Post-Christmas Chess Marks

I came across the fact that Johnny Marks had been a long time member of the Marshall Chess Club at 23 W. 10th St., N.Y.C. 

Johnny Marks, for those who may not know, was a songwriter famous for such Christmas songs as "Run Rudolph Run," "Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree," "Silver and Gold, A Holly," "Jolly Christmas," "A Caroling We Go," my personal favorite, "I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day," and most well-known of all, "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer."

A few bloggers mentioned having met/played Marks as the Marshall Club:

Lawrence Bernstein on his Info Marketing Blog wrote:

As a kid, I played a few games of speed chess at the Marshall Chess Club in New York against a pleasant old-timer. I didn’t find out till years later that the old timer was songwriter, Johnny Marks, who composed “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.” I heard Marks collected somewhere around $800,000 a year in royalties for a song that took him less than a day to write. No wonder he was so pleasant!

Daniel Van Riper, on his Albany Weblog, wrote in an entry his titled, "A Rant Against Christmas":

While we’re at it, Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer was created for an ad campaign for Montgomery Ward department stores in 1939. I actually met the guy who wrote that song. His name was Johnny Marks, and he hated the song that made him rich more than anything else in the world. I personally experienced his hatred.
When I was fifteen years old I followed a “friend” into the venerable Marshall Chess Club in Manhattan. The “friend” suggested that I walk up to the grizzled old guy playing a casual game in the corner and ask him if he wrote the song. Being even more of a naive idiot than I am now, I did as he suggested and was met with a barrage of vile curses and threats, much to the delight of my so-called friend.

Nate Bloom, on his site celebrating Jewish Celebrities (yes, this famous creator of Christmas tunes was Jewish) gives a detailed history of the song "Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer," including a lot of interesting information on Marks. 

Marks died in September 1985. A year earlier Marcy Soltis (GM Andy Soltis' wife) wrote this article about him:

Interesting as always @batgirl

Especially intriguing since the Christmas season is wrapping up. I'll certainly think of Johnny Marks next time I hear Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer. 

WAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Nice poem!

xD funny @batgirl serves him right for making art he hated!

just to put xmas completely to bed:

It was christmas eve babe
In the drunk tank
An old man said to me: won't see another one
And then they sang a song
The rare old mountain dew
I turned my face away and dreamed about you
Got on a lucky one
Came in eighteen to one
I've got a feeling
This year's for me and you
So happy christmas
I love you baby
I can see a better time
Where all our dreams come true.

They got cars big as bars
They got rivers of gold
But the wind goes right through you
It's no place for the old
When you first took my hand on a cold christmas eve
You promised me broadway was waiting for me
You were handsome you were pretty
Queen of new york city when the band finished playing they yelled out for more
Sinatra was swinging all the drunks they were singing
We kissed on a corner
Then danced through the night.

And the boys from the nypd choir were singing Galway Bay
And the bells were ringing out for christmas day.

You're a bum you're a punk
You're an old s*** on junk
Lying there almost dead on a drip in that bed
You scumbag you maggot
You cheap lousy thicket
Happy christmas your arsze I pray god it's our last.

And the boys of the nypd choir's still singing Galway Bay
And the bells were ringing out
For christmas day.

I could have been someone
Well so could anyone
You took my dreams from me
When I first found you
I kept them with me babe
I put them with my own
Can't make it out alone
I've built my dreams around you

And the boys of the nypd choir's still singing Galway Bay
And the bells are ringing out
For christmas day.

I used to see Johnny Marks play at the Marshall. He, whenever I saw him there, used to play with his friends at the chess table by the office door in the great hall of the Marshall.

Best wishes,

DrM