New York Times, New York, New York, Sunday, June 29, 1958
Bobby Fischer a Hit in Soviet Chess, Though He Made First Move Too Fast
Moscow, June 28 (AP)—Bobby Fischer, the 15-year-old whiz kid of American chess, has had little trouble with the complicated maneuvering at Moscow's Central Chess Club but he has become ensnarled in some Soviet red tape.
Bobby is the Brooklyn schoolboy who won the United States chess championship, then won passage to Europe on a TV program. He hasn't done anything but play chess since he got here last Wednesday.
The only trouble is that Bobby wasn't due to show up until July 20, two weeks prior to his scheduled appearance in the opening interzone chess championships in Yugoslavia Aug. 5-15.
Bobby wants to stay around until tournament time, but one Soviet official said this presented a complicated problem, although Bobby is certainly welcome. The official explained that it might be difficult to get an extension of Bobby's two-week visa.
Meanwhile, as the chess club directors hold daily meetings aimed at unraveling the legal problem, Bobby keeps showing up daily to play chess. He knocks off thirty games in three or four hours every morning before the officials turn him out to get some sunshine.
One official threw his hands up today, saying “We have to throw him out every afternoon. We don't know what to do with him. But he's a wonderful boy.”
Bobby said, “I like to play. I want to play against the best they've got. Their style gets me. That's why I came here.”
Club officials said Bobby had been winning about 60 per cent of his games.
Bobby has lined up a friendly but relatively serious match with Tigran Petrosyan, a Soviet grandmaster, for Monday afternoon. But as for meeting the world champion, Mikhail Botvinnik, or the former champion, Vassily Smyslov, Bobby said, “You got to go through channels with these championship class players.”
