ukraine.   Yuri was his only child.   His mother, Alexandra Afanasievna Yumashev, was a housewife and, later, worked in a sewing factory cutter.  In 1934, Yuri learned how to play chess from his father.  In 1938, Yuri took his first chess lessons from from Apollinary Nikolaevich Gaevsky (1897-1990), a physics and math teacher and strong chess player from Donetsk, Ukraine.  He played in the first Ukrainian chess championship, held in Kiev in 1924.  He also played in the second Ukranian championship, held in Kharkov in 1925. In 1938, Sakharov’s father was arrested, proclaimed as “an enemy of the people,” and executed