Recently Mark Ginsburg had a post in his blog with the USCF ratings of everybody named Ginsburg. It was a pretty strong group, featuring a GM that I had never heard of (Gennady Ginsburg, rated 2527) and a strong Midwestern master (Jeff Ginsburg, rated 2331) in addition to Mark himself, who is an IM rated 2432.
So this gave me the idea of looking up all the Mackenzies on the USCF rating list. Alas, Team Mackenzie turns out to be rather feeble compared to Team Ginsburg:
USCF ID St Exp Date Reg Quick Member Name -------- -- ---------- ------ ------ ----------------------- 14289814 (PA) 2010-11-30 1495P 1594P MACKENZIE, ALDEN 14175231 (NV) 2010-03-31 102P 102P MACKENZIE, AMANDA 13153548 (NV) 2008-02-29 305P 297P MACKENZIE, ANDREW 12765246 (MD) 2000-03-31 292P Unr MACKENZIE, ANDREW J 12479498 (NC) 1991-11-30 1526 Unr MACKENZIE, BRIAN J 12606416 ( ) 1994-10-31 Unr Unr MACKENZIE, C R 12574690 (NJ) 1995-04-30 1052P Unr MACKENZIE, CHERYL 12871153 (DC) 2004-05-31 Unr Unr MACKENZIE, COOPER 12892164 (MN) 2004-01-31 845P Unr MACKENZIE, CURTIS P 10277604 (CA) 2011-08-31 2139 2018P MACKENZIE, DANA N 12657348 (MA) 1999-08-31 1210 1295 MACKENZIE, IAN 13619687 (PA) 2012-01-31 1700 1715P MACKENZIE, IAN ANDREW 14396260 (OH) 2011-03-31 * * MACKENZIE, JAMES R 12910572 (TX) 2004-08-31 100P 100P MACKENZIE, KEN J 14289767 (PA) 2010-11-30 Unr Unr MACKENZIE, LOGAN 20133121 (NV) 1996-02-29 1153P Unr MACKENZIE, MARC 21020824 (WA) Non-Member 287P Unr MACKENZIE, P IAN 14289794 (PA) 2010-11-30 941P 956P MACKENZIE, QUINN 12506472 (MI) Non-Member 1151 Unr MACKENZIE, RAY 13850207 (NY) 2011-02-28 1467P 1436P MACKENZIE, RICHARD 14289788 (PA) 2010-11-30 647P 667P MACKENZIE, ROY 13354814 (IL) 2008-01-31 821P 787P MACKENZIE, SAMUEL EDWARD 12852942 (CA) 2002-12-31 Unr Unr MACKENZIE, SCOTT 12537016 (NM) 1990-12-31 1524 Unr MACKENZIE, SEAMUS H 20054239 (NE) 1992-03-31 1072 Unr MACKENZIE, TIM 13654315 (VT) 2010-05-31 Unr Unr MACKENZIE, TODD 12935065 (RI) 2008-06-30 Unr Unr MACKENZIE, WARREN K 12840348 (NY) Non-Member * Unr MACKENZIE, WAY 12702806 (MS) 1998-02-28 430P Unr MACKENZIE, WILL
No mystery GMs, alas. If we have a fantasy chess match against Team Ginsburg, I’ll have to play against Gennady Ginsburg on board one. The highest-rated Mackenzie after me is Ian Mackenzie, who will have a tough battle against Mark Ginsburg on board two.
I also note one player on this list (Ken Mackenzie) with a rating of 100. Is that the lowest that ratings can go? I don’t remember ever seeing a rating lower than that. Perhaps it is the Absolute Zero of rating, the rating floor of all rating floors. Team Ginsburg also has a 100 player, Lily Ginsburg. This might be one of the best matchups of the Ginsburg vs. Mackenzie smackdown.
Another fun game to play with this list is to look at USCF ID numbers. You can tell people who were USCF members back in the mid-1970s when they first computerized their membership list, because we have ID numbers that begin “10.” Alas, I am the only surviving Mackenzie from the pre-computer era.
In fact, really savvy old-timers know that the original USCF ID numbers were assigned geographically. So a member whose ID number begins 1027, like mine, lived in Ohio or Indiana in the mid-1970s. This created some puzzlement when I moved to Ohio in 1989, after many years of living in other places. I won my very first tournament in Ohio, and some people wondered who was this “mystery master” who had just shown up with an OLD identification number that seemed to show he was from Ohio, yet no one could remember him. The answer was that I used to live in Indiana, and I had a different name then. (I changed my name from Dana Nance to Dana Mackenzie when I got married.)
Team Mackenzie does have one thing that Team Ginsburg doesn’t have: a former (albeit deceased) U.S. champion, George Mackenzie. Note that Team Ginsburg is NOT allowed to claim Isidor Gunsberg, who according to one calculation was the world’s #2 player in the late 1880s and probably could have beaten George Mackenzie. But as Mark clearly explains in his blog, “berg” is not the same as “burg” and therefore Gunsberg is not a variant of Ginsburg.
Also, I’d like to point out that we become a lot more competitive when you allow Mackenzie as a first name, because we can then play Mackenzie Molner on first board. Unless he is disqualified on the technicality that the USCF misspells his first name!
USCF ID St Exp Date Reg Quick Member Name -------- -- ---------- ------ ------ ----------------------- 12662506 (NJ) 2011-01-31 2454 2287 MOLNER, MACKENIZE S
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I feel left out…I’m the only Krooskos that plays chess…
Hi Jim,
Well, there are some good things to having a unique name. If you look up the comments to Mark Ginsburg’s post, you’ll find a reader whose rating was computed incorrectly after one tournament because the wizards at the USCF thought he had been paired against a different Ginsburg! Also, Mark wonders whether he was mis-rated for the same reason. At least you don’t have that to worry about.
Check out Team Fridel:
Josh Friedel (CA) – 2575
Tom Friedel (FL) – 2342
Henry Friedel (??) – 2001
David Friedell (PA) – 1775
Quite a team. Interestingly, none of these guys are from NH, Josh Friedel’s home state. Only Lynn Friedel, rated 1132, is listed from NH.
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