Bill Wall's Chess Blog

  Chess, Money, and Prizes by Bill Wall In May 1826, Johann Maelzel (1772-1838), the owner of the Turk Automaton Chess-Player, held a New York charity exhibition with The Turk and raised $128.50. The money was given to the Association for the Relief of Respectable Indigent Females. In 1827, William Lewis (1787-1870) was a strong English chess player and author that declared bankruptcy due to bad investments.   His chess club in London was forced to close. In 1845, the first place prize for the U.S. Championship match was $1,000 ($40,000 in today’s currency). The winner was Charles Stanley (1819-1901), defeating Eugene Rousseau (1810-1870) in a match. In 1851, the prize fund at the Lonon 1851 International Tournament was 500 British pounds.   That would have been $2,500 at the time and $95,000 in today’s money. In 1857, the $300 first place money for the first American Chess Congress played in New York was refused by Paul Morphy (1837-1884), the winner. Inste...

  The world’s largest chess piece is a king piece in front of the World Chess Hall of Fame in St. Louis.  It is 20 feet tall and 9 feet in diameter.  It is 53 times larger than a standard Staunton chess king.   The oldest chess master was Hungarian-Canadian master Zoltan Sarosy (1906-2017) who was 110 years, 300 days when he died.  He won the Canadian Correspondence Chess Championship in 1967, 1972, and 1981.  He was still actively playing chess at the age of 107.   The oldest pieces identified as chess pieces were found at Nashipur, India, datable to 800 AD.   The largest collection of chess sets consists of 438 items, owned by Tumen-Ulzii Zandraa of Mongolia. On Jan 29, 2016, the Russian State Social University hosted the largest chess lesson with 250 students and pupils.  The 30-minute lesson was about William Steinitz with a demonstration of his chess games.   On Sep 20, 2018, the largest chess lesson had 1,459 participants taught by...

  I was born William (Bill) Dale Wall in Raymond, Washington on May 11, 1951. My parents were William Raymond Wall and Bobbie (Brown) Wall, both chess players. I probably learned chess from my parents when I was around 9 years old in Tacoma, Washington.  I did not know all the rules, such as en passant and proper castling.  I did not know chess notation until 1969, when I started buying chess books. In 1965, I played in a chess tournament sponsored by a Boy Scouts Troop in San Francisco. From 1967 to 1969 I played on the high school chess team at Clover Park High School in Lakewood, Washington.  I was the chess club treasurer.  We played several local schools. In 1968, I won a chess tournament for juniors a the Tacoma YMCA. In 1969, I transferred to Lakes High School in Tacoma and played on their chess team. In the summer of 1969, after graduating from High School, I joined the Tacoma Chess Club, located at 719 South I Street in Tacoma, Washington.  I was a...