Talk:Adam Meredith

Ruth Sherman
Ruth Sherman (1903-1965) of New York played more in Europe than ACBL in recent years, a regular partner of Adam Meredith in "European tournaments" per Alan Truscott, then a recent British expatriate. "Miss Ruth T. Sherman" --socalled in her NYT obituary and in AP notice of her will one week later-- left $450,000 (about 90%) to Meredith to support bridge activities (to revert upon his death). See Ruth Sherman, where I shall return.

Search NYTimes.com shows Meredith played in New York City or region, at least in 1965 after her death. --P64 (talk) 02:53, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
 * P.S. two months later: For articles published in the newspaper before 1981 --and for me as a visitor, not subscriber-- NYTtimes.com routinely serves the title, author if any, and date; frequently the page number (useful given other access i have sometimes) or opening lines of text (sometimes called 'Abstract'); rarely full text; never the diagram for a featured deal.
 * Vaguely I recall that some articles from before 1980/1981 are available and some later articles are not. Certainly the search returns hits for articles whose crucial portion is not available; thus the search feature adequately markets $3.95 copies.
 * I have greater access now and I will fix the Sherman obituary reference momentarily but probably do no more. --P64 (talk) 23:34, 16 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Google 'ruth sherman 1965 adam meredith' returns several promising hits. The Sports Illustrated "Farewell" by Charles Goren describes the impact of Meredith on the repertoire of old reliable Miss Sherman. Concerning the bequest in particular, Kingsport [TN] Times-News April 18, 1965 "page 27" and "page 30" are identical. On that page, "Money Won't Change Bridge Player" quotes Meredith. The article is available to Newspapers.com subscribers. I doubt that Kingsport interviewed Meredith but cannot read the byline in the tiny full-page. --P64 (talk) 15:14, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
 * A different tidbit shows the byline "New York (HTNS)" and implies that Meredith, "I never dreamt ..." does not appear elsewhere in the google database. --P64 (talk) 15:20, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Which is the source?
The one-paragraph lead and first the three pars of section 2 Bridge career nearly match the four-paragraph text of our External links listing "Biography at the English Bridge Union website (no date)".

"The English Bridge Union" (EBU) claims copyright there, no copyright date, no publication date, no relevant internal date. Possibly that is a claim for the webpage rather than its content.

For the lead we cite primarily "The Official Encyclopedia of Bridge. ACBL, N.Y., various editions and dates."--after the penultimate sentence, which closes what matches the lead paragraph at EBU.co.uk.

If our text matches "various editions and dates" of OEB (as it matches EBU), then one of those two must be the source for its wording, and all should be quoted (unlikely) or rewritten. But EBU may be copied from us, cobbled together from material in OEB and poorly attributed.

--P64 (talk) 17:08, 20 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I have reviewed OEBs 6 and 7 and find that a significant amount of the material is copied almost verbatim and IMHO violates OEB copyright. A rewrite is necessary. An additional source is the obit written by Reese and documented in the British Bridge Almanack by Hasenson - I also have it at hand. I am busy with other matters in life and will try to attend to the rewrite next week if no one else does so in the interim. Newwhist (talk) 03:50, 22 January 2015 (UTC)
 * ✅ Rewrite to avoid copyright violation is as complete as I can do (or want to do) at this stage. Others are welcome to improve further. Newwhist (talk) 21:53, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Semi-retired from what?
"Meredith was semi-retired in 1957..." From bridge, or from some other career? If the latter then the career ought to be mentioned. If the former, then it would be better to say "Meredith was semi-retired from bridge in 1957..." If this is the case, it's only two years after his Bermuda Bowl win, so seems very surprising. Was the ill-health that is mentioned as affecting him in the last ten years of his life already starting to become a serious problem? I suppose his semu-reirement could have been due to his asthma. I imagine that most bridge venues at this time would have been thick with cigarette smoke, which can't have been good for an asthmatic. JH (talk page) 21:28, 11 February 2015 (UTC)
 * It is clear from the references (Hasenson, Ramsey and Mollo) that Meredith's income was exclusively as a professional rubber bridge player at clubs for money and he had no pretense to having any other means of income (other than from Ruth Sherman after having relocated to the USA). The Official Encyclopedia of Bridge (Edition 5) on page 673 states "Semi-retired from tournament play since moving from London to New York City in 1957." This statement is removed in Editions 6 and 7 of the OEB. Looking at the career of Ruth Sherman (10 years Meredith's senior), she had no significant wins after the National Women's Teams in 1955 and so does not appear to have won anything with Meredith subsequent to his arrival, even if they ever played competitively at all. Mollo's reference to Meredith's inheritance from Sherman in 1965 was "to enable him to continue his bridge activities". So Meredith must have been doing something in the mind of Sherman. Truscott's obit says Meredith lived in obscurity at the end. I suspect Meredith was sick, alcoholic and inactive at any serious level of bridge for most of the post 1957 era. I will add the reference to "retirement from tournament play" as per your initial query Newwhist (talk) 22:30, 11 February 2015 (UTC)


 * I agree, retired from high-level bridge competition --or semi-retired if AM and Sherman entered championship pairs events as opposed to the lesser "championships" and side games that embellish or plague major bridge meets today.
 * See section Ruth Sherman, above, and feel free also to visit our article Ruth Sherman. Among other things it's clear they played as partners on both sides of the Atlantic after he moved to NYC/USA. --P64 (talk) 23:18, 16 February 2015 (UTC)