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K Williams

Number of games in database: 4
Years covered: 1977 to 1979
Overall record: +0 -3 =1 (12.5%)*
   * Overall winning percentage = (wins+draws/2) / total games.

Most played openings
B22 Sicilian, Alapin (2 games)


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 page 1 of 1; 4 games  PGN Download 
Game  ResultMoves YearEvent/LocaleOpening
1. J Hardinge vs K Williams  1-0221977U-23 v PenarthB22 Sicilian, Alapin
2. J Hardinge vs K Williams  ½-½311978v PenarthB51 Sicilian, Canal-Sokolsky (Rossolimo) Attack
3. J Hardinge vs K Williams  1-0301979v Cardiff AB22 Sicilian, Alapin
4. K Williams vs J Hardinge  0-1251979v PenarthB83 Sicilian
  REFINE SEARCH:   White wins (1-0) | Black wins (0-1) | Draws (1/2-1/2) | Williams wins | Williams loses  

Kibitzer's Corner
May-27-09  RonB52734: I've been looking into the origin of the name "Wilkes Barre variation," which is used in the US for the Traxler counterattack:


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A few websites state without attribution that "Marshall analyzed the line and named it after a town in Pennsylvania," an explanation that seems suspicious to me. (There are no games by Marshall in the line as White or Black, to my knowledge.)

Wikipedia I believe attributes the name to the Wilkes Barre chess club which supposedly "reinvented" (a better word would be rediscovered) the line "some decades" after Traxler first played it in the late 19th c. I think Wikipedia even mentions "K. Williams" but again this explanation is so thin as to be suspicious as well.

But an article by Alex Dunne: http://www.uschess.org/cc/dunne/ale... refers to a book: The Real American Wilkes Barre by Ken Williams which contains analysis of the opening.

Unfortunately, I googled this and wasn't able to find any other references to the book.

Oddly enough, the K Williams on this page only played one published Two Knights game, as White, and lost, and appears not to have played chess again for 46 years! (A kibitzer to the Karpov game suggests that the "K Williams" of the 1970s is in fact "H Williams.")

I wonder if any of our historians or book collectors have anything to add?

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