2026 Tri-Cities Regional, Day Three: Wednesday, October 28

What’s My Name?

This Day in History - October 28 Birthdays

The five self-describing historical figures below were all born on October 28. Can you name them and place their birth years in chronological order? (Hint: the five people are in alphabetical order by surname.) Answers below.

• “May God preserve my reputation as a faithful scholar and advocate for humanism, tolerance, and understanding. My lifetime was one of great upheaval in the Catholic Church and I remained comitted to its reformation from within, while others around me wanted revolution from without. This made necessary frequent travel, to Britain, to France, to what is now known as Italy, Germany, and Belgium from my birthplace in Holland, to avoid trouble from radicals who opposed my moderation. At each of these locations I met a circle of new friends and allies to help spread my ideas and views and findings.”
• “French newspapers called me the ‘king of chefs and chef of kings’. Overstatement probably: my main achievement was to take the very little written about French cooking traditions and re-work it into a complete work on cooking, recipes, techniques, and strategies for management of a large restaurant kitchen. My book became more popular than the over-ornate ones that preceeded it and is a reference today for chefs around the world.;”
• “The outdoor symphony concert is over, the featured conductor has left the stage, but the orchestra has nominated one of their own to conduct a short passage. It is a tradition at the Interlochen Center for the Arts near Interlochen MI, and custom dictates that there is no applause when the music ends. It all comes from my efforts in the 1920s and 1930s to present free concerts, both live and on radio, of classical music written exclusively by American composers at the Eastman School of Music, where I was director for forty years. The ‘Interlochen Theme’ played comes from my 1930 Symphony #2 (Romantic).”
• “My parents wanted me to be born in Japan, but I resisted and was born at sea on the way there. I was interned with other Japanese-Americans during the Second World War in Utah, and was a camp favorite, singing at dances and other events. I took a Chinese-sounding name to avoid anti-Japanese feelings and worked in nightclubs before breaking into movies and TV guest appearances in the late 1950s. I made a recording for Motown Records that was never released because they were saving the song for Stevie Wonder (For Once In My Life)! But I am best known for my final role, as Detective Nick Yemana on Barney Miller, where a tribute episode was dedicated to memories of me after I died from throat cancer, with the cast members as themselves. Must have been my coffee...”
• “I played point guard in the NBA from 1960 to 1975, serving as a player-coach for Seattle and Portland in my later years. I took a year off after retiring and accepted another head coaching stint in Seattle in 1977 after they started the season with five wins in 22 games. We won eleven of my first twelve and made it to game seven of the NBA Finals against Washington, then avenged that loss the very next year by beating them in five for Seattle’s one and only NBA title! I stayed in Seattle for six more years before coaching in Cleveland, Atlanta, Toronto, and New York.”

In 2024 (Ocean Shores), there were 119 tables to this point.
In 2019 (Pasco), there were 162 tables to this point.
For full details, check out the Table Counts page!

Bridge clubs and tournaments throughout the ACBL are still struggling with returning to live play after the pandemic, so comparing this tournament's attendance to one before the pandemic is not really fair. We'll hope to get a similar number to Ocean Shores in 2024, around two-thirds of the 2019 pre-pandemic attendance, making the target number 280 tables this time — but perhaps we will be pleasantly surprised!

Masterpoints for all players are updated nightly here first, with everyone’s current red and gold point total listed alphabetically below the leaders, before a shorter leaderboard is added to this page.

(The clues are above). This set of five are in the same order when sorted by birth date and by surname!

• Erasmus ( 1466 - 1536 ) — Dutch scholar and philosopher who advocated moderation and tolerance in a time of revolution and reform in the Catholic Church.
• Auguste Escoffier ( 1846 - 1935 ) — French chef, restauranteur, and culinary writer who collected and modernized French cooking methods in Le Guide Culinaire, a landmark book which influences chefs to this day.
• Howard Hanson ( 1896 - 1981 ) — American composer, conductor, educator, executive, and music theorist who directed the Eastman School of Music for forty years.
• Jack Soo ( 1917 - 1979 ) — American actor and singer, best known as Detective Nick Yemana on Barney Miller.
• Lenny Wilkens ( 1937 - 2025 ) — American basketball player and coach who led Seattle SuperSonics, a team he had played for a decade earlier, to their NBA Championship in 1979.