David Bruce (bridge)

David Burnstine (May 5 1900 – August 26, 1965) was a leading tournament contract bridge player of the 1930s. He changed his name to David Bruce after he retired from competition in 1939.

Burnstine was born in New York City and regularly played at the Contract Bridge Club of New York. He was a member of the Four Horsemen team captained by P. Hal Sims, which he left to create his own teams, first the Bid-Rite team and later the Four Aces. The Four Aces dominated tournament play in the later half of the 1930s. Burnstine became American Contract Bridge League (ACBL) Life Master #1 at the age of 36.

Burnstine moved to Los Angeles in 1939, changed his name to David Bruce, and retired from regular tournament play. He died in 1965 and was inducted into the ACBL Hall of Fame as David Bruce in 1997. Thus he was the second recipient (after Sims) of the von Zedtwitz Award, a name for Hall of Fame recognition of players long out of the limelight.

Burnstine won one unofficial world championship in 1935 as the Four Aces defeated a team from France during a December fortnight in New York City.

He "won 26 national titles by 1936, the year the rank of Life Master was established":

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