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In 1936, already known as a highly successful tournament player, Goren published his first book, Winning Bridge Made Easy. In it he prophetically deviated from the Culbertson system. For suit bids, Goren stuck pretty much to Culbertson's elaborate "honor trick" count, but for no-trump bidding he adopted Milton Work's method of evaluating a hand with a point count: four points for an ace, three for a king, two for a queen, one for a jack. Entranced by the point count's simplicity, Goren devoted numberless hours to expanding the idea into a general bidding method. "It took me about 15 years," he says, "and I had some very expert help." Most valuable helper: Toronto Insurance Executive William M. Anderson, a bridge buff and mathematician.
The Goren system revolves around the fact that there are 40 high-card points in a deck. An opening suit bid requires 13 points, a bid is mandatory at 14 points, a partnership with 26 points should make game in a major suit (29 are needed in a minor suit), partners with 33 points should have a little slam, and 37 is the magic number for a grand slam.
Beyond its tremendous advantage of simplicity, the Goren method was more reliable than Culbertson's. Ely's honor-trick count tended to undervalue kings, queens and jacks, overvalue the ace and the A-K combination. By bringing high-card valuation more into line with play-of-the-cards realities, Goren saved bridge players countless set contracts, especially at no trump. Another virtue of Goren's method was that it supplied a practical way of taking distribution into account: on suit bids (but not on no-trump) it adds one point for a doubleton, two for a singleton, three for a void.
Goren speaks of his point-count bidding system as a "back to nature movement," meaning that it makes scant use of artificial conventions, relies on "natural" bids that are logically related to the cards in the hand. In his own play, Goren seldom uses any artificial bids except the Blackwood and Gerber slam conventions.*
Flicker of Triumph. The day Winning Bridge Made Easy was published, Charles Goren gave up the practice of law. Soon after that, Ely Culbertson issued a public challenge to all comers, apparently never dreaming that Goren would risk his growing reputation against the master. But Charlie grabbed at the opportunity. Goren still treasures Culbertson's letter explaining that a sudden business trip to Europe made it necessary to call off the match. "Ely was using good judgment," says Goren, a faint but unmistakable flicker of triumph on his face.
Closing in on Culbertson, Goren replaced him as the Chicago Tribune syndicate's bridge columnist when Ely moved over to the Sun in 1944. A year later, sprightly Columnist Goren was appearing in more papers than Culbertson. Then, in 1951 Goren published his point-count bidding system in Contract Bridge Complete, and overwhelmed Culbertson with the decisiveness of a trump ace.