Trading Pawns for Trumps
Story by Mostafa (BBO: darsh99) I am 31 years old, a professional chess player a...
Story by Cyrus (BBO: cyrusv)
Four-person bridge was a rare treat when I was growing up. My mother didn't play cards, so Dad and I played "Honeymoon Bridge" every alternate day. We played a version with half of both dummies exposed, with the card underneath getting exposed as the card on top got played.
Bidding was, predictably, an unpredictable enterprise. Not only did you get only one shot (unless the opponent also bid, of course), but whether one made the contract or not depended less on the points in one's hand and more on what got exposed in the two dummies, and when.
Dad bid 4S with a solid hand and dummy, and re-bid 5S after my 5H interference. With KQ of Hearts in hand and 6 of the exposed cards in my dummy being hearts, I ventured 6H as a sacrifice. Got doubled, of course. Four more hearts emerged from my dummy, including the Ace! My Queen and Jack-10 and low of Clubs came good (with the AK of Clubs staying buried in Dad's dummy till too late). Made 7!
When Grandma came to visit, Honeymoon Bridge expanded to "Cutthroat." The entire dummy got exposed only after the bidding and the lead. 20 points in hand, yet a 3NT bid going down 3 because dummy comes up with just one point.
One wanted to be third bidder and not the first, because you could then infer something from the other bids (or their absence). Of course, knowing this, Dad sometimes slyly bid a suit he didn't have. He hoped it would keep the others from bidding it, or no trumps. And who would dare double him, given the 13 surprises that dummy could always throw up?
Who needed poker when one had these bridge variations?
We'd sometimes play what was usually a more predictable three-handed version. All three players got dealt 17 cards and discarded four cards each. Any four, except that it had to include your highest Ace (or King if you didn't have any Aces). This made the point count of dummy quite predictable. But distributions could be wild, as players discarded an entire suit if they could.
I remember a hand that I bid where I bid 3NT with 22 points in three solid suits and counting on dummy providing the much-needed stopper in Hearts: the forced discard of its Ace. I'd even contemplated bidding 6, but since Granny also had the Spade Ace, the Ace of Hearts stayed with her. Dad and Granny had 11 of the 12 remaining Hearts. Down 7!
From that day, I named this "more predictable" version "Slit-throat."
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great stories and memories.
If only more family members were involved in card games such as these the world would be a happier place. Just imagine bridge playing instead of crime.
great stories and memories.
If only more family members were involved in card games such as these the world would be a happier place.
Thank you all for these wonderful personal journey. I love reading these, they're inspiring.
Sounds like fun for all!! Great that Grandma liked to participate - love it!
My "Cinderella" team of non-Life Masters (myself, Stan Schenker, Dean Panagopoulos, and Steve Buchthal) made it to the final round of the open knockout at a regional at the Samoset Resort in Rockport, Maine. We upset several much stronger teams on the way.
I remember overcalling one spade in a four-card suit and making three. Charlie Coon, a world-class player, looked at me, shook his head and said, "I'll be damned." "Everyone grows up eventually, Charlie" I said. I had played against Charlie many times at the Boston Chess Club and this was probably the first good result I'd ever had.
The final match was in two separate rooms. Our room had glass walls, kind of like a big fishbowl, with lots of people watching. We were incredibly nervous. We'd never even seen bidding boxes before and had to be shown how to use them before the match started. I convinced myself that I was going play bridge the way I play bridge regardless of what anyone else thought.
Stan and I bid and made a grand slam but the coach turned into a pumpkin and we lost the match. Now, at age 75, the knockout bracket sheet, along with the travel cup prize from our first-ever regional win, are my most treasured pieces of bridge memorabilia.
I played a very similar game with my Dad when I was growing up, although he called it Honeymoon Whist. I remember the basics of the game (e.g,the part about the semi-exposed dummies), but I cannot remember the scoring or the particulars of the bidding. Most websites I've found about Honeymoon Bridge or Honeymoon Whist are quite different from what we played. Would love to know if anyone has found a website with the rules for a game like this.