In the following four-mover, White has a pawn on the 7th, and the
composer's keymove is to underpromote: 1. d8R. Incredibly, promoting
instead to a queen cooks the problem! How could this have happened? Here
are the details:

4KB1b/p1pP1Pr1/2P3Pk/6p1/P1p3P1/2P5/3P4/1B6
White mates in four

Kenneth S. Howard
Commended
Eleventh Informal Tourney
The Weekly Westminister
January 24, 1925

1. d8R a5 2. d4 cxd3 e.p. 3. Rxd3 Kxg6 4. Rd6#
1...a6 2. Rd4 a5 3. Re4 Kxg6 4. Re6#

Later this became #156 in Howard's The Enjoyment of Chess Problems,
first published in 1943. In his Note to the Second Edition, the author
credits various individuals for checking the soundness of his problems.
Though several errors were found, no one caught this one. Obviously, a
player's viewpoint was needed. A promoted queen has two paths to the
h-rank for a short mate in three. Black has only the stalemate defense
1...a5 to answer these threats, and Howard probably figured that not
having the rook available to mask the b1 bishop prevented the queen
promotion from working. Overlooked by everyone was that White has a
simple alternative to release the stalemate: 2. Ba2! Kxg6 3. Bb1+ Kh6 4.
Qf6#. Adding a pawn on a2 could fix this, but all eight White pawns are
already on the board, so it appears that no repair is possible.

Source:

The Enjoyment of Chess Problems
Kenneth S. Howard
Second Edition Revised
Bell Publishing Company
Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania, 1951

Analysis by:

Popeye DOS-32Bit-Version 3.75

Clifford Stern

Clifford Stern wrote:
In the following four-mover, White has a pawn on the 7th, and the
composer's keymove is to underpromote: 1. d8R. Incredibly, promoting
instead to a queen cooks the problem! How could this have happened?

In the pre-computer days, such things indeed happened more commonly
than one might think, even with checking. I am not sure " a player"
would do any better, since if he did guess the Q-promo, the author
would probably show him why this does not work, and we have a way of
believing such things despite evidence to the contrary.

I did an analysis of the long movers in Schach-Echo of the early 1970s,
which probably had the best problem column in the world at that time.
About 30% of them contained fairly grave errors and duals.

Even with computers, errors still crop up. An embarassing story
involves the creation of a long seriesselfmate that I checked using the
intelligent option 1 of a popular solving program. This assumes at
least one self-block around the white king before whites last
seriesmove and then the selfmate is delivered by black. However, an
astute solver found a solution in which the one self-block came on the
last white move; the computer didn't find this, of course, as I had set
it not to! That was my mistake, of course; I chose a faster solving
speed and sacrificed accuracy.

I currently run the new Problem column at Chess Life online, and in the
near future, we will, in addition to problems for solution, have a
bulletin board and blog set up where questions of precisely this nature
can be asked. I hope to see you and other problems enthusiasts there.

Mr. Stern, I believe I found it and we should probably check original
sources to make sure some sort of misprint did not occur. Sometimes
problems are correct as published, but republished incorrectly.

One of the joys in being a problemist - a solver or composer - is
fixing old problems that have various flaws in them; at least it can be
for me. For then, if the problem was incorrect, but can be fixed, we
then get to have our names on the diagram with the author as follows:

Kenneth Howard
v. Stern and Dowd

For me, it feels like I am reaching back in history to lend a hand to
those great composers of the past, and all subsequent publications of
the problem would include our variation. It is like the time I found a
TN in a game that Rudolf Spielmann lost (a King's Gambit, no less!) and
I was able to spring that TN on a strong opponent - I somehow felt that
"Rudy" and I had something in common. But not everyone is as romantic
as me!

A white pawn on a2 would indeed solve the dual solution, as you note,
but you assumed that the white pawn a4 must also be there. Well, that
is true, if the black pawn remains on a7. But if we retract the WP a4
to a2 and bring the BP a7 forward to a4, then I believe only the
author's intended solution of 1. d8R! holds. 1. d8R! a3, and then as
intended in the author's solution.

If this does not involve a misprint, I would love to include this new
version in my column next month, with you of course as first "fixer" of
the problem (as above), since you noted that a Pa2 would fix it, but
assumed it needed to be *another* pawn instead, not realizing one can
simply bring the white a4 pawn back and the a7 pawn forward.

I will check all sources first; we may end up disappointed, and find
the problem was published correctly to begin with, and something
happened in the reprint process.

Could you please check any sources you might find as well, and also
check it on Popeye - I've checked mine on two different programs, but
as you can see from my first reply, I don't always trust the computer!

If this interests you, contact me here or at -
remove the nospam, of course.

Congratulations on your find, and maybe this will encourage you to
compose problems of your own as well.

Mr Stern and other problem enthusiasts!

My first version only saved one of Howard's solutions. I have now found
a way to save both. My research indicates that this was the original
version, and it was cooked from the start. But I am still looking! The
way to save both was simple, and again, I should have seen it right
away.

In case you can't tell, this sort of analytical work really "jazzes"
me.

Again, please contact me here or by email for the "new and improved"
version.

SBD

IS DOCTOR DOWD BACK?

It would appear that Rynd/Dowd has shed his split personality.

SBD wrote:
Mr Stern and other problem enthusiasts!

My first version only saved one of Howard's solutions. I have now found
a way to save both. My research indicates that this was the original
version, and it was cooked from the start. But I am still looking! The
way to save both was simple, and again, I should have seen it right
away.

In case you can't tell, this sort of analytical work really "jazzes"
me.

Again, please contact me here or by email for the "new and improved"
version.

SBD

wrote:
IS DOCTOR DOWD BACK?

It would appear that Rynd/Dowd has shed his split personality.

Thanks for the welcome back Liarry, but my decision was to ignore you
and Phil; thus no need for a "secret identity" of sorts. You two boys
continue to have fun muckraking.

SBD wrote:
Mr Stern and other problem enthusiasts!

My first version only saved one of Howard's solutions. I have now found
a way to save both. My research indicates that this was the original
version, and it was cooked from the start. But I am still looking! The
way to save both was simple, and again, I should have seen it right
away.

In case you can't tell, this sort of analytical work really "jazzes"
me.

Again, please contact me here or by email for the "new and improved"
version.

SBD

I have also found a way to save both. Am I spoling something if I post
it here to ask whether the position is legal or not? I think it's legal
but there might be some factor I have not considered that makes it
unorthodox.

My first version only saved one of Howard's solutions. I have now found
a way to save both. My research indicates that this was the original
version, and it was cooked from the start. But I am still looking! The
way to save both was simple, and again, I should have seen it right
away.

I have also found a way to save both. Am I spoling anything if I post
it here? It is a (12+7).

wrote:

I have also found a way to save both. Am I spoling anything if I post
it here? It is a (12+7).

I'd love to see it, Jose, but would prefer that it not be posted here
(of course, you are free to do what you want), but I may want to
publish both versions in my column to show how such problems can be
saved. You will of course receive credit for your version, whether it
is different or the same as the one I found.

I am trying to stress instruction in the new column, to show how
problems are made, can be fixed, what the common themes are, to try to
appeal to a wider audience. You can send it to my old aol address or my
new gmail address if you like. I would be very appreciative.

Good luck, as always, in your composing!

SBD

Clifford Stern wrote:
In the following four-mover, White has a pawn on the 7th, and the
composer's keymove is to underpromote: 1. d8R. Incredibly, promoting
instead to a queen cooks the problem! How could this have happened?
Here are the details:

4KB1b/p1pP1Pr1/2P3Pk/6p1/P1p3P1/2P5/3P4/1B6
White mates in four

Does moving the king from d8 to a2 help? Or is he needed on d8?
(I've not looked closely and I'm no good at problems anyway.)


Dave.

--
David Richerby Chocolate Wine (TM): it's like a
www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~davidr/ vintage Beaujolais that's made of
chocolate!