Scrabble Tournament

Fun For All

By Nancy K. Crevier

An amiable group of serious and not-so-serious wordsmiths huddled over Scrabble boards in the meeting room of the C.H. Booth Library Saturday, February 17, from 9:30 am to 3:30 pm, participants in the kick-off C.H. Booth Library 75th Anniversary Celebration Scrabble Tournament. Under the direction of local resident Rodney Amable, library director Janet Woycik, and librarian Kim Weber, more than 40 people of all ages matched wits, words, and endurance during the course of six rounds of play in four divisions.

“Everyone appears to be having fun,” said Ms Woycik, as the tournament reached the halfway point of the day. By the time the last tile was played, though, many Scrabblers looked like the next two words that they would spell would be H-A-P-P-Y and T-I-R-E-D.

Winners of the Red Division were husband and wife team Rosanne and Mike Phillips. Ms Phillips won all six of her games and Mr Phillips placed second, winning five of the six rounds.

In the Yellow Division, Louise Hanusovsky won five out of five rounds to take first place. Second place winner, Shirley A. Towne, won three of the five rounds.

Blue Division winners were Bryan Roth, winning all five rounds for first place, and Kathy Loeher in second place.

Julie Stern was the first place winner of the Green Division, followed closely by Thomas Buonocore.

Several of the winning players scored in the high 400s for individual games.

Winners in each division received a cash prize of $25 plus a Scrabble-related item. All players left with a bookmark and pencil — and a lot of new words in their vocabularies.