| Here is a copy of the ACBL's "Hall of Fame"
write-up on Ozzie:
Oswald Jacoby of Dallas TX, bridge columnist. One of the great players of
all time. Member ACBL Hall of Fame. First achieved international preeminence
as partner of Sidney Lenz in the famous Culbertson-Lenz Match. Had already
established himself as a champion at auction and contract. Next became a
member of famed Four Horsemen and Four Aces teams. His selection by Lenz
over players of greater experience and with whom Lenz had practiced
partnerships was early recognition of the brilliance and skill that were
later to bring Jacoby to the top of the ACBL’s list of all-time masterpoint
winners.
Jacoby had two months of Army service in World War I, when he was 15, and he
was awarded the Victory Medal. On Dec. 7, 1941 hewas playing in the NABC
Open Pairs in Richmond VA. when the attack on Pearl Harbor was announced. He
immediately left the tournament and did not play again for 4 years. During
most of that time he served as a specialist in the Navy, with the rank of
lieutenant commander. When he returned to competition in 1945, he found
Charles Goren far ahead in the MP rankings. He had done very little about
returning to the top when he again returned to active duty in 1950 for
service in the Korean War. He served as a commander in Intelligence and was
a member of the original staff at the Panmunjom armistice conference. This
return to service cost him his place on the American team in the first
Bermuda Bowl matches. He had however, represented the ABL in international
competition as far back as 1935, the year when the Four Aces team defeated
the French, champions of Europe, in the first official World Championship
encounter. Returning from 2 years of Korean service, Jacoby found he had
dropped out of the top 19 MP holders. By 1958 he had managed to move back
into 6th place, still far behind Goren. At that time he decided to make a
determined effort to regain the #1 position. By
1962, he had done so. Between 1959 and 1963, he won the McKenney Trophy 4
times in 5 years; the only player at that time older than 50 to win the
trophy. He won it at ages 57, 59, 60 and 61. In 1963 he became the
first player to acquire more than 1,000 MPs in a single year. His winning
total that year was 1,034. In 1967, he surpassed the 10,000-point mark, at
which time he retired from active competition for the McKenney Trophy.
Almost exactly one year later he relinquished his position as top
masterpoint holder to Barry Crane.
Jacoby pioneered many bidding ideas, including Forcing 2NT, Jacoby Transfer
Bids and Weak Jump Overcalls. His innovations have included developments of
Gerber and Blackwood and a specialized use of Two Notrump and Three Notrump
Responses. His most recent innovations were the use of Two-Way Stayman in
connection with Jacoby Transfer Bids after 2NT opening and after
2-anything-2NT. He invented the use of 2H as a double negative response to
2C with 2NT a positive heart response and 2*D* the usual waiting bid. Among
his writings are “The Four Aces System , What’s New in Bridge, Win at Bridge
with Oswald Jacoby, Win at Bridge with Jacoby Modern, The Backgammon Book
(with John Crawford). He also had many books on mathematics, gambling, poker
and other card games, including canasta, in which he had the two
best-selling books.
Jacoby, born in Brooklyn on Dec. 8, 1902, left Columbia in his junior year
to become an actuary, completing the examination of the Society of Actuaries
in 1924 to become, at age 21, the youngest person ever to do so. After four
years with Metropolitan Life, he went into business for himself, but his
success was cut short by the 1929 stock market crash. Jacoby’s
victory-studded career includes many oddities. He played in (and won) his
first auction tournament in July 1929 — the National Team Championship of
the American Whist League. But he had already won the first big contract
pair
tournament ever played, the Goldman Pairs event in the Eastern States
Championship held in February of that year. Later on, he set a record by
winning the Goldman Trophy 3 times in 20 years. Those were the only
occasions on which he entered. Afterward, he became a national champion by
winning 2 AWL pair and team events.
After the Culbertson-Lenz match, Jacoby was secretary of the United States
Bridge Association for nearly 2 years - thus being associated with Ely
Culbertson. Late in 1933, however, he helped to form the original Four Aces
team, which dominated the bridge world for the next several years. During
this period, in addition to American Bridge League triumphs, he won 2 pair
championships and 4 team championships of the USBA. He won a North
American Championship (the Chicago in 1955) with his son, James Jacoby. He
also scored many victories with his wife of 50 years, Mary Zita Jacoby.
Jacoby was elected to the bridge Hall of Fame 1965 and was named ACBL
Honorary Member in 1967. Jacoby was "npc" of North American teams for
1969, 1970 and 1971. As a result he became captain of the first North
American Bermuda
Bowl champion teams (1970 and 1971). The United States had not won this
coveted title in more than a decade. His North American Championship titles
are as follows: Spingold 1934, 36, 38, 39, 45, 50, 59; Vanderbilt 1931, 34,
35, 37, 38, 46, 65; Chicago (now the Reisinger) 1955; Reisinger 1983; Master
Individual 1935; Master Mixed Teams 1968; Life Master Pairs 1936; Men’s
Teams 1952, 59; Open Pairs 1935, 60, 64; Men’s Pairs 1934, 39, 49. He also
won USBA Grand National Open Teams 1934, 35, 37, Open Pairs 1936, 37. He
also won ABL Men’s Teams 1931, 32; AWL Team-of-Four 1929, 31, 33, Open Pairs
1933, Herman Trophy 1960. He placed 2nd in many NABC events and won
countless regional titles including the prestigious Marcus Cup 1955. In 1973
he won the World Championship of Backgammon.
In 1950, Jacoby became the daily bridge columnist for Newspaper Enterprise
Association, serving several hundred newspapers. He established a record on
April 22, 1982 when his 10,000th article was printed. (Goren’s name appeared
on more than this number, but he had not written any columns for many years
before his death in 1991.) Jacoby wrote books on poker, canasta, gin rummy
and mathematical odds. He also continuously maintained a practice as a
consulting actuary, He served for 6 years as a member of the Board of
Visitors of Harvard Observatory (for the last 3, under the chairmanship of
then Senator John F. Kennedy) He became an expert on computers and was
frequently consulted on questions of tournament movements, elimination
schedules and scoring. |
