Paul Felix Schmidt


Paul Felix Schmidt was an Estonian chess player, writer and chemist.

Biography

In June 1935, Schmidt won, ahead of Paul Keres, at Tallinn. In May 1936, he drew a match against Keres at Pärnu. In 1936, he won the 8th Estonian Championship at Tallinn. In December 1936, he placed 2nd, behind Keres, at Tallinn. In July 1937, he won Estonia's first-ever international tournament at Pärnu, ahead of two world title contenders, Salo Flohr and Keres, as well as Gideon Ståhlberg. In 1937, he won at Tallinn.
In August 1937, he played for Estonia at the 7th Chess Olympiad in Stockholm. In June 1938, he tied for 8th-10th at Noordwijk. The event was won by Erich Eliskases. In August–September 1939, he played for Estonia at the 8th Chess Olympiad at Buenos Aires. Estonia took 3rd place, behind Germany and Poland.
Schmidt emigrated from Estonia to Germany in the autumn of 1939. In August 1940, he took 2nd, behind Georg Kieninger, at the 7th German Championship, held in Bad Oeynhausen. In August 1941, he tied for 1st with Klaus Junge at Bad Oeynhausen. In 1941, he won a play-off match for the German championship against Junge at Bromberg. In October 1941, he tied for 1st with Alexander Alekhine at Kraków/Warsaw. In June 1942, he tied for 3rd-4th with Junge, behind Alekhine and Keres, at Salzburg. In June 1943, he took 3rd, behind Keres and Alekhine, at Salzburg. In August 1943, he took 2nd, behind Josef Lokvenc, at Vienna.
After World War II, in May 1946, he tied for 2nd-3rd with Carl Ahues, behind Wilfried Lange, at Hamburg. In May 1947, he took 2nd, behind Efim Bogoljubov at Kassel. In 1949, he tied for 3rd-5th at Heidelberg. The event was won by Wolfgang Unzicker.
In 1949, he published the book Schachmeister denken. In 1950, he was awarded the title of International Master by FIDE. In 1951, he earned a PhD in chemistry from Heidelberg University, and moved to Canada, then to the United States, settling in Philadelphia, where he took a job as a professor.
After this, he and his wife Eva moved to Bell Telephone Laboratories, Allentown, Pennsylvania, where he made contributions to electrochemistry and anodic oxidation of silicon, was expert in neutron activation analysis, and published many papers, till his retirement in 1982. He continued playing occasional games of chess, regularly visiting Reuben Fine in New York.

Notable chess games