Mona May Karff (née Minna Ratner; 20 October 1908 – 10 January 1998) was an American
chess
Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to disti ...
player. She dominated U.S. women's chess in the 1940s and early 1950s: she held seven
U.S. Women's Chess Champion titles and four consecutive
U.S. Open titles.
Chess career
Karff played in three
Women's World Chess Championship
The Women's World Chess Championship (WWCC) is played to determine the world champion in women's chess. Like the World Chess Championship, it is administered by FIDE.
Unlike with most sports recognized by the International Olympic Committee, wher ...
s:
1937 Stockholm, playing for Palestine and placing sixth (won by
Vera Menchik
Vera Francevna Mencikova (russian: Вера Францевна Менчик, ''Vera Frantsevna Menchik''; cz, Věra Menčíková; 16 February 1906 – 26 June 1944), was a Russian-born Czechoslovak chess player who primarily resided in En ...
);
1939 Buenos Aires, playing for the U.S. and placing 5th (also won by Menchik);
1949 Moscow, playing for the U.S. (won by
Lyudmila Rudenko
Lyudmila Vladimirovna Rudenko (russian: Людми́ла Влади́мировна Руде́нко, uk, Людмила Володимирівна Руденко; 27 July 1904 – 4 March 1986) was a Soviet chess player and the second women' ...
). When
FIDE
The International Chess Federation or World Chess Federation, commonly referred to by its French acronym FIDE ( Fédération Internationale des Échecs), is an international organization based in Switzerland that connects the various national c ...
established titles in 1950, Mona May Karff was one of three American women to receive the title of
International Woman Master.
Karff, along with
Gisela Kahn Gresser and
Mary Bain
Mary Weiser Bain (born August 8, 1904 – October 26, 1972) was an American chess master.
She was born in or near Ungvár, Kárpátalja, Hungary, which is now Uzhhorod, Zakarpattia oblast, Ukraine, into an assimilated Jewish family. Under the n ...
, dominated U.S. women's chess in the 1940s and early 1950s. Mona May Karff won her first U.S. Women's Chess Champion title ahead of
Mary Bain
Mary Weiser Bain (born August 8, 1904 – October 26, 1972) was an American chess master.
She was born in or near Ungvár, Kárpátalja, Hungary, which is now Uzhhorod, Zakarpattia oblast, Ukraine, into an assimilated Jewish family. Under the n ...
and
Adele Rivero in 1938. She competed and won the title six more times, in 1941, 1943, 1946, 1948 (sharing it with Gresser), 1953 and in 1974 (at age 66). She also won four consecutive U.S. Open titles: 1938, 1939, 1948, and 1950 (shared with
Lucille Kellner).
Personal life
Karff was born in
Bessarabia
Bessarabia (; Gagauz: ''Besarabiya''; Romanian: ''Basarabia''; Ukrainian: ''Бессара́бія'') is a historical region in Eastern Europe, bounded by the Dniester river on the east and the Prut river on the west. About two thirds of Be ...
, a province in Tsarist
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...
. Sometime after the
Bolshevik Revolution
The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolsheviks, Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was ...
of 1917, her family moved to
Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv-Yafo ( he, תֵּל־אָבִיב-יָפוֹ, translit=Tēl-ʾĀvīv-Yāfō ; ar, تَلّ أَبِيب – يَافَا, translit=Tall ʾAbīb-Yāfā, links=no), often referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the G ...
, in what was then
Palestine
__NOTOC__
Palestine may refer to:
* State of Palestine, a state in Western Asia
* Palestine (region), a geographic region in Western Asia
* Palestinian territories, territories occupied by Israel since 1967, namely the West Bank (including East ...
. Her father, Aviv Ratner, a wealthy
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
land-owner, had taught her to play chess when she was 9 years old. Because of her natural ability, she started playing in tournaments in Tel Aviv and developed into a strong player.
In 1930, she moved to
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
and became a U.S. citizen, aged 21. There she met and married her cousin, an attorney named Abraham S. Karff (15 March 1901 – 16 February 1995). The marriage was brief. She never remarried, but her long-time romantic relationship with
Edward Lasker
Edward Lasker (born Eduard Lasker) (December 3, 1885 – March 25, 1981) was a German-American chess and Go player. He was awarded the title of International Master of chess by FIDE. Lasker was an engineer by profession, and an author of ...
(a five-time U.S. Chess Open champion) was not a secret.
Karff was also a
stock investor
A stock trader or equity trader or share trader, also called a stock investor, is a person or company involved in trading equity securities and attempting to profit from the purchase and sale of those securities. Stock traders may be an invest ...
who was worth a small fortune. She spoke eight languages fluently and traveled extensively. As an art lover, she spent a good portion of her fortune on
modern art
Modern art includes artistic work produced during the period extending roughly from the 1860s to the 1970s, and denotes the styles and philosophies of the art produced during that era. The term is usually associated with art in which the tradi ...
. She died in
Manhattan
Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
on January 10, 1998.
See also
*
List of Jewish chess players
Jews, Jewish players and Chess theory, theoreticians have long been involved in the game of chess and have significantly contributed to the development of chess, which has been described as the "Jewish National game". Chess gained po ...
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Karff, Mona May
1908 births
1998 deaths
20th-century chess players
Jewish chess players
American female chess players
Palestinian chess players
Chess Woman International Masters
Bessarabian Jews
Jews in Mandatory Palestine
Mandatory Palestine emigrants to the United States
American people of Moldovan-Jewish descent
20th-century American women
American people of Palestinian-Jewish descent