I recently searched Google for a list of past Ohio chess
champions and couldn’t find one! I was
hoping to find something like they have in North Carolina and Missouri and
probably other states that have a “Hall of Fame” list that includes brief
biographies of past champions and prominent players. Even the Ohio Chess Association does not have
a list of past champions. This Blog has a post on Saul Wachs
who was a very strong master in his day but almost all of
the information I gathered on him came from non-chess sites! I was interested in finding out some
information on players like James Schroeder and discovered the following: The Man Who Was Once Somebody and A Chronicle of James Schroeder .
However a search of prominent Ohio players of the past like Jerry
Fink, Lajos Szedlacksek, Tom Lajcik, Richard Kause, Tom Wozney, Ross Sprague,
Dr. Joseph I. Schaeffer, Robert H. Burns and others didn’t turn up much. Little or nothing seems to be available on
these players and in many cases even their games are not available. That’s
disappointing.
I agree with you that it was long overdue for the Ohio Chess Association to do something to recognize its past champions. Since the organization seemed loathe to correct this oversight, I took it upon myself to get the ball rolling with this article: http://besteversportstalk.blogspot.com/2015/01/history-of-ohio-chess-congress.html
ReplyDeleteSubsequently, OCA President Mike Steve joined my efforts and helped to complete my list as well as uncover other historical information about the OCA. He has since posted the list on the OCA website and in the Ohio Chess Bulletin.
The Dayton Chess Club has been similarly remiss about its history and a few years ago I posted a list of that club's champions, too; here is the updated version of that list (the DCC is still a couple years behind in terms of putting the champions' names on the rotating trophy that honors every winner of the event, so even someone who visits the club in person will not see an updated list of the champions): http://besteversportstalk.blogspot.com/2015/05/david-friedman-captures-10th-dayton.html
Thanks for the information and the effort you put in on compiling the list of past champions. BTW...you have a great blog!
ReplyDelete