The Bridge Battle of the Century
Published July 17, 2026
On a cold New York evening — December 7, 1931 — four people sat down around a card table in a hotel room. For the next month, what happened at that little table ran on the front pages of newspapers in 30 countries and was reported on the radio every night. Not a war, not an election, not a heavyweight title fight. A game of bridge. They called it the Bridge Battle of the Century, and it may be the strangest, most delightful story the game has ever produced.
What was the fight about?
In the early 1930s modern bridge was still young, and everyone was arguing about one question: what is the right way to bid? On one side stood Ely Culbertson — a charismatic player, businessman and marketing genius — who had published his own bidding book in 1930. It was a runaway hit: within three months it was already in its fourteenth printing. On the other side stood the respected old guard of the bridge world, who had published a rival method known as the "Official System." Its best-known face was Sidney Lenz: wealthy, seasoned, and widely admired.
Both camps made the same claim — we know how bidding should be done. So they settled it the only way that ever really settles anything: they sat down and played.
The wager
Culbertson proposed a bet — $5,000 of his money against $1,000 of Lenz's. Lenz took it, and both sides agreed the winnings would go to charity regardless. The format: 150 rubbers, played across 20 evening sessions from December 7, 1931 to January 8, 1932. The first half was played in the Culbertsons' apartment at the Hotel Chatham; the second half moved to the newly opened Waldorf-Astoria.
When bridge was the news
What followed had no precedent. Wire services sent their top reporters to cover a card game. Daily scores ran on front pages, and NBC broadcast a fifteen-minute report from the table every night. Depression-era America was hooked.
One lovely footnote: the chief referee was a young officer named Alfred Gruenther, then an instructor at West Point. Years later he became NATO's Supreme Allied Commander in Europe (1953–1956). The story goes that when Dwight Eisenhower was asked whom he wanted as his second-in-command at NATO, he said he'd take Gruenther — because he was the better bridge player.
The woman who stole the show
Culbertson's main partner was his wife, Josephine Culbertson, who played 88 of the 150 rubbers. To this day some experts consider her the stronger player of the two. In 1931, when women barely appeared on the sports pages at all, a woman sat at the centre of the biggest media event of the year — and played beautifully.
The partner who walked out
Across the table, a different drama was unfolding. Lenz had chosen Oswald Jacoby, a brilliant young talent, as his partner. But the tension between them kept rising: Lenz would criticise Jacoby's play — sometimes when the mistake had been Lenz's own. After 103 rubbers, Jacoby stood up and quit, in the middle of the most publicised card game on earth. Commander Winfield Liggett took his seat for the rest of the match.
So who won?
Culbertson. At one point his lead ballooned to 20,535 points; Lenz clawed some of it back, but the match ended with Culbertson ahead by 8,980 points. And here's the part that matters: careful records were kept of every hand dealt, and at the end it turned out both sides had held roughly the same number of high cards. In other words — it wasn't luck.
What's left of it now
Culbertson didn't just win — he turned bridge into a global phenomenon. Millions of people learned the game because of the coverage, and his method became the root from which the modern bidding systems we all play grew, ours included.
But beyond the history, the story is a reminder of something simple: bridge isn't a game about good cards. It's a game about partnership. Two partners who speak the same language will beat two stronger players who don't understand each other. If you're just starting out, get to know how to play bridge and the rules of bridge first — then just play.
J Bridge is a free bridge game in Hebrew and English: play against the computer, Yehudit teaches you step by step, no ads — and it works offline after the first load.