There were two events on Sunday 12/18: a benefit concert and blitz tournament at the Seattle Chess Club, and the Washington Action Championship at the Tacoma Chess Club. We hope you enjoyed these events!

Try It! USCF Tournament Membership Offers Low Cost Option for Rated Play – See the story on the USCF website.

Grand Prix – 2005 Christopher Memorial Northwest Chess Grand Prix standings!

Interested in Chess 960 or Fischer Random Chess? – This was one of the side events at the WA Class Championships, and the participants seemed to enjoy it! See the Chess 960 rules. © Frankfurt Chess Tigers e.V. ( www.chesstigers.de ), used by permission.

Chess Chronicle – Billing itself as "the first ever semi-monthly e-zine on the Chess Horizon," Chess Chronicle is now available online by subscription, and there is an ad and discount code in the November and December issues of Northwest Chess magazine.

See the USCF website for information about the 2005 National K-12 / Collegiate Championship, set for December 2-4 in Houston, Texas.

Battle of Champions! The America’s Foundation for Chess and Internet Chess Club conducted the running of the second State ‘Champion of Champions’ event, November 19-20, the winner of which gets a guaranteed spot in the 64-player field battling it out for the $250,000 U.S. Chess Championship to be held next March in San Diego.

Cajun Chess, whose warehouse in New Orleans was completely destroyed by Hurricane Katrina, reports that they are "back and better than ever!" Please see the Cajun Chess website for their grand reopening sale!

Kasparov video available – The video Game Over: Kasparov and the Machine, as advertised in Northwest Chess and Chess Life, is available in DVD format from Th!nk Film, at the website www.specialtydvd.com. There is a review in the June issue of Northwest Chess.

FIDE Changes Format for Next Championship Cycle – See USCF website.

Legendary Chess Master and International Chess Teacher and author Jude Acers returned to New Orleans and re-opened his famed world chess table for all on October 27. The “Man in the Red Beret” has been a permanent fixture in New Orleans for more than 25 years and chess fans worldwide will be delighted to know he is back in business.

Topalov Coasts to World Championship – See story on the USCF website.

Western States Open was held October 14-16 in Reno, Nevada. See the website at http://www.renochess.org/wso. Boris Spassky attended again this year! NWC editor Fred Kleist was there and will probably have a report in the November magazine.

Chess coach wanted for University Child Development School, Seattle, WA.

King County and America's Foundation for Chess (AF4C) to launch pilot project in unincorporated King County, using chess as a learning tool to increase higher-level thinking skills, raise math and reading scores and build self-esteem in our students. The First Move™ program is an innovative curriculum that will be used in 2nd and 3rd grade classrooms at Southern Heights and White Center Heights elementary schools in the Highline Public Schools. King County Executive Ron Sims joined Michael Flor, Executive Director of the Western Washington Chapter of AF4C, to launch this project in the Highline Public Schools.

The Tacoma Chess Club was at the Puyallup Fair on 9/18 and 9/19. If you are visiting this website as a result of receiving Northwest Chess magazine at the Fair, welcome to chess in the Northwest! Please see the calendar and clubs list if you are interested in chess tournaments or club activities.

Chess Leagues – Important message from new WCF tournament director H. G. (Hanniegn) Pitre regarding chess leagues in Washington State. (PDF file) Contact info on officers page.

The US Chess Federation has established an outreach program to aid USCF members affected by Hurricane Katrina. See info on the USCF website.

Euro Gallery "Live" Art – See some interesting art based on the chess game Byrne-v-Fischer, New York, 1956. Bobby Fischer was 13 years old at the time!

Brad Jackson, founder of the Everett Chess Club, will be leaving the Northwest. Please see his message on the Everett club page.

USCF Crosstables – Rusty Miller reports that the tournament cross tables USCF e-mails to people are now in finish order! Rusty has formatted some of these tables for use in the September Northwest Chess magazine.

Exciting Finish at the 2005 U.S. Open Chess Championship, which concluded August 14 in Phoenix, Arizona. See story on the USCF website.

Mastering The Game: A History of Computer Chess – New exhibit at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California. See story on CCNews.

See the viewpoints of Yasser Seirawan, Hikaru Nakamura and others on the Association of Chess Professionals website news page.

Everett Chess Club 2nd anniversary party – Tuesday August 9th at Espresso Americano at the Everett Public Library, Main Branch, 6:00 to 8:45 PM. They had cake and a chess quiz with prizes to the top finishers as well as a prize for the funniest quiz answer!

Chess Camp with FIDE Master Chuck Schulien took place Aug 1-2 in Clatskanie, OR.

GM Emil Anka lecture and 30-board simul took place Monday July 18 at the Portland Chess Club, the day after the Portland Summer Open (July 16-17).

Chess players set world record in Mexico. See story on the USCF website.

Heather Ramsey, Executive Director of the Western Washington Chapter of America's Foundation for Chess (AF4C), has resigned because her family is moving to the Washington, D.C. area. She reports that "the search for a new Executive Director is well underway." Please contact AF4C for more information. Their website is www.af4c.org.

AF4C also offered The First Move Extension Workshop Series August 9-11 in Bellevue, WA. This workshop was for 2nd and 3rd grade teachers who wish to increase student achievement using chess. The cost was $1,500. E-mail Torrey Volk for information.

Northwest Chess Center Forum is looking for more people to post messages.
No sign-in is necessary, just go to http://pub16.bravenet.com/forum/1316140942/.

New ballots mailed in USCF officer election – See story on USCF website.

Tacoma Chess Club moved to a new site near the Tacoma Dome beginning June 3 –
see the club's page. All local chessplayers were invited to "opening night."

President's Corner – WA Open and other topics, by WCF President Kent McNall.

WCF Constitution – The revised constitution of the Washington Chess Federation, as approved last year, is now available as a PDF file.

Rusty Miller e-mail list started again – Former Business Manager Rusty Miller, has resumed his weekly e-mail newsletter for local chessplayers. He is still missing a lot of e-mail addresses that were previously on his list. If you are interested in receiving e-mails about chess events in Washington and Oregon, please contact Rusty at his new e-mail, rmille9601@nwi.net, to sign up for his list.

Northwest Chess was the featured organization of the week in the April 30 edition of Seattle Spin, a weekly email newsletter highlighting the best restaurants, activities, and venues in Seattle. (Email spin@seattlespin.net for more info.) If you are here because of that link, we welcome you to the chess-playing community in Washington and Oregon!

Oregon Scholastic Chess Federation (OSCF) founded to meet some key needs of all school-aged players in Oregon. The mission of OSCF is to promote, support, sponsor and coordinate scholastic chess activities in Oregon. OSCF is a non-profit organization founded by elementary, middle school and high school chess coaches, advisors, and parents. See the new OSCF website at http://www.oscf.org/.

In case anyone hasn't already heard, Bobby Fischer arrived in Iceland on 3/24, following his release from months of detention in Japan. Is this the end of the story? – probably not. See the story on Fox News. See some humorous satire from Pug Bus.

According to Rusty Miller, "There will be NO Dake Memorial Chess Event in 2005."

Kasparov retires from professional chess play – See story on Fox News.
See story on USCF website. Game Over: Kasparov vs. The Machine ran from March 25 to March 31 at the Varsity Theatre in the University District in Seattle.

ALERT! Rusty Miller e-mail change/lost address book – Former Business Manager Rusty Miller, who prepared a weekly e-mail newsletter for local chessplayers, reports that he lost his e-mail account at AOL.com, and his e-mail address book! From now on, please contact Rusty at his new e-mail: rmille9601@nwi.net. He will no longer be sending e-mails direct to people about chess events in Washington and Oregon. Information can be found on this website and websites for various chess clubs. Another way to find out about what is going on in Washington and Oregon is to sign up for the Yahoo group Kate Taylor has set up. Sign up by going to www.yahoogroups.com and looking for PNWChess (open to anyone), or send a message to pnwchess-subscribe@yahoogroups.com. (A Yahoo ID may be required.) Tournament directors can also request access to the  PNWChessTD group.

Some February Northwest Chess magazines were mailed with the apartment number or second address line missing from the label. Please contact Business Manager  Eric Holcomb to request a replacement copy if your copy didn't arrive.

Chess in Federal Way? – Ian Raygor and Eric Holcomb met at noon on 2/26 at the Federal Way Commons (formerly Seatac Mall) for chess, but no one else who Ian had invited showed up! Please contact Ian if you are interested in trying a different time.

Story in Chessbase News about Chouchanik Airapetian, the first woman ever to receive a gender neutral invitation to the US Chess Championship. She now lives in Seattle.

FINAL! Grand Prix Standings – Final Christopher Memorial Northwest Chess Grand Prix standings for 2004 are available! Click on the link to see the results alphabetically or the point standings by state. A total of $2,521.60 in prize funds were awarded!

IN MEMORIAM – Raymond E. Page died on February 8 at age 80. He was in charge of the International Chess Club that meets on Saturdays at the Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church in SE Portland. We will miss him and his commitment to promoting chess in the Northwest.

Article about chess at the Boys & Girls Club of Southwestern Oregon in Coos Bay.

Former US Chess Champion Arnold Denker Dies at Age 90. See USCF report.