Bruce Matzner

Bruce Matzner was a long time active member of Kolty going back to the 1980's based upon recollections of current members. 

Despite being in his 90's, Bruce continued playing at the club until the Summer of 2025. Bruce was a strong player with a peak rating of over 2000 and a dynamic, attacking style that led to many upsets.  One of those upsets was a win against Max Euwe during a simul match in 1980.  Euwe was World Chess Champion from 1935 to 1937 after defeating Alekhine. The later "Game of the Day" of 1/8/09 on chessgames.com can be found here: Max Euwe vs Bruce Matzner (1980) "Matzner no Patzer".  Bruce was an active area chess coach until around 2019/2020 until classes shut down due to COVID.

Bruce loved chess and always looked forward to playing at the club on Wednesday nights.  He had a big collection of chess books and boards at home, and graciously donated them to the community.  Despite medical issues and worsening vision, Bruce always put a positive spin on things and found something meaningful or enjoyable in his games.  

Bruce worked as an engineer for General Electric, innovating on the geometry of nuclear reactor cores to increase cooling and efficiency.  He had over 50 patents in his name.