Joan Fischer Targ (July 8, 1937 – June 2, 1998) was an American educator who was an early proponent of

computer literacy Computer literacy is defined as the knowledge and ability to use computers and related technology efficiently, with skill levels ranging from elementary use to computer programming and advanced problem solving. Computer literacy can also refer ...

and initiated

peer tutor Peer mentoring is a form of mentorship that usually takes place between a person who has lived through a specific experience (peer mentor) and a person who is new to that experience (the peer mentee). An example would be an experienced student being ...

ing programs for students of all ages. As a child, she bought her younger brother,

Bobby Fischer Robert James Fischer (March 9, 1943January 17, 2008) was an American chess grandmaster and the eleventh World Chess Champion. A chess prodigy, he won his first of a record eight US Championships at the age of 14. In 1964, he won with an 11� ...

, his first

chess set A chess set consists of a chessboard and White and Black in chess, white and black chess pieces for playing chess. There are sixteen pieces of each color: one King (chess), king, one Queen (chess), queen, two Rook (chess), rooks, two Bishop (chess ...

and taught him how to play the game.

Early life

Joan Fischer was born in

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

in 1937 to Hans-Gerhardt Fischer, a German-born biophysicist, and his wife, Regina Wender Fischer, a Swiss-born naturalized American citizen of Russian-Jewish and Polish-Jewish ancestry. Regina Fischer left Moscow because of the

persecution of Jews The persecution of Jews has been a major event in Jewish history, prompting shifting waves of refugees and the formation of diaspora communities. As early as 605 BCE, Jews who lived in the Neo-Babylonian Empire were persecuted and deported. ...

in the 1930s, bringing her child with her to the United States. She spoke seven languages fluently and was a teacher, registered nurse and eventually a

physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...

. After living in several cities in various parts of the United States, in 1948 the family moved to

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

, where Regina worked as an elementary school teacher and nurse. One year later, in Brooklyn, Joan taught her younger brother, future

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 ...

world champion

, to play chess.

Proponent of computer education

Targ founded a number of programs to study the teaching of

, including programs in the

Palo Alto Unified School District The Palo Alto Unified School District is a public school district located near Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. It consists of twelve primary schools, three middle schools, two high schools, and an adult school. History The distri ...

, as well as the Institute of Microcomputing in Education at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

.. Her educational techniques included the creation of

ing systems whereby a student, trained by peers in a basic course in computer programming, would then tutor the next students. In the early 1980s, she created and led a programs sponsored by

in which elementary school teachers were taught the basics of programming by high school students. One focus of her work was bringing computer literacy to girls, senior citizens, and other groups that were underrepresented in computing. She coauthored the book ''Ready, run, fun: IBM PC edition'' with Jeff Levinsky.

Personal life

Targ later lived in

Palo Alto, California Palo Alto (; Spanish language, Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a Sequoia sempervirens, coastal redwood tree kno ...

and

Portola Valley Portola Valley is a town in San Mateo County, California. Located on the San Francisco Peninsula in the Bay Area, Portola Valley is a small, wealthy community nestled on the eastern slopes of the Santa Cruz Mountains. History Portola Val ...

, receiving a

Master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is an academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice.

in education from the College of Notre Dame, Belmont, California. Her husband,

Russell Targ Russell Targ (born April 11, 1934) is an American physicist, parapsychologist and author who is best known for his work on remote viewing. Targ joined Stanford Research Institute (SRI) in 1972 where he and Harold E. Puthoff coined the term "rem ...

, worked at

SRI International SRI International (SRI) is an American nonprofit scientific research institute and organization headquartered in Menlo Park, California. The trustees of Stanford University established SRI in 1946 as a center of innovation to support economic d ...

as a parapsychologist, and her daughter, Elisabeth, also became a parapsychologist.. This page from the preface quotes

Martin Gardner Martin Gardner (October 21, 1914May 22, 2010) was an American popular mathematics and popular science writer with interests also encompassing scientific skepticism, micromagic, philosophy, religion, and literatureespecially the writings of Lewis ...

writing in ''

The Skeptical Inquirer ''Skeptical Inquirer'' is a bimonthly American general-audience magazine published by the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI) with the subtitle: ''The Magazine for Science and Reason''. Mission statement and goals Daniel Loxton, writing in 2 ...

'' in 2001: "William Targ's beliefs in the paranormal trickled down to his son Russell, and now they have descended on Russell's attractive and energetic daughter Elisabeth. Her mother, Joan, by the way, is the sister of chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer." Joan Targ was noted for her activism for

organic farming Organic farming, also known as ecological farming or biological farming,Labelling, article 30 o''Regulation (EU) 2018/848 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2018 on organic production and labelling of organic products and re ...

, having built an organic farm soon after she married Russell Targ in 1958. In 1976, she, her husband, and another family bought 80 acres of land in Portola Valley they hoped to turn into another such farm; a lawsuit from her neighbors attempting to block this use was settled in her favor shortly before her death.

Death

Joan Fischer Targ died of a

cerebral hemorrhage Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), also known as cerebral bleed, intraparenchymal bleed, and hemorrhagic stroke, or haemorrhagic stroke, is a sudden bleeding into the tissues of the brain, into its ventricles, or into both. It is one kind of bleed ...

in Portola Valley at the age of 60 in 1998..

In popular culture

In the 2014

biopic ''

Pawn Sacrifice ''Pawn Sacrifice'' is a 2014 American biographical drama film about chess player Bobby Fischer. It follows Fischer's challenge against top Soviet chess grandmasters during the Cold War and culminating in the World Chess Championship 1972 mat ...

'', Targ was portrayed by

Lily Rabe Lily Rabe (born June 29, 1982) is an American actress. She is best known for her multiple roles on the FX anthology horror series ''American Horror Story'' (2011–2021). For her performance as Portia in the Broadway production of ''The Merchan ...

, with

Sophie Nélisse Marie-Sophie Nélisse (born March 27, 2000) is a Canadian actress. She is known for her Genie Award–winning performance in ''Monsieur Lazhar'', as Liesel Meminger in the film adaptation of the best-selling novel ''The Book Thief'', written by ...

appearing as the teenage Joan.

References

Additional sources

* ''Anything to Win: The Mad Genius of Bobby Fischer'', television documentary, produced by Frank Sinton and Anthony Storm * {{DEFAULTSORT:Targ, Joan 1937 births 1998 deaths Educators from Brooklyn 20th-century American educators American people of Russian-Jewish descent American people of Polish-Jewish descent Notre Dame de Namur University alumni Stanford Graduate School of Education faculty People from Palo Alto, California