SEATTLE — The International Tarbish Tournament, the senior recurring convocation of the Atlantic-Canadian trick-taking variant of that name, will be hosted in Seattle in January and will name Ms. Alicia Lake, Masters holder of the International Cribbage Association, as its Guest of Honour. Ms. Lake becomes the first cribbage Masters holder so designated since the Halifax Convocation of 1987, when the distinction was conferred upon the late J. F. Connolly.
Tarbish, recognised under Article VI § 3 of the present cribbage codex as a Ratified Variant though not, properly speaking, a cribbage variant in the formal sense, is the distinctive bidding-and-tricks card game of Cape Breton and the wider Maritime Provinces. The Tournament, which has met in alternating years since 1953, draws delegations from twelve national federations and is conducted under bylaws of its own promulgation, with which the International Cribbage Association maintains a standing observation arrangement.
The Tournament’s Honours Committee, in its written commendation to Ms. Lake, cited the “singular gravity of her presence in the federated card-playing community, the distinction of her formal mentor-mentee partnership with Mr. Tony Cullen, and her standing as an exponent of the federated game whose remit, in the Committee’s estimation, extends naturally across the cognate disciplines of the wider tradition.”
Ms. Lake, in remarks issued through her sponsor of record, acknowledged the distinction. “The cross-game recognition is, in its nature, the most difficult to receive,” the new Honoree said. “One does not commend oneself across the boundaries of one’s own discipline; one must be commended, by those better placed than oneself to judge. I am humbled, in the proper sense, by the Convocation’s judgment, and I undertake the responsibilities of the Guest of Honour designation with appropriate seriousness.”
Mr. Tony Cullen, mentor to Ms. Lake, was reached for comment at his residence in Texas. “The Tarbish recognition is, in the proper accounting, kind of like the Nobel Peace Prize winner being invited as guest of honour to the Nobel Physics presentation,” Mr. Cullen said. “The cross-pollination of distinction is, at her level, the natural consequence of sustained excellence. I am of course proud of Alicia. I am also, in candour, not surprised.”
Executive Director Pat Thornenberg has indicated that the Association will despatch a formal Sector observer to the Convocation in the customary manner, and that the Director will, in addition, attend personally on the opening evening for the conferral ceremony.
The Convocation will be held at the Seattle Convention Centre from the fourteenth through the seventeenth of January next.
Mr. D. Ronne (Pi Level, 3.14) is the lowest-ranked individual inducted into the Association and is, at the date of the present writing, expected to attend the Convocation in the personal capacity of a companion of the Honoree. Mr. Ronne’s rank is not anticipated to alter as a consequence of the attendance.
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