Ajeeb was a chess automaton, created by Charles Hooper (carpenter), initially at the Royal Polytechnic Institute in 1865. Ajeeb’s name was derived from the Arabic/Urdu/Persian word „ajib“, which means something like „wonderful, marvelous“. Another derivation is that it was derived after the Hindu word for „mysterious“ or „mysterious“. His head was made of wax, and his body was modeled from papier mache. The main work, however, was the elaborate „inner workings“ of the supposed automaton, which, after all, was to be displayed for the astonished public to see at each performance, without the player inside being allowed to be seen. In 1868 this alleged chess automaton, which in appearance reminded of a Sikh from the Punjab, had its first public appearance in London and was thereafter in the famous London Crystal Palace (Crystal Palace) until 1876. In 1877, „Ajeeb“ then embarked on a „tour“ of mainland Europe, including performances in Paris and Berlin, where he quickly became an attraction in the premises of „Castan’s Panoptikum,“ a very popular wax museum in Friedrichstrasse at the time. After three successful (and profitable) months, Hooper moved on with „Ajeeb“ to Breslau in June 1877, where the branch of „Castan’s Panoptikum“ in Königsstraße became the venue for the shows. The Silesian capital Breslau was at that time one of the strongholds of chess in the country. The appearance of the alleged automaton had also aroused lively interest in Wroclaw and numerous spectators followed the games when „Ajeeb“ competed against a challenger who had to pay a stake for it. Unfortunately, it is not known who was the „skilled“ player behind „Ajeeb“ at that time. Charles Hooper returned to London after his European tour with „Ajeeb“ and arrived in the USA in 1885. There „Ajeeb“ performed at the Eden Museum in New York City, played against all kinds of celebrities, checkmated the American vice president, among others. Still in the 1880s, Hooper sold his automaton to an American named Jim Smith and retired to England. „Ajeeb“ was taken to one of the then numerous amusement parks at Coney Island in Brooklyn to spend the rest of his days. For a while „Ajeeb“ was still popular and successful, famous masters like the world class player of that time Harry Nelson Pillsbury set the figures of the automaton and well-known and famous contemporaries also competed against the automaton. As time went by, however, it became more and more difficult to attract strong chess players to play in „Ajeeb“ or to meet their demands for money, so that the automaton was finally used only for checkers games. On March 15, 1929, „Ajeeb“, now „out of service“, was destroyed in a fire in a storeroom in Coney Island.
