Black and White

adolphi chess problem

By Heinrich Leonhard Adolphi. White to mate in two moves.

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1.Be1 Kb6 2.Rd6# From Der kleine Problemfreund, 1896.

August 16, 2013August 23, 2013 | Puzzles

Black and White

nash chess problem

By Hugh H. Nash. White to mate in two moves.

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1.Qa2 Ke4 2.Qe6# From The Chess Amateur, 1910.

August 9, 2013August 16, 2013 | Puzzles

Mystery Guest

2013-08-07-mystery-guest

Who is this?

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Adolf Hitler. In 1945, before Hitler’s death was confirmed, the U.S. Secret Service posted these images throughout Germany to show how the dictator might disguise himself in order to escape capture.

August 7, 2013August 16, 2013 | History · Puzzles

Black and White

hermanson chess problem

By Halvar Hermanson. White to mate in two moves.

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1. Rb4! and the queen will mate. From Münchner Zeitung, 1912.

August 2, 2013August 9, 2013 | Puzzles

Rock Music

From the 2001 Moscow Mathematical Olympiad:

Before you are three piles of stones. One contains 51 stones, one 49 stones, and one 5 stones. On each move you can either combine two piles into one or divide any pile with an even number of stones into two equal piles. Is it possible to end up with 105 piles, each containing a single stone?

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No. If at any point the number of stones in each pile is a multiple of the same odd number a, then this will remain true after any number of operations. On the first move we’re forced to create two piles of 100 and 5 stones (both divisible by 5), or 56 and 49 stones (both divisible by 7), or 51 and 54 stones (both divisible by 3). Whichever course we choose, all subsequent operations will produce piles divisible by that odd factor. This prevents us from producing piles of single stones.

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August 1, 2013August 9, 2013 | Puzzles

An Invitation

On Nov. 25, 1862, Abraham Lincoln sent this dispatch to Gen. Ambrose Burnside at Aquia Creek, Va.:

Can Inn Ale me withe 2 oar our Ann pas Ann me flesh ends NV Corn Inn out with U cud Inn heaven day nest Wed roe Moore Tom darkey hat Greek Why Hawk of abbott Inn B chewed I if.

What did it mean?

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David Homer Bates, manager of the War Department Telegraph Office, explains: “By reading the above backward, observing the phonetics, and bearing in mind that flesh is the equivalent of meat, the real meaning is easily found”: If I should be in a boat off Aquia Creek at dark tomorrow (Wednesday) evening, could you without inconvenience meet me and pass an hour or two with me? — A. Lincoln “It cannot be said that this specimen exhibits specially clever work on the part of the War Department staff, nor is it likely that the Confederate operator, if he overheard its transmission, had much trouble in unraveling its meaning. As to this we can only conjecture.” Burnside understood it, and the two met. (David Homer Bates, “Lincoln in the Telegraph Office,” The Century Magazine, June 1907)

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July 28, 2013August 9, 2013 | Puzzles

Dictation

In 1887, Irish journalist Richard Pigott sold a series of letters to the Times of London. Purportedly written by Irish Parliamentary Party leader Charles Parnell, they seemed to show that Parnell had approved of a savage political assassination five years earlier. Parnell denounced the letters as a “villainous and bare-faced forgery.”

In the ensuing investigation, Parnell’s attorney asked Pigott to write a series of words and submit them to the court:

livelihood
likelihood
Richard Pigott
proselytism
Patrick Egan
P. Egan
hesitency

What was the point of this?

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Pigott misspelled hesitancy … as had the forger. He fled to the continent, sent a full confession from Paris, and shot himself in a hotel room in Madrid.

July 27, 2013August 2, 2013 | History · Puzzles

Black and White

ognjanovic chess problem

By Zarko Ognjanovic, 1912. White to mate in two moves.

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1. Kc5! followed by 2. Qa8# or 2.axb6#.

July 26, 2013August 2, 2013 | Puzzles

Buoy Howdy

From Russian puzzle maven Boris Kordemsky:

Two diesel ships leave a pier at the same time. One travels upstream, the other downstream, each with the same motive power. As they depart, one drops a lifebuoy into the water. An hour later, both ships reverse course. Which will reach the buoy first?

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Consider the situation from the perspective of the floating buoy. Now there is no current; the two ships move away from the buoy at equal speeds and return at equal speeds. They’ll reach it simultaneously.

July 25, 2013August 2, 2013 | Puzzles

Square Dance

paint scheme puzzle

From the 2001 Moscow Mathematical Olympiad:

Two stones, one black and one white, are placed on a chessboard. A move consists of moving one stone up, down, left, or right. The two stones may not occupy the same square. Does a sequence of moves exist that will produce every possible arrangement of the stones, each occurring exactly once?

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No. Call an arrangement even if the stones occupy squares of the same color, odd otherwise. In the sequence we’re seeking, the number of odd arrangements can differ from the number of even arrangements by at most 1. The number of odd arrangements is 64 × 32 — choose any square for the black stone and then any square of the opposite color for the white. But the number of even arrangements is 64 × 31, since the two stones can’t occupy the same square. So the task is impossible.

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July 22, 2013August 2, 2013 | Puzzles