Thirtieth anniversary booklet
By Andrew Medworth
Here you can see images of a booklet produced for Hendon Chess Club’s thirtieth anniversary in 1977. Many thanks to Michael Bennett for the photographs!
For more about this period in the club’s history, see this interview with Michael.
For those who may struggle to read the images, the introductory letter by the chairman, W. Gluckman, reads as follows:
On the momentous occasion of the 30th Anniversary of the founding of Hendon Chess Club, I should like to send greetings to all our members and friends, both past and present.
From small beginnings of meetings held above a public house in Brent Street, Hendon, to our present position of one of the foremost Chess Clubs in both London and Middlesex, we have indeed come a long way. Our first team playing in the London Chess League has gradually gained honours and promotion to a very elevated position in its premier division, and our second team is doing very nicely too.
This success would not have been possible without the devoted help of a small number of members, and we should always be grateful to them.
Unfortunately, however, the club has been badly hit financially by the rising inflation in the country, and we have spent a year living from hand to mouth, trying to save the club from having to close down through lack of funds. We are not a profit making organisation, but at the moment it is difficult finding the funds to pay our way.
However, a large percentage of our club today consists of younger members, and we all look to them to work with us for the future of the club. The old maxim that you can only take out what you are prepared to put in, surely holds good for our club.
This year has seen the initiation of the Eumig Chess Scholarship, whereby the best chess players from the various local schools will be sponsored for a year’s free membership by the photographic equipment firm, Eumig UK Ltd., to whom we give our grateful thanks. This is the first Chess Scholarship of its kind in Great Britain, and it is particularly appropriate that we are able to celebrate our 30th Anniversary by making chess history in this way. The aim of the scheme is to encourage younger players, and help them develop their ability at chess, and we shall all be looking out for their names in years to come, among the leading players of this country!
We hope that the Chess Scholarship may become an annual event, giving assistance and opportunity to many generations of chess players.
W. Gluckman
Club Chairman.
There is also an article by Ken Davies, who was the Hendon London League captain for many years. The article has a game in descriptive notation, which I reproduce in full here (with my own comments):
