RIP Boris Spassky: "one of the greatest chess players of the Soviet era and the world, but also a true gentleman"

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Boris Spassky, the World Chess Champion who faced Bobby Fischer in the legendary "Match of the Century," died Thursday at age 88.

Spassky was born in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg), where he became a grandmaster at 18. He claimed the world championship in 1969 and held it until his historic 1972 loss to Fischer in Reykjavik — a match that was a symbolic Cold War battle between the US and USSR. — Read the rest

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