The Weinsteins of Chess by Bill Wall
A few years ago I put some chess trivia together and made a
horrible mistake. I mixed up some facts between International
Masters Norman Weinstein and Raymond Weinstein. I stated
that Norman Weinstein was the first chess master that
murdered someone. I was mistaken. It was Raymond Weinstein.
Neither player are related.
Raymond Allen Weinstein was born on April 25, 1941 in Brooklyn.
Raymond attended the same high school (Erasmus HIgh School) as
Bobby Fischer (and Barbra Streisand) and was two grades ahead of him.
Bobby Fischer dropped out of high school and Raymond became
captain and first board of Erasmus High School for 3 years.
His high school team won the Interscholastic Team Championship.
Raymond was part of the Collins Kids, taught by Jack Collins.
In 1956, at the age of 15, he won the Junior championship
of the Marshall chess club in New York City. He would win
the Marshall chess club championship in 1960, 1961, and 1962.
He played in his first rated tournament, the 1957 U.S. Open
in Cleveland and got an expert's rating as his first rating.
In 1957 Raymond won the Long Island Amateur Championship.
In 1958 he won the U.S. Junior Open in Homestead, Florida
(Norman Weinstein would win this event 10 years later) and
became a USCF master, after an 8-1 score (7 wins, 2 draws).
This event was won the two previous years by Bobby Fischer.
Raymond attended Brooklyn College for 4 years (he received
a Bachelors of Arts degree in psychology) and was captain and 1st
board of his college chess team the won the Intercollegiate
Chess Championship. Raymond was invited to the U.S. Championship
in 1958-59 because of his win in the U.S. Junior Championship.
However, he took last place. He was unable to win a single game,
drawing 6 and losing 5. He won the 1959 New Jersey Open and the
1960 Western Open. In 1959 he tied for 2nd-3rd at the U.S. Open in
Omaha, Nebraska (Norman Weinstein would win the US Open in 1973 in
Chicago). First place went to Arthur Bisguier (his second cousin).
Raymond and Pal Benko tied for 2nd-3rd place. Raymond played in the
1959-60 U.S. Championship, which he took 6th place and drawing his
game with Fischer. In 1960 Raymond was part of the winning U.S. team
that won the students World Team Championship in Leningrad. He played
Board 3 and had the best percentage points for board 3.
Board 1 was Lombardy and board 2 was Charles Kalme.
That year he also played for the U.S. Olympiad team in Leipzig.
Raymond Weinstein's USCF rating was now 2444, the 6th highest
in the country. Bobby Fischer was rated at 2640.
In the 1960-61 U.S. Championship, at age 19, he took 3rd place.
First place went to Bobby Fischer and 2nd place went to Bill
Lombardy. He had defeated Lombardy in their individual game.
He also defeated his cousin Arthur Bisguier, Sam Reshevsky,
William Lombardy and Robert Byrne in this event to score 6.5 out of 11.
His only losses were to Fischer and Anthony Saidy.
He qualified for the next Interzonal Tournament with Fischer and Lombardy.
However, Lombardy and Raymond Weinstein were unable to go to
the next Interzonal in Stockholm, and their places were
taken by Bisguier and Benko. In 1961 Raymond was giving simultaneous
exhibitions at Princeton and Harvard, playing 65 games and remembering
all the games days after the event. Raymond Weinstein took 9th place
in the 1961-62 U.S. Championship. Raymond became an International Master
in 1962. In 1962 he played on the U.S. Olympiad team in Helsinki and
won an individual board performance prize. In 1963 he played on the
U.S. team at the World Student Championship at Budva, Yugoslavia.
In the 1963-64 U.S. Championship Raymond Weinstein
ended up in 7th place, but he defeated Larry Evans, Sam
Reshevsky, Robert Bryne and Donald Byrne. He had played in 5 U.S.
Championships. In 1964 he participated in the11th Student Olympiad
in Cracow and the team took 4th place. Weinstein played board 2.
Lombardy played board 1. Raymond was studying to be a psychiatrist
at the Free University of Amsterdam, in the Netherlands.
Raymond was fluent in many languages and had a very good memory.
In 1964 Raymond killed an 83-year old man in a nursing home with a
razor. Raymond went to trial and was judged mentally ill. He was
confined to Ward's Island for the mentally ill in New York, where
he remains there today.
Norman Stephen Weinstein was born on October 4, 1950 in New
York. In 1968 he won the U.S. Junior Open in New York.
Norman attended Brandeis University and got a Masters degree
in mathematics. In 1972 Norman won the Atlantic Open. In 1972,
Norman Weinstein's rating was 2416, number 20 in the U.S.
In 1973 he won the U.S. Open in Chicago.
In 1974 Norman took 9th place at the U.S. Championship in Chicago.
He defeated Reshevsky in this event. In 1975 he
took 3rd place at Lone Pine and did well enough in the 1975
Cleveland International to gain the International Master
norm (playing at Grandmaster pace). In 1975 he took 2nd place
at an international tournament in Portimaio, Portugal. Larry Evans
took 1st place. This was the first time Americans took 1st and 2nd
place at an international tournament. In 1976 he won
the Quebec Open. In 1978 he wrote a book on the
Reti Opening (1.Nf3 d5 2.c4).
In 1978 Norman tied for 5th-7th in the U.S. Championship
in Pasadena, California. He scored 1 win (against Kim Commons)
and 13 draws, with no losses, the only player not to lose a game.
Norman Weinstein has the highest percentage of draws
(77.1 percent) of any player participating in a U.S. Championship.
He was recruited by Bankers Trust, who was looking for chess masters,
and Norman became a very successful and wealthy currency trader.
He has been mentioned in Forbes magazine.
There is another famous Weinstein. That's Garik Weinstein
who changed his name to Garry Kasparov.
Raymond Weinstein - Miron Scher, Brooklyn 1957
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e5 3.dxe5 Ne4 4.Nf3 Nc6 5.a3 a5 6.Qc2 Nc5
7.Bf4 Ne6 8.Bg3 Bc5 9.e3 b6 10.Nc3 Bb7 11.Bd3 Ng5
12.Nxg5 Qxg5 13.O-O O-O-O 14.Nd5 Ne7 15.b4 axb4
16.axb4 Nxd5 17.cxd5 Bxb4 18.Ba6 Qg6 19.Qc4 Ba5
20.e6 d6 21.Qc6! 1-0
Raymond Weinstein - Ole Jakobsen, Helsinki 1961
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 e6 5.Nc3 Qc7 6.g3 a6
7.Bg2 b5 8.O-O Bb7 9.Re1 d6 10.a4 b4 11.Nd5! Qa5
12.Nxc6 Bxc6 13.Bd2 Bxd5 14.exd5 e5 15.f4 O-O-O
16.Re4 Qxd5 17.Qe2 Qc5+ 18.Kh1 d5 19.Qxa6+ Kc7
20.Rxb4 Rb8 21.Rb5 1-0
(if 21...Rxb5 22.axb5 exf4? 23.Bb4 Qxb4?? 24.Qc6+ Kd8
25.Ra8+ leads to mate)
Norman Weinstein - Ron Gross, Aspen (US Open), 1968
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Bc5 4.c3 Qf6 5.O-O Nge7
6.Re1 O-O 7.d4 exd4 8.e5 Qg6 9.cxd4 Nxd4 10.Nxd4 Qb6
11.Be3 Bxd4 12.Bxd4 Qxb5 13.Nc3 Qa6 14.Bc5 Qe6
15.Nb5 Qd5 16.Rc1 d6 17.Nxc7 Qxd1 18.Rexd1 dxc5
19.Nxa8 Bg4 20.f3 Rxa8 21.fxg4 b6 22.b4 cxb4
23.Rc7 Ng6 24.Rdd7 1-0
George Kane - Norman Weinstein, New York 1972
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.f3 b6 6.Bd3 Bb7
7.Nge2 c5 8.d5 Nbd7 9.O-O O-O 10.f4 e6 11.dxe6 fxe6
12.f5 exf5 13.fxg6 Qh4 14.Nf4 Ng4 15.fxg6 Nfg4
16.gxh7+ Kh8 17.h3 Qg3 18.hxg4 Rxf4! (threatening
19...Qxg2 mate) 0-1
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