Hoots from the Archive – Check Mates: The MGS Chess Club

Posted by System Administrator on 17 Mar 2020

Modified by Rachel Kneale on 13 Jan 2023

Old Photo of an MGS Boy playing Chess

                                                                                                   The MGS ‘Chess Tie’ Design

The MGS Chess Club was founded in January 1874 by members of the Classical Sixth Form, originally exclusive to that group of students, with the club initially consisting of seven to eight members.  From those early, humble beginnings, the club has continued from strength to strength, eventually producing  Double-Grand Master Jonathan Mestell (MGS 1967-73), who was also the British Champion in 1976 and 1983 (presently Professor of Applied Mathematics at Imperial College, London), and International Master Daniel Fernandez (MGS 2011-13).  More recently, current Year 6 pupil Ethan Gardiner was part of the Under 11 team at this year’s European Schools’ Chess Championships.  The school also boasts the second most wins (after St Paul’s) as champions of the E.C.F. National Schools’ Chess Championship.

                                                                                                     Jonathan Mestell (1967-73)

From the time of the club’s inception, Ulula regularly included ‘chess problems’ in its pages, although this tradition seems to have died out sometime around 1900, with the occasional exception, including the following contribution by the sadly recently departed, esteemed mathematician and OM Michael Atiyah (1945-47), who briefly revived the idea in 1946:

The original ‘Problems’ were quite elaborately and elegantly designed, with each one individually  numbered, the following example being Problem No. 20, originally printed in the April 1890 issue of Ulula:
 

A revival in the club’s ambitions seems to have taken place in the 1980s, when a Chess Club Bulletin was published from 1984 to 1987, featuring news, results and reviews of matches played, and in-depth analyses of game strategies.  The bulletins were initially edited by Peter Webster and then taken over by Steve Rix:

Finally, to end this short overview of chess at MGS, here’s an evocative image from the 1930s showing a group of boys engrossed in a game of chess during a stay at Alderley Camp:

Otto Smart

Comments

Visitor

1 Like Posted one year ago

I remember when I played chess for MGS. Our B team beat the Bolton team of future GM Nigel Short in the Sunday Times schools tournament. I spent many happy lunchtimes playing chess in the chemistry laboratory.

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