Here’s a quiz question for you. What do these chess players have in common?
GM Luke McShane
GM Jonathan Rowson
GM Dmitris Anagnostopolous (formerly Demetrios Agnos)
GM Aaron Summerscale
IM Richard Bates
IM Gavin Wall
IM Ali Mortazavi
IM Tom Hinks-Edwards
IM Andrew Kinsman
IM Yang-Fan Zhou
IM Callum Kilpatrick
WIM Cathy Forbes
Well, you probably guessed the answer from the title of this article, didn’t you? They were all, along with many other strong players, a lot of whom could, had they chosen to do so, have reached at least IM level, members of Richmond Junior Chess Club between 1975 and 2006.
I could add a few more names as well, who were never members but friends of the club who took part in one of more of our semi-closed competitions. For example:
GM David Howell
IM Michael Hennigan
IM Matthew Wadsworth
I think you’ll agree that RJCC was one of the success stories of English junior chess over the past half century.
John Upham has kindly provided me the space to write a history of Richmond Junior Chess Club from its foundation in 1975 up to 2006, when I resigned as club director.
When I’m asked, as I often am, to explain how we were so successful, I can now point them in the direction of this series of articles. No: that’s a lie. I’ve never been asked this question by any junior chess organiser, and when I try to explain anyway, I’m usually cut off in mid-sentence. I wonder why.
People who don’t know me automatically assume from our successes that I’m a brilliant teacher and, when they met me, are disappointed to find out that I’m not: in fact, I’m not really a teacher at all. I have a combination of social, communication and speech disorders which means I’m not very good at standing front of an audience talking or keeping a class of children under control. I’m also not a brilliant chess player, although, by most standards, I’m reasonably competent (about 1900-2000 strength for the past 50 years).
What I did, and do, have is this: I’m an efficient organiser, reliable, conscientious and detail oriented. I take a pragmatic, logical and structured approach to everything I do, rather than being influenced by emotions. Children enjoyed my company, as is often the case with adults whom they perceive as ‘different’ in some way, and I, in turn, enjoyed their company.
You might think I’m not the obvious person to run a junior chess club at all, least of all one as successful as RJCC. But this is a story which might challenge your views about education, about children, about chess, and about how these should interact. You might also think it’s a story about leadership, and how those who appear not to have leadership qualities can, in some instances, be very successful.
What we did at RJCC was very different from any other junior chess club at the time or subsequently. You’ll find out how this developed as the years went by through this series of articles. One example of how we took a very different approach was that, once children had reached the level where notation was worthwhile, we’d collect scoresheets from all our internal competitions to enable us to find out everything we could about how all our members played chess. I have a database of nearly 17000 games played at Richmond Junior Chess Club over a period of almost 30 years, and I’ll use this to illustrate the club’s story.
Anyway, I’ll now take you back half a century, to the summer of 1972. I’d just completed my education and, at the same time, the Fischer – Spassky match was on the front page of all the papers. Suddenly a lot of parents wanted their children to learn chess, and several of my parents’ friends, knowing I played chess, asked if I could teach their children. I’d been bullied throughout my schooldays and couldn’t wait to grow up so that I’d never have to have anything to do with children again, but not wishing to disappoint people by saying no, I reluctantly agreed. Sometimes fate plays strange tricks on you. Much to my surprise, the lessons seemed to go well: my pupils made good progress and the idea of starting a junior chess club occurred to me.
At about this time I met a remarkable man named Mike Fox at Richmond & Twickenham Chess Club. We had quite a lot in common: apart from both being passionate about chess, we both enjoyed teaching children, had a shared sense of humour and even a shared birthday, although 17 years apart. In other ways, though we were total opposites: he was tall and sporty, I was short and unsporty, he was an extreme extrovert, I was an extreme introvert, he played aggressive tactical chess, favouring the King’s Gambit (19th Century Fox, we called him) and the Sicilian Dragon, while I played rather dull and cautious chess. He was running a chess club at his son’s school and had had the same idea as me.
We were also getting some younger children coming along to Richmond & Twickenham, even though it was rather late for them. It was also not really suitable as, naturally enough, they wanted to run around and chat rather than play quietly.
We put the three groups together: my pupils, Mike’s pupils and the children from RTCC, booked our club venue, a church hall in Richmond, for Saturday mornings, and, at some point in the autumn of 1975 (the exact date is lost in the mists of time) Richmond Junior Chess Club, at that point part of Richmond & Twickenham Chess Club, opened its doors for the first time.
It was just something very informal where children could come along, meet their friends, play some chess and perhaps learn something in the process. And it was also very cheap: children would come along with their 10p, 20p or whatever it was per week, which just paid the venue costs. Of course, Mike and I were unpaid volunteers, just running the club for the love of chess. I rather expected it to be something like Charlie Brown’s baseball team: losing every match but providing a lot of fun. Today we’d call it a social chess club or a community chess club. The tagline on our first flyers was “Hey kids! Meet your mates at Richmond Junior Chess Club!”. It was just somewhere to meet your friends, not a club for budding masters.
We soon started running both internal and open competitions, which became more and more popular, and hosted a visit by a Danish team. On one occasion the saintly Bob Wade looked in and gave a talk on a master game. I remember at the time thinking, although we were both big fans of Bob, that I didn’t see the point of that sort of lesson for young children. (My views are no different today, but now I can justify them by quoting educational theory.) My other abiding memory of Bob, by the way, was a few years later, when he dropped into a London Junior Championship qualifying tournament at nearby Hampton School and unobtrusively helped set up the pieces between rounds: very typical of the man.
There was some coaching built in as well, with Mike giving lessons with his customary humour. The one I remember took place on Saturday 1 April 1978, when he demonstrated to the audience a new opening, which, I seem to recall, involved moving your knight out and back again to avoid creating any weaknesses. This, he explained, was called the Oliphant Opening, named after Francis Oliver Oliphant Leonard. Check out the first letters of his names and the day of the lesson. Mike also, as I do, loved using acronyms as a learning tool: KUFTE (King Up For The Ending) was one of his favourites.
At some point we introduced notation for our older and stronger players in club games as well as tournaments and in 1977 I started keeping them. Being someone with hoarding tendencies, I decided to hold onto them just in case they’d come in useful later. I was very pleased that I did: I started entering RJCC games in ChessBase in 1992 and eventually entered scoresheets of the 4000+ games I’d collected up to this point. Now, when I hear from former members from the early days, they’re in equal parts delighted and embarrassed when I send them pdfs of their games.
It had become clear from very early in the club’s history that something remarkable was happening. Back in 1976-77 future IM Gavin Wall became our first London Junior Champion: these days he plays top board for Richmond and captains our London League team. Another of our very early members was future IM Andrew Kinsman: I knew his late father Ken, who played chess for Wimbledon.
Some of our early members have achieved eminence in fields other than chess. This game features author and psychologist Kevin Dutton (we’re in touch on Twitter) against top lawyer Ian Winter (I gave him some private tuition at the time of this game: his parents were friends of my parents: I’m still indirectly in touch). To put it another way, an expert on psychopaths against one of Harold Shipman’s defence team.
[Event “RJCC Championship (4)”]
[Date “1978.06.18”]
[White “Dutton, Kevin”]
[Black “Winter, Ian”]
[Result “1/2-1/2”]
1. e4 e5 2. f4 d5 3. exd5 exf4 4. Nc3 Bc5 5. Qe2+ Qe7 6. Qxe7+ Nxe7 7. Nf3 O-O 8. a3 Re8 9. Be2 Bf5 10. d4 Bd6 11. Kd1 c6 12. Bc4 Nd7 13. h3 h6 14. Re1 Nf6 15. Ne5 Bxe5 16. dxe5 Nfxd5 17. Bxd5 Nxd5 18. Nxd5 Rad8 19. c4 cxd5 20. Bxf4 dxc4+ 21. Ke2 Rd5 22. Kf3 Rd3+ 23. Re3 Rxe3+ 24. Kxe3 Rd8 25. Ke2 g5 26. g4 Bxg4+ 27. hxg4 gxf4 28. Kf3 Rd4 29. Re1 Kg7 30. e6 fxe6 31. Rxe6 Rd7 32. Kxf4 Rf7+ 33. Kg3 b5 34. Rc6 a5 35. Rc5 Rb7 36. Kf4 Rf7+ 37. Kg3 Rb7 1/2-1/2
This exciting game was published in the Richmond & Twickenham Chess Club newsletter. I’m in contact with Craig Gawler, who, like several other former members, chose to opt out of the rat-race. His now a guitarist with a love of Flamenco music, living in Barcelona where he runs a junior chess club based on the principles of the original RJCC: a fun club rather than a club putting children under pressure to become prodigies. Just like me, and for exactly the same reasons, he’s unhappy about recent trends in junior chess.
[Event “Richmond Junior Congress (5)”]
[Date “1978.10.01”]
[White “Gawler, Craig”]
[Black “Khan, Salim”]
[Result “1-0”]
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 h6 4. Nc3 Bc5 5. Nxe5 Nxe5 6. d4 Nxc4 7. dxc5 Nf6 8. Bf4 Nxb2 9. Qd4 d5 10. Nb5 O-O 11. Nxc7 Rb8 12. Ne6 Bxe6 13. Bxb8 Qxb8 14. Qxb2 Nxe4 15. Qd4 Re8 16. O-O Qc7 17. f3 Nxc5 18. Rfe1 Qb6 19. Rab1 Qc6 20. f4 b6 21. Qf2 Ne4 22. Qe3 Qc5 23. Qxc5 bxc5 24. Rb7 Ra8 25. Reb1 Bc8 26. Rb8 Rxb8 27. Rxb8 Nd6 28. Ra8 a6 29. Kf2 Kf8 30. Ke3 d4+ 31. Kd3 Ke7 32. c3 Bf5+ 33. Kd2 Nc4+ 34. Kc1 a5 35. Ra7+ Bd7 36. cxd4 cxd4 37. Kc2 Kd6 38. Kd3 Bb5 39. Kxd4 g5 40. fxg5 hxg5 41. Rxf7 Ne5 42. Rf5 Nc6+ 43. Kc3 Ne5 44. Rxg5 Bf1 45. h4 Be2 46. h5 Bxh5 47. Rxh5 Ke6 48. Kd4 Nc6+ 49. Kc5 Kd7 50. Rh7+ Ke6 51. Rh6+ Ke5 52. Rxc6 Ke4 53. Rf6 Kd3 54. g4 Ke4 55. g5 Ke5 56. Rf1 Ke4 57. g6 Kd3 58. g7 Ke4 59. g8=R Ke5 60. Re8# 1-0
Here’s an early Gavin Wall game: many years later his opponent would bring his daughter along to Richmond Junior Club.
[Event “RJCC Training Tournament (3)”]
[Date “1979.10.06”]
[White “Wall, Gavin”]
[Black “Kapila, Sundeep”]
[Result “1-0”]
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Bc5 4. c3 Nf6 5. d4 exd4 6. cxd4 Bb4+ 7. Nc3 d5 8. exd5 Nxd5 9. Qb3 Qe7+ 10. Kf1 Nxc3 11. bxc3 Bd6 12. Bg5 Qf8 13. d5 Na5 14. Qb5+ Bd7 15. Qxa5 a6 16. Re1+ Be7 17. Rxe7+ Qxe7 18. Bxe7 Kxe7 19. Qxc7 Rac8 20. Qe5+ Kd8 21. d6 Re8 22. Qa5+ b6 23. Qxb6+ Rc7 24. Qxc7# 1-0
At some point round about late 1979 or early 1980 Mike’s job as the creative director of an advertising agency took him to Birmingham, so I was, rather reluctantly, left alone in charge of what was rapidly becoming a very successful club. Mike and I made an ideal partnership: he was the charismatic frontman, while I was the backroom worker. To put it another way, if you like, I was the Gordon Brown to Mike’s Tony Blair. Being the frontman wasn’t a role in which I was naturally comfortable, but I just had to do my best.
Over the next year or two we attracted a lot of strong new members. One in particular, then using the name Demetrios Agnos, a pupil at a local primary school, impressed with a maturity well beyond that of most of his peers.
[Event “RJCC U14 Ch”]
[Date “1980.??.??”]
[White “Mitchell, John”]
[Black “Agnos, Demetrios”]
[Result “0-1”]
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. Be3 e6 7. Qd2 Be7 8. Bd3 Qc7 9. f3 Nc6 10. O-O-O O-O 11. g4 b5 12. h4 Bb7 13. g5 Nd7 14. Rdg1 Nde5 15. Qe2 Nxd4 16. Bxd4 Nxd3+ 17. Qxd3 Rac8 18. h5 Qc4 19. Qe3 b4 20. g6 e5 21. gxh7+ Kxh7 22. h6 g6 23. b3 Qxd4 24. Qxd4 exd4 25. Ne2 d3 26. Nd4 Bf6 27. f4 Bxd4 28. Rg4 Rxc2+ 29. Kd1 Bxe4 30. f5 Bf3+ 0-1
I didn’t realise it at the time, but I now understand the real purpose of Richmond Junior Chess Club was to build a chess community. In that we undoubtedly succeeded. Producing international players like Gavin Wall and Demetrios Agnos was merely a by-product. When I speak to former members from that period today – and from time to time someone will get in touch via social media – they always tell me how much they enjoyed RJCC and how much they enjoyed spending time with Mike and myself.
One of our earliest members whose games feature in the database was Simon Illsley: he’s just joined Richmond & Twickenham Chess Club for the first time for the 2022-23 season. As a pupil at Hampton (Grammar) School he taught a friend, Andrew Hebron, to play. Andrew is also now a member of RTCC.
This game from a 1980 training tournament. between Sampson Low and Mark Josse, demonstrates again the power and influence of the chess community Mike and I created. Sampson (whose family company has published a few chess books over the centuries) is now Secretary of Richmond & Twickenham Chess Club as well as being involved in the organisation of the Thames Valley League. Mark plays for Surbiton, and occasionally for Richmond in the London League. Now retired from a career in the Metropolitan Police, he also coaches at the current Richmond Junior Chess Club.
[Event “RJCC Knights (2)”]
[Date “1980.07.05”]
[White “Low, Sampson”]
[Black “Josse, Mark”]
[Result “1-0”]
1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. e3 Nc6 5. Nf3 Ne4 6. Bd2 Nxc3 7. Bxc3 Bxc3+ 8. bxc3 O-O 9. Bd3 b6 10. O-O Bb7 11. Qc2 g6 12. Be4 f5 13. Bxc6 Bxc6 14. Ne5 Be4 15. Qd2 Qg5 16. f3 Bc6 17. Nxc6 dxc6 18. Rae1 f4 19. exf4 Rxf4 20. g3 Rf5 21. Qxg5 Rxg5 22. Rxe6 c5 23. Rd1 Rd8 24. f4 Rf5 25. Re5 Rf6 26. Re7 Rc6 27. d5 Rcd6 28. Rxc7 a5 29. Rb7 h5 30. Rb1 Re8 31. R1xb6 Rxb6 32. Rxb6 Re4 33. Rxg6+ Kh7 34. Ra6 Rxc4 35. Rxa5 Rxc3 36. d6 Rd3 37. Rxc5 Rxd6 38. Rxh5+ Kg6 39. Rg5+ Kf7 40. h4 Rg6 41. Rxg6 Kxg6 42. a4 1-0
My next article will cover what happened in Richmond Junior Chess Club in the early 1980s. Come back soon for the next episode in the club’s history.
Chess with Richard 