Liam, Earl and Churchill's Compilations

[Jay H]

Greetings all,
I just received this scan of a letter from Mr. Liam Stephens, who wanted to share it with fellow forumites, but could not get it to post. So, I am posting this on Liam's behalf......
It is an interesting piece of correspondence sent from Earl Hangen to Liam Stephens over thirty years ago !!! It is regarding a correction made to Churchill's Compilations.




In this day and age of computers and programs, I doubt many of the younger players have ever heard of Churchill's Compilations. ( or CC, as called in annotations from other publications)
At one point in time, a complete, cross indexed set of CC with updated corrections and transpostions would have been the prize of any players collection, and was the absolute BIBLE for mail players and analysts.

Today, it is an almost forgotten volume of work, as again, with computers and programming, it has become somewhat, (dare I say it ??...lol) obsolete.
Obviously, Mr. Stephens was a subscriber and contributor, as was Earl.
I don't know how much Mr. Stephens contributed, but, I have Earl's set of CC, with all of his additions, corrections, and transpositions, and he contributed VERY HEAVILY to CC. Hundreds, and probably into the thousands of contributions....specializing in transpositions. In fact, Earl was contributing to CC long before he even took over as ACF Mail Play directer.
Included in Earl's CC are the responses from Mr. Churchill himself, offering praise and amazement at Earl's ability to find transpositions....
(Earl had even kept a "cook book", part of which contained ways to transpose into the barred openings, some of which were sent to Brian Hinkle and Marion Tinsley while they were analyzing the soundness of some of these openings, and Tinsley himself offered admiration to Earl's ability in this regard...)

A very interesting letter, reaching from the past into the present......Thanx so very much for sharing this Liam.
An absolute treat to see this !!!!!


Comments anyone...????
Regards

Jay H

Trivia; does anyone here know the story of what happened to the original transcripts from CC......a terrible story.

[Jay H]

Greetings,
I found scanned this, to compliment the previous post


Earl's intro to fellow CC subscribers.

Regards

Jay H

[Bill Salot]

The mention of Churchill's Compilations brings back many fond memories.

Ernie Churchill was a good mail player. He developed a personal manuscript covering both sides of every opening. It consisted of what he considered to be the "best" available moves. He used his manuscript to start the monthly publication that he called Churchill's Compilations (CC). He thought it would be finished when he published the last opening.

But Herb Richter and others kept sending Ernie additions, corrections, and transpositions. He couldn't keep up. I volunteered to print copies and mail them to all the subscribers if he would continue his work. He agreed.

He typed each issue on an old typewriter in California, and mailed the original pages to me in Virginia each month. He included a few bucks for postage and envelopes. I Xeroxed the pages and sent the copies to his subscribers. I then returned his originals to him, and awaited the next batch. This went on for more than 20 years, and generated thousanmds of loose leaf pages of play for each subscriber.

You asked what happened to the originals. I don't know, but I can guess. I visited Ernie a few years before he died. He told me that his son was not interested in checkers, so Ernie was concerned about what would happen to CC when he was gone. I told him I had been keeping a complete, clean set of pages in case more copies were needed for new subscribers. I still have it in addition to my annotated set.

Except for its sentimental value, CC is not worth much in this computer age. But it brings back memories.

Bill Salot

[Jay H]

The mention of Churchill's Compilations brings back many fond memories.

Ernie Churchill was a good mail player. He developed a personal manuscript covering both sides of every opening. It consisted of what he considered to be the "best" available moves. He used his manuscript to start the monthly publication that he called Churchill's Compilations (CC). He thought it would be finished when he published the last opening.

But Herb Richter and others kept sending Ernie additions, corrections, and transpositions. He couldn't keep up. I volunteered to print copies and mail them to all the subscribers if he would continue his work. He agreed.

He typed each issue on an old typewriter in California, and mailed the original pages to me in Virginia each month. He included a few bucks for postage and envelopes. I Xeroxed the pages and sent the copies to his subscribers. I then returned his originals to him, and awaited the next batch. This went on for more than 20 years, and generated thousanmds of loose leaf pages of play for each subscriber.

You asked what happened to the originals. I don't know, but I can guess. I visited Ernie a few years before he died. He told me that his son was not interested in checkers, so Ernie was concerned about what would happen to CC when he was gone. I told him I had been keeping a complete, clean set of pages in case more copies were needed for new subscribers. I still have it in addition to my annotated set.

Except for its sentimental value, CC is not worth much in this computer age. But it brings back memories.

Bill Salot

Greetings Mr. Salot......
What a pleasure to see you here on ACF the forum !!!!! Several years ago, Earl Hangen printed a photograph (of a very young Billy "The Browser" Salot ) in his "Wood's Ladder Report", with the caption ...."He might be back sometime".... ( If you need a copy of this Woods Ladder report, I can furnish) Are you indeed back ..???
Hint,hint...there is a problem board here on the forum.....World Champion Alex Moiseyev contributes some problems, among others....will we be seeing some Bill Salot problems...??

***Edited...Well, ......not necessarily a "Problem" board, but a Strategy and Tactics board, that has plenty of problems on it.....***

I have some correspondence regarding the fate of Ernie's original transcripts....I'll dig it out and post it.....Very sad.
Yes, CC has become almost obsolete......I have two copies, completely crossed, transposed, with additions, etc. etc. Paul Ottey's set, and Earl Hangen's...back in the mid-late 1980's, these could have been sold for hundreds of dollars each....
Anyway, great to hear from you, and look forward to reading more of your posts !!!

Regards

Jay H

[JR Smith]

Hello Jay, why are most scans posted with the right hand side clipped?

[Bill Salot]

Thanks, Jay, for bringing up CC and responding to my comments on it. Anything you add about CC will be of interest to me.

Earl Hangen sent me the picture that you mentioned. His comment that maybe I would be back was based on the fact that I haven't yet retired from my full time job. I've never been far away from checkers. if I retire, checkers would probably get a bigger chunk of my time. At 78, I'm old enough.

Last summer, a friend at work told me I could play checkers on the internet. Since then, I've got my feet wet on Kurnik and Fly or Die. I learned that I can't compete with the strong players, and I still get hung up analyzing worthless end games instead of practical openings and midgames.

I learned that there are checker programs, but I'm not sure whether I could install one if I had one. They probably make problem composing obsolete because all the late game positions are already in their databases.

I'll drop in now and then. Jay, please tell me something about yourself. How old are you, and where are you from?

Bill Salot

[Jay H]

Hello Jay, why are most scans posted with the right hand side clipped?

Greetings JRSmith,
Great to hear from you....
I have gone back and looked at every one of my scans that I have posted, and even now, looking at the sample above, and there is nothing cut off on any of them,they are all complete and readable.
Could this possibly have something to do with a browser adjustment that may need to be made on your reader....in other words, did this just start when they changed the format on the forum board several weeks back...?
Maybe Jason , the webmaster, can help you out....Seriously, nobody else has stated anything about this problem...

Anyway, hope you are having a great holiday season, and always look forward to hearing from you !!!


Regards

Jay H

[Jay H]

Thanks, Jay, for bringing up CC and responding to my comments on it. Anything you add about CC will be of interest to me.

Earl Hangen sent me the picture that you mentioned. His comment that maybe I would be back was based on the fact that I haven't yet retired from my full time job. I've never been far away from checkers. if I retire, checkers would probably get a bigger chunk of my time. At 78, I'm old enough.

Last summer, a friend at work told me I could play checkers on the internet. Since then, I've got my feet wet on Kurnik and Fly or Die. I learned that I can't compete with the strong players, and I still get hung up analyzing worthless end games instead of practical openings and midgames.

I learned that there are checker programs, but I'm not sure whether I could install one if I had one. They probably make problem composing obsolete because all the late game positions are already in their databases.

I'll drop in now and then. Jay, please tell me something about yourself. How old are you, and where are you from?

Bill Salot

Greetings Mr. Salot,
Great to hear from you...!!!
I, myself, have been in and out of checkers since 1985, when I first discovered "Scientific", and "Organized" Checkers. When I joined the ACF, Burke Grandjean wrote me and told me of Earl Hangen, who lived in the same town as I did....Reading, PA. I have been friends with Earl ever since...There are times when I have had to step away from the game for extended periods of time, so I never developed into a player that has "Twenty years" under his belt.....In fact, I have never played a cross board tourney. I used to play by mail in the mid1980's , on and off thru the mid-late 1990's.
Earl himself fell on some hard times, and in an effort to preserve the mail play records from his term as Mail play director, I salvaged what I could from his paperwork....and also got a few pieces of interesting checkers history, which I have been sharing with fellow forumites, here on these boards. ( This all done with Earl's knowledge and blessing)I still have a great interest in playing, on the internet, and studying problems, etc. But, I have also developed an interest in the history of the game itself...meaning the players, the traditions, and collecting books and boards, etc.

One of the things which Earl had in one of his scrapbooks was a letter from Herb Richter....Yes, Ernie's originals were trashed, but first, they were placed on the sidewalk during what could best be described as a "yard sale".....Earl , when he heard of this, looked at me, with what I could swear were tears in his eyes, and said..."Yeah, just imagine the neighborhood kids coming by and making airplanes with Ernie's originals"......This was, of course, back in the days when mail players were paying $300.00-$400.00 for complete sets.
Herb had tried to talk to Ernie's son, Omer, and tried to get him to donate some of the items to the ICHF, as he (Herb) himself had done. He had also given Omer's phone number to Walker himself, hoping he could talk him into preserving Ernie's work...but from reading the letter, it appears as niether was succesful.
Another piece of Checkers history gone....Which would have happened to all of Earl's Checkers things, if I had not stepped in at the last minute.
And, as I am going through the paper's and ring binders, I find things and post them here. In all of Earl's years involved in checkers, he acquired a large collection of interesting things. Everybody here on the forum seems to enjoy them, so, until I am out of items, or I am thrown off the forum, I will continue to post.....
Mr. Salot, It is a pleasure to meet such a distinguished Checkerist here on the ACF forum... ( Along with all of the rest of the fine company here !!)
I look forward to you dropping by now and then, and eagerly look forward to reading more of your posts !!!


Regards

Jay H

[liam stephens]

Hi Jay and JR,

I've also had that problem with the right hand side of the page being cropped. It only occurs with pictures, photocopies or down loaded items, and not the message page itself.
I understand this is due to the pixel resolution of the item concerned. If you right click on the mouse,for the page concerned, then click on "properties" and select "settings", it will give you an option to adjust the pixel resolution.
I only know this because my son is visiting over Christmas and knows a bit about these things.
Another problem which can arise is when sending photos, if the resolution is too high the resulting transmitted picture will take up too much memory on the computer. Before transmitting the photograph, the resolution should be reduced to an appropriate level.

Hope this is of some help.

Regards - Liam.

[Patrick Parker]

if u can accurately scan fotos
then one could scan an entire book and use a program like winzip...not winzip tho
to shrink it an entire book umm like say ryans scme could be scanned and made to about 300kb
just an idea
if you wanted to do an entire book ....J