Geoffrey Wolfarth

[David Sedgwick]

The English Bridge Union reports the death of Geoffrey Wolfarth. There is an obituary at https://www.ebu.co.uk/node/3859/.

I believe that he had long since abandoned chess for bridge. However, I may not be the only person who was at Cambridge in the early 1970s to remember him both at the chessboard and away from it.

[Roger de Coverly]

However, I may not be the only person who was at Cambridge in the early 1970s to remember him both at the chessboard and away from it.

We did not quite overlap, as I was at St Catharine's Cambridge from 1968 to 1971 and I think he was 1971 to 1974. I did meet him once or twice on Cambridge visits. Phil Stimpson, now of Guildford 4NCL and Horsham would have known us both, as I imagine would John Saunders.

[John Saunders]

Yes, he was at Cambridge at the same time as me, as Roger says - 1971-74. I didn't know him personally but I was aware that he was a strong player. In the 1972 British Under-21 Championship he scored a creditable 6/11 in a strong field. Big/Mega Database has one of his games, a loss to Steve Boniface from 1971 but gives his first name as 'George', which I'm sorry to say was my fault originally as that was what I had on BritBase (now corrected). I have three more of his games from his time at Cambridge (taken from the pages of the club magazine 'Dragon'); all three were losses, so, observing the principle 'de mortuis, nihil nisi victoriae', I shan't publish any of them here. He played in the Oxford v Cambridge 2nd team match in 1974 on board six.