Chess is a global game, enjoyed by millions around the world. For much of the 20th Century the nucleus of chess was the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. But now a new chess capital of the world is emerging - the American Midwest city of St Louis.
Over the past couple of years, St Louis has been in the news for all the wrong reasons. In August 2014, a white policeman shot dead a black teenager, Michael Brown, in the northern suburb of Ferguson. The riots that followed received global coverage. Here was a story about one of the most violent cities in the country, a story of racial segregation. But chess is an unusual game in that it transcends race, in a way few things in America do. "Chess has exploded in the black communities here," says Ashley.
The city's mayor, Francis Slay, wants to rebrand St Louis. If the world knows about St Louis for its black-white tension, he'd rather it was celebrated for its black and white squares. "It's a great cultural attraction. By itself it's not going to change our image. But it adds to the mix of things that make our city unique," he says.
Around St Louis there is now an extraordinary clustering of chess activity. Three local universities offer chess scholarships, covering the tuition fees of top players. They include Webster University, which houses SPICE, the Susan Polgar Institute for Chess Excellence. Brainy Spice herself, Susan Polgar, was the first woman in history to earn the grandmaster title by successfully competing in chess tournaments. She's built a college team at Webster that would trounce almost every national chess team in the world.
And chess is not just funded at university level. It's been introduced in after-school classes in more than 100 local schools, including all the schools in the Ferguson-Florissant School District, where the riots took place.
From the World Chess Hall of Fame and Museum.... to becoming the new home to international Grandmasters.......to chess pocket parks popping up throughout metro St. Louis..... to the St. Louis "chess campus" in the Central West End with its state-of-the-art television studio to broadcast live tournaments and chess-themed restaurant, St. Louis has literally gone mad over the game of chess.
Even the St. Louis Cardinals have chess tables in their locker room.
The world's first African-American Grandmaster, Maurice Ashley (a native New Yorker by way of Jamaica) visits St. Louis often.
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Debating some people on the Internet is like debating dead people - it makes you look crazy so why bother? #BYE
Nothing bad ever came from learning Chess, I can see only positives for the city of this cultural trend becomes deeply embedded rather than just being a short-lived fad.
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