Jude Frazier Acers (born April 6, 1944 in

Long Beach, California Long Beach is a city in Los Angeles County, California. It is the 42nd-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 466,742 as of 2020. A charter city, Long Beach is the seventh-most populous city in California. Incorporate ...

) is a

chess master A chess title is a title regulated by a chess governing body and bestowed upon players based on their performance and rank. Such titles are usually granted for life. The international chess governing body FIDE grants several titles, the most pres ...

, showman ( simultaneous exhibitor), and chess author/writer.

Early years

Acers spent much of his childhood in an orphanage. His father was a Marine and was away a lot and his mother struggled with mental issues. When he was five, he saw a book about chess and started playing. His father returned when he was an adolescent and took him from the

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

orphanage to New Orleans. His father was abusive, and committed Acers at the age of 14 to Louisiana's state mental institution in Mandeville. At 17, Acers was already rated as a master by the U.S. Chess Federation. The state paid for him to get a degree in

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

from

Louisiana State University Louisiana State University (officially Louisiana State University and Agricultural and Mechanical College, commonly referred to as LSU) is a public land-grant research university in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The university was founded in 1860 nea ...

Chess biography

Acers is best known for playing against all comers in a

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans
Merriam-Webster. ; french: La Nouvelle-Orléans , es, Nuev ...

downtown gazebo while wearing a red beret. A longtime resident of Louisiana, he claims to have been the first New Orleans native chess master of comparable strength since

Paul Morphy Paul Charles Morphy (June 22, 1837 – July 10, 1884) was an American chess player. He is considered to have been the greatest chess master of his era and is often considered the unofficial World Chess Champion. A chess prodigy, he was ca ...

He is also known for being a great showman, touring the country giving simultaneous chess exhibitions. He was twice the world record holder of having played the most opponents in a

simultaneous exhibition A simultaneous exhibition or simultaneous display is a board game exhibition (commonly chess or Go) in which one player (typically of high rank, such as a grandmaster or dan-level player) plays multiple games at a time with a number of other pl ...

. First against 117 opponents (1974,

Lloyd Center Lloyd Center is a shopping mall in the Lloyd District of Portland, Oregon, United States, just northeast of downtown. It is owned by Arrow Retail of Dallas. The mall features three floors of shopping, with the third level serving mostly as prof ...

Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers, Portland is the county seat of Multnomah County, the most populous co ...

), then against 179 opponents (1976, Mid Island Plaza,

Long Island Long Island is a densely populated island in the southeastern region of the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, part of the New York metropolitan area. With over 8 million people, Long Island is the most populous island in the United Sta ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

). The records were certified by the

Guinness Book of World Records ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a reference book published annually, listing world ...

. Acers barely survived

Hurricane Katrina Hurricane Katrina was a destructive Category 5 Atlantic hurricane that caused over 1,800 fatalities and $125 billion in damage in late August 2005, especially in the city of New Orleans and the surrounding areas. It was at the time the cost ...

and lived in a

displaced persons Forced displacement (also forced migration) is an involuntary or coerced movement of a person or people away from their home or home region. The UNHCR defines 'forced displacement' as follows: displaced "as a result of persecution, conflict, g ...

camp for some time. As the city recovered, he returned to New Orleans and resumed his customary chess table in the

French Quarter The French Quarter, also known as the , is the oldest neighborhood in the city of New Orleans. After New Orleans (french: La Nouvelle-Orléans) was founded in 1718 by Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, the city developed around the ("Old Squ ...

Playing strength

In September 2007 Acers defeated Bill Hook in the first round of the

World Senior Championship The World Senior Championship was a golf match held between the winners of the American PGA Seniors' Championship (now Senior PGA Championship) and the British PGA Seniors Championship. It was held from 1954 to 1978. It was a 36-hole match-play e ...

held in

Gmunden Gmunden () is a town in Upper Austria, Austria in the district of Gmunden (district), Gmunden. It has 13,204 inhabitants (estimates 2016 ). It is much frequented as a health and summer resort, and has a variety of lake, brine, vegetable and pine-c ...

, Austria. Acers' recent result at the 17th World Senior Chess Championship, with a FIDE performance of 2289, should help to confirm his playing strength.

Author/writer

Acers has written or contributed to several chess books. In 2008 he is working on ''The Road'' which will be a book about his chess tours. He has annotated many American master-level games, along with Louis Ciamarra, for the Yugoslav-published series ''

Chess Informant Chess Informant (Šahovski Informator) is a publishing company from Belgrade (Serbia, former Yugoslavia) that periodically (since 2012, four volumes per year) produces a book entitled ''Chess Informant'', as well as the ''Encyclopaedia of Chess O ...

''.

Books

''The Italian Gambit (and) A Guiding Repertoire For White – E4!''

References

External links

* * *
Jude Acers results at the World Senior Championship

American chess icon hit by Katrina from Chessbase.com

The Amazing & Slightly Irregular Jude Acers by Derek Bridges
Extensive biographical portrait {{DEFAULTSORT:Acers, Jude 1944 births Living people American chess players American chess writers American male non-fiction writers Sportspeople from New Orleans