When I used to teach my girlfriend online, some years ago, I would say
things to her like "You should have played the spade Jack, not the
spade Queen" and she would say "How did you know I had the Jack?"

The answer to your question "How did Mike Lawrence know what was in
everyone's hand" is probably the same as "How do you know that when a
certain move is made at move 10, what the board will look like at move
25?" Experts know.

In point of fact, Lawrence wrote a book "How To Read Your Opponent's
Cards" in which he explains how to use the clues available to locate
the unseen cards. If your opponents are rank novices then it will do
you no good, as you can't know what they hold when they themselves
don't know.

Regarding republishing of books, I don't know what the market is in
chess for them. Bridge has only been around for about 80 years, so
there are no "classic" books that predate that. Bidding has changed
tremendously, so older books on bidding are of almost no use.

I personally would find a book about the Culbertson-Sims and Culberton-
Lenz matches interesting, but I don't know if one exists.

Most bridge books are sold either through Baron-Barclay books (the
product of consolidation among three major booksellers) or by
booksellers at tournaments who buy them from Baron-Barclay. So Baron-
Barclay would be a good place to start.

- Hank Youngerman
ACBL Gold Life Master
Probably plays chess about as well as you play bridge


On Feb 25, 1:02*am, samsloan wrote:
It is a mild exaggeration for me to say that I do not know a heart
from a spade. I actually played bridge for a little while in college
at the University of California in about 1966-67. I got about ten
master points but never send them in.

I even played with Al Lawrence as my partner in several sessions in
the Game Room or in the Bear's Lair at the University of California at
Berkeley. In case you think that makes me a good player, actually
these were money games. The idea was that Mike Lawrence was the best
player in the world and I was the worst player in the world.
Therefore, we played for money against a partnership of above average
ability. We always won. All I had to figure out how to do is always
have Mike Lawrence be the declarer and under no circumstances be the
declarer myself because I was terrible at that. I could defend a
little bit however.

I always had money in my pocket because I was President of the Sexual
Freedom League then so therefore I never had any financial problems
and I could afford to play in the big money games in the Bear's Lair
without fear of losing.

I was amazed how Mike Lawrence could figure out every card in
everybody's hand and know the exact result of the hand after only
three rounds of play. He would say "Down One" or "Making" or something
like that after only three rounds of play and everybody would just
throw in their cards and another hand would be dealt.

I could never understand how they did that.

Sam Sloan