The Silver Rook and Other Pieces
Where
are they now? Bearded Blackburne still looks down on us, as he has done
for many years. But where are all the other mementoes - the trophies,
the pictures, the old letters? What has become of the silver rook? Where
are the hourglasses? One of them, we know, was sold to Mr.Witton for a
shilling in 1904, but what of the others? Has there survived in some
dark cupboard any of the "Fattorini chess-timing clocks" presented to
the club in 1901? Where are the cables from Dr.Alekhine, the letter from
Esling "containing some interesting remarks on the club's early
history"? What happened to the Honour Roll of the Great War? Who has the
McCutcheon set? When did we lose Cornered("subject - a game of chess"),
which was hanging in our Athenaeum clubroom as recently as 1899? And
the "valuable framed photograph of a leading European and American chess
players" presented in 1883 has gone too.
We
have, alas, so few relics to show for our 120 years. On the walls you
will find the first president, Sir George Stephen(1794 - 1879);
Blackburne, our guest in 1885; the Victorian team that vanquished NSW
(9.5 to 0.5) in the telegraphic match of 1897; the field in the 1922
Australian championship; the autographed photo from Bad Kissingen
(Capablanca, Euwue, Nimzovitch, Tarrasch, Bogoljubov, Reti, Marshall,
Spielmann, Tartakower..); the Victorian team for the 1946 wireless match
against France and Watson in particular, then a member of 48 years
standing. The Blackwood honour boards for the Victorian and club
championship are still there, despite a claim made to the former by the
Victorian Chess Association in 1982, when it decided to follow the club
into its new home. The minute books back to 1866 are for the most part
intact, and they give some idea of what had been lost. Since 1866 the
club has on average moved every 5 years, and has sometimes stayed only
for a matter of months if not weeks. Small wonder that things have
disappeared.
Of the old
trophies sadly there are none. Players now want cash prizes; they would
not welcome the bronze kettle given in 1911 to the handicap tourney
winner or the biscuit barrel or jam spoon presented on the same night.
The winner of the lightning tourney might not now "return thanks" as
Gundersen did when handed Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
The
Goldsmith cup, as it was to become known, was presented in 1873 by the
Australasian and the Leader. Designed by the jeweller Edwards, this
silver cup, costing 15 guineas, was to be played for annually in a
handicap tourney and to become the property of the player who won it 3
times. Goldsmith won it outright and on his death left it to the club,
and it again became the trophy for the annual handicap tourney, the cup
(and often the tournament itself) being called the Goldsmith cup. In
1932 the Herald and Weekly Times donated another silver cup, to be taken
absolutely by the winner of 3 annual handicap tourneys. When Martin
Green had his third win in 1946 the company presented another cup.
The
silver rook itself was donated by Leonard V.Biggs and Stanley White in
1932. This handsome solid silver piece, executed by A.Burr, was held by
the club champion for the time being, going to Crowl for the first year.
The rook was not kept up to date and in 1947 it cost15 shillings to
have the missing names inscribed. Crowl had won the club championship
again that year and the committee handed the Rook over to him, taking
the precaution of getting a receipt ("held in trust for the club").
Dr.Learner became the holder of the silver rook in 1951 and that is the
last time we hear of it under that description. In December 1952 we find
a decision to present the club champion from that time onwards with a
mounted rook engraved with the year, but this does not sound like the
Silver Rook.
The Silver
Rook must not be confused with the Silver Bishop, presented by S.J.Myers
and inscribed with the words "Top of the ladder." This minor piece
glides quickly in and out of the minute book in 1940 and 1941. Dunklings
the Jewellers valued it at 3 pounds. Nothing more is known of it.
Then
there is the McCutcheon set, which has had what can be described as a
chequered career. R.G.McCutcheon was president from 1908 to 1918. After
his death his daughter presented to the club a fine ivory chess set by
Jaques of London, with king height of 4.5 inches. In 1931 Mr Hunt
donated a handsome stand for the better display of the McCutcheon set.
The item "Ivory Chess Set and case £25" appears in a trial balance in
1937, in which year the committee had Miss McCutcheon's name placed
inside the glass case that Mr Hunt had presented. Dunklings the
Jewellers valued the set at 20 pounds in 1940. For most of its life the
club disdained what the minutes call "common sets". Nowadays, we play
with the ubiquitous plastic men, but for many years the committee
ensured that only the best were used, importing chessmen and boards from
England. A wooden set was stolen from the clubroom in 1944. It was
recovered by the treasurer, who came across it in a second-hand shop and
had to lay out 25 shillings to get it back. In the meantime, the
committee, alarmed at the theft, had deposited the valuable McCutcheon
set for safe custody with the bank of NSW. There it lay, "suitably
packaged" in a deed box , for 23 years and came to be forgotten. In 1967
the president, Mr Joseph Matters, chanced upon the bank deposit
receipt and the set was retrieved. It was bought by Mr Matters in the
same year.
When Victoria
played South Australia by telegraph in 1868 the actual rate of paly was
so slow that members had to subscribe "towards liquidating the claim of
the Telegraph Department". And so hourglasses were used 2 years later
for the telegraph match between Victoria and NSW. The chess clock, first
suggested by Blackburne, had not been devised. The first satisfactory
clock - a pair so arranged that when one was going the other was not -
was invented by T.B.Wilson of Manchester and used in the London
tournament of 1883; Fattorini and Son of Bradford began manufacturing
this about 2 years later. As one would expect, the club's records in
1884 mention hourglasses but not clocks. We hear nothing of clocks until
4 years later, when the secretary is instructed to "make enquiries in
the matter of procuring time clocks for match games." By 1898 the club
is paying for clock repairs, so we can say that the first clocks were
bought some time between 1888 and 1889. In 1900 the committee decided to
buy a "new patent clock" evidently known as the "One time chess clock",
but this was found to be not yet on the market. In the following years
a member presented "2 Fattorini chess-timing clocks". By 1904 the club
had 8 chess clocks. But the hourglasses were still there, for in the
same year the club sold one of them for a shilling. When and where the
last of the hourglasses went is not known.
Talk
of clocks leads naturally to lightning games, where the clock really is
master. "Lightning" means in Melbourne 5 minutes each on the clock.
Almost any Friday night for quite some years you will have found a
lightning tournament in progress at the club. Until his death in 1984 at
the age of 81, J.L.Bairstow would be there, watching over things with
his glittering eye, using his strong voice to chide the latecomers,
while generously augmenting the prize fund; he is kindly remembered as a
benefactor and office-bearer. When it is not Friday night the staccato
sound of the clock in the casual lightning game barely breaks in upon
the consciousness until, looking up with idle interest roused by a
crescendo, we see the near empty board, the 2 kings and the white pawn
hurrying forward with his short quick steps; notice the queen held ready
in the left hand for coronation; then sense the fall of white's flag,
and so the draw. We look away, but hear the familiar rattle as the men
pick themselves up and change sides, and the battle lines are drawn for
another game, perhaps the hundred thousandth played on that field. Who
can say? For while the plastic men are new ("common sets", the old
committee men would have said), the chess tables are venerable; they
cannot remember how many contestants they have seen. Tables long outlive
chairs. No player would dream of treating his chair with consideration:
chairs are as much for the relief of tension as for sitting, and suffer
accordingly.
But we
were talking of lightning chess. Tournaments of 5 minute games are an
innovation in a club established before even the sandglasses was an
accepted part of competitive play. The first 5 minute each tournament at
the club was a wartime one, played on 18 February, 1942 and won by a
visitor, Corporal Parkin. Before this, lightning tournaments of a
different kind had been held at the club once a year or so since 1908,
moves being made at the stroke of a bell rung by the timekeeper every 10
seconds. Such a tournament was held as recently as 1948, only 5 seconds
a move being allowed.