15 January 2019

Postcards from 1935 Moscow

I'm swamped with other projects and have no time for a post requiring any significant amount of work. I spotted a set of five postcards on eBay, some of which I had seen before individually. What caught my attention was additional information about the cards, for example:-

Ultra Rare Vintage USSR postcard 1925s Edit MOOSH Emanuel Lasker CHESS Mikhailov

USSR; 1925s; Size: 14.8 x 10 cm; Circulation: 20 000; Artist: Mikhailov

Unfortunately, the scans were not very good, but when I checked my archive I found the same set of five cards from 2006. Those scans were much better.


Left: Riumin
Others: Flohr, Botvinnik, Lasker, Capablanca

The back of the Riumin card said (in Russian), 'Riumin,N.N.; Artist: Mikhailov,V.V.', gave some additional info about the card's origin, and confirmed the circulation ('tirage'). The cryptic word 'MOOSH' in the description is a direct transliteration of the Russian word 'MOCCX', but I have no idea what it means.

As for the date, which is not indicated on the card, it must be from the Moscow 1935 chess tournament (wikipedia.org). The four players I've indicated in the caption as 'Others' finished in the first four places, with Flohr and Botvinnik tied for 1st/2nd. Riumin finished further down in the crosstable with an even score.

Are there similar cards for any of the other 15 players who participated in the event? I'll add a note if I find any.

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