State chess champions… all states, all years

by admin on November 15, 2012

Last night I started looking online for lists of all the state chess champions in the U.S. since the beginning of time (or since 1878, when the New York State Championship was first held). It will probably surprise no one to hear that the information is scattered and incomplete. History is forever incomplete!

Nevertheless, a remarkable number of state chess organizations keep extremely good records of their past state champions. I counted 37 states that have what appear to be essentially complete records. Possibly a few champions remain unknown from the earliest days of organized chess in those states, but it would take serious historical research and some luck to find out who they were.

That leaves 14 states with records that are either absent or seriously incomplete. And they are not, for the most part, the ones you would expect.

STATES WITH MISSING OR INCOMPLETE STATE CHAMPION DATA

  • New York (!!). That’s right, the state with the oldest championship of all, including past winners like Jose Raul Capablanca, Carlos Torre, Larry Evans, Arnold Denker, and Reuben Fine, does not appear to have an official record on its website. The best thing I could find was a list of champions from 1878 to 1972 on the website of an individual called The Colonel. We owe him a debt of gratitude, but where are the champions since 1972? Why doesn’t the New York State Chess Association keep track?
  • Connecticut
  • Rhode Island
  • Vermont
  • Georgia
  • Pennsylvania
  • Ohio
  • Michigan (incomplete)
  • Mississippi (incomplete)
  • Minnesota
  • Missouri (incomplete)
  • Montana (incomplete)
  • Alaska
  • Northern California (!!). The state where I live! By burrowing through past issues of the CalChess newsletter I found a list of winners from 2002 to 2010, but that must be incomplete. I participated in some CalChess championships before 2002. The Southern California Chess Federation provides some interesting back story: California split into two “chess states” in 1977. Before then, “The failure of the state-wide organization to conduct championships for several years… provided one of the reasons for the formation of the SCCF.” Maybe it took northern California a while to get its act together… but surely somebody must know what happened between 1977 and 2002. Enlighten us!

For the delinquent states, it should be possible at least to piece together the recent years fairly easily. The US Chess Federation publishes a yearbook every April that lists the officially recognized state champions. I don’t know quite how far back these yearbooks go, but I would guess at least 20 years. Unfortunately, I sold my Chess Life collection several years ago, so my collection goes back only to 2006.

Also, it’s conceivable that for some of these states I missed or overlooked the list of champions. I put forth a reasonable effort for each state — both by doing a Google search and by browsing through the state federation’s website if the Google search didn’t turn up a hit. But I didn’t want to spend hours on any individual state.

Anyway, let me put out an open request: If anyone from the above 14 states has a complete or near-complete record of the state champions, or knows where I can find one on the Internet, please let me know!

Now, you might be wondering… Why do I want this information? Well, a few months ago Dennis Monokroussos [Nevada, 1984, 1985, 1986; Indiana, 2009] started doing a series of ChessLectures about each of the former World Champions. That’s cool, I thought, but it’s been done before. A lot. A fellow named Garry Kasparov, whom you might have heard of, even wrote a few books on that subject called My Great Predecessors.

But a series of lectures on great state champions… Now there’s something that I don’t think anybody has thought of before! And it’s a topic that is closer to my own capabilities. Being a former state champion myself [North Carolina, 1985 and 1987], I could even call it “My Great Predecessors.”

So my idea is to take one champion from each state — probably someone who won several times and has plenty of games available online — and study ten or so of their games to get an idea of their style, then select one game to lecture on. If I can do that for all 51 chess states, that will keep me busy doing ChessLectures for a long time …

My prototypical example would be John Curdo, the 17-time state champion of Massachusetts, who has been a beast on the regional chess scene since forever but somehow never became as big a force on the national or international level. But I haven’t chosen any others yet. Does anyone have any other nominations?

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

{ 39 comments… read them below or add one }

splitleaf November 16, 2012 at 2:17 pm

What a wonderful idea!
A nasty gap in our history indeed, I hope someone responds with some leads. Was able to find out some Sacramento champions for the gap years you listed through this page (http://ecs.csus.edu/~gordonvs/chess/sac.html) so you would think there would be something. Can you possibly provide a list of the Nor Cal champs we do know about? Am excited to see who your home pic is, and look forward to the series! Best of luck! 😀

ps Am sure you’re familiar with the chessdryad page and have probably seen the HF page there already but here it just in case, some of these folks could perhaps be contacts to further resources (well, less then half of them are still alive but its an idea anyway, even if it is a bad one XD).
http://www.chessdryad.com/articles/fame/index.htm

Reply

admin November 16, 2012 at 3:17 pm

Hi splitleaf,

Thanks for the links. It certainly seems as if John Donaldson should know where I could get the information on Northern California champions. Maybe he even has it.

The CalChess state champions who were listed in the California Chess Journal were:

2010 – Jesse Kraai
2009 – Sam Shankland
2008 – Sam Shankland
2007 – Josh Friedel
2006 – Josh Friedel
2005 – Alex Yermolinsky
2004 – Vladimir Mezentsev
2003 – Dmitry Zilberstein
2002 – Ricardo de Guzman

The USCF website is strangely incomplete for the CalChess Labor Day Tournament (which is the state championship for northern California). It has crosstables for 2012 (winners: Ray Kaufman, Dharim Bacus), 2002-2007, 1992, 1994, 1995, and 1997. The tournament must have had a different name in the other years. At least this proves the tournament did exist before 2002. I do think that there was one year since 1996 (when I moved here) when the tournament was not held, but I’m not sure which year.

Reply

splitleaf November 16, 2012 at 5:29 pm

That is strange. Good to know, thank you and thanks for the list (those Josh Friedel years reminded me of the great season S.F had in 2006, go Mechanics!). Again, best wishes on the new project, hope you have lots of fun with it. 😀

Reply

Robin J. Grochowski November 20, 2012 at 9:11 am

I would like to submit William (Bill) Williams from Wisconsin. I believe he is a five time champion. Thanks.

Reply

Ivan February 9, 2013 at 12:21 am

Where would one go to find the oldest tournaments in the US.

The MN Open will be having its 120th edition this year

Thanks

Reply

admin February 9, 2013 at 8:49 am

While I can’t be certain, the New York State Championship appears to be older. It was first held in 1878 and it has skipped a few years since then (most recently 1944, a war year), but even so I think it has been held at least 130 times.

The reason for uncertainty is that the webpage I cited in my post lists only the past champions but doesn’t say how they were determined. So it’s possible that the tournament might have gone through different formats, or even that the champion might have been determined by a match in some years.

Reply

Pam macy May 16, 2013 at 5:40 am

My father (Mark Pence) was a co-champion of the State of Michigan, and I’m trying to find out what year. He is now 89 and I’m putting together a photo album of his chess years, as a surprise when he moves into assisted living since he won’t have the room for his many trophies. Is he in your Michigan records? Or do you have any links of articles about his chess career? Thanks so much for any help you can offer.

Reply

admin May 17, 2013 at 3:47 pm

Can anybody help? Michigan is one of the states with very poor information. On the Michigan Chess website I could only find information about the state champions back to 2007, which is not far at all.

Reply

David Moody June 10, 2013 at 9:08 am

As for Michigan, I’ll pull something together when I get home tonight. There were official champions dating back to 1931, and the list was often printed in Michigan Chess magazine.

Reply

David Moody June 10, 2013 at 6:04 pm

Here is a list of Michigan Champions. The tournament has been held every year since the establishment of the Michigan Chess Association in 1931.

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chesscollection?cid=1026313

As for who to choose for your project, Leon Stolzenberg would be an ideal choice–12 championships over four decades. Unfortunately, very few of his games are available. The same would go for Paul Poschel (five titles) and Eric Torman/Vadim Tsemekhman (five titles). Poschel was in some ways the John Curdo of Michigan, though not nearly as active.

Ben Finegold (seven titles) is another possibility, and there are certainly plenty of his games around. However, I suspect few of them will be from Michigan tournaments, if that’s a criteria for you.

I’m going to work a little more on this list, then send it in to MCA in the hope that it may eventually get on their website.

By the way, Mark Pence is not on this list. He may well have tied for first one year, but lost out on the official title after tiebreaks. I have very few details on the touranments before 1973.

David Moody

Reply

Joe Leahy July 15, 2013 at 2:05 pm

For a Minnesota, look no further than Curt Brasket, 16-time Minnesota State champion, US Junior Champ (1952), North Central Open Champ (1959) and current (although, I believe, inactive) FIDE Master.

http://www.lakefieldstandard.com/Stories/Story.cfm?SID=32644
http://www.chessmaniac.com/index.php/2012/10/26/early-us-junior-champions/
http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1368&dat=19591129&id=8cwwAAAAIBAJ&sjid=hA8EAAAAIBAJ&pg=5740,5087297

I believe that Curt (my father-in-law, full disclosure) has many games available online:

http://www.redhotpawn.com/chess/grandmaster-games/index.php
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessplayer?pid=21473

Reply

Kerry Lawless November 13, 2013 at 3:45 pm

Hi Dana, I’m still working on a complete list. But here’s what I have so far:

1921: Elmer Gruer
1922: Adolf Jay Fink
1923: Stasch Mlotkowski
1926: Elmer Gruer
1927: Elmer Gruer
1928: Adolf Jay Fink
1929: Adolf Jay Fink
1930: Harry Borochow
1931: Harry Borochow
1932: Harry Borochow
1933: Harry Borochow
1934: Harry Borochow
1935: Harry Borochow
1936: Harry Borochow
1937: Harry Borochow
1938: Harry Borochow
1939: Philip Woliston
1945: Adolf Jay Fink and Herman Steiner
1946: Adolf Jay Fink
1948: Jim Cross
1949: George Croy
1950: Ray Martin
1951: Arthur Spiller
1952: Henry Gross and Irving Rivise
1953: IM Herman Steiner
1954: IM Herman Steiner
1955: Cancelled due to Herman Steiner’s passing.
1956: Gilbert Ramirez
1957: Jim Cross
1958: Charles Bagby
1959: Tibor Weinberger
1960: Zoltan Kovacs
1961: Irving Rivise and Tibor Weinberger
1962: William Addison
1963: William Addison
1964: Zoltan Kovacs and Norris Weaver
1965: Don Sutherland
1966: Charles Henin
1967: Walter Browne
1968: David Blohm
1969: Charles Henin
1970_71: Dennis Fritzinger and Charles Henin
1972: Kim Commons
1973: David Strauss

Reply

admin November 14, 2013 at 1:44 am

Fantastic! Thanks, Kerry. For anybody who’s wondering which state this is, we’re talking about California. (In the future, for anyone posting new information to this thread, make sure you identify the state. Thanks!)

Reply

Joe Leahy January 30, 2014 at 1:10 pm

Hi Dana:

I see that you took me up on my suggestion to lecture on Curt Brasket. I told his family and they were pleased to hear it. Sadly, however, Curt passed away last week at age 81.

http://www.startribune.com/obituaries/detail/13999490/?fullname=curt-j-brasket

But his memory — and his chess games — live on!

Joe Leahy

Reply

RI Chess May 6, 2014 at 7:06 am

List of Rhode Island State Chess Champions since 2005:

2005: James Della-Selva
2006: Joseph Acampora
2007: Joseph Acampora
2008: Miro Reverby
2009: David Harris
2010: Benjamin Goldberg
2011: Christoper Gu
2012: Stuart Finney
2013: Christopher Gu
2014: Miro Reverby

Reply

Karl Winters December 7, 2014 at 6:15 am

Here’s a list I found for Missouri.

http://www.geocities.ws/jvoelker/statech.html

My dad opened The Chess House in Kansas City in 1972.
He was once the highest rated player in Missouri.

Reply

David Friedman January 2, 2015 at 11:45 pm

Dana:

I agree with you that it is too bad that so many states do not recognize their former chess champions. I wish that Ohio chess organizations and chess players had a better sense of the state’s rich chess history. I do not have much information about the Ohio Chess Association’s earliest years but here is a link to the list of Ohio Chess Champions that I have been able to assemble thus far based on information from Chess Life, the Ohio Chess Bulletin and the Dayton Chess Club Review:

http://besteversportstalk.blogspot.com/2015/01/history-of-ohio-chess-congress.html

Reply

Carl Boor January 3, 2015 at 8:31 am

Thank you Dana for peeling back the scabs on the ugly truth: Many chess communities in the United States would rather glorify scholastic accomplishments or worship visiting foreign GM/IMs rather than recognize the accomplishments of their dominate master level players.

“Truly I tell you,” he continued, “no prophet is accepted in his hometown.” – Jesus.

Three time Ohio Champ.

Reply

Ed Knox January 21, 2015 at 3:44 am

We are doing research on my wife’s step-father, Raymond Richards. He was said to be a highly rated player in Northern California in the 1950s and/or 1960s. Is there any record of his accomplishments or standing?

Reply

Al Kok March 6, 2015 at 8:28 pm

Some years ago a colleague showed me a web page pointed to my brother as some sort of US Junior Champion. He was indeed a chess maniac, but unfortunately he’s no longer around to ask, and his name. sadly enough, is Bessel Kok (yah, try to search on chess with that!)

He graduated from high school in 1965, and lived in Baltimore, MD. I would appreciate any info on this that i can forward to his children. They were quite young when he died.

Many, many Thanks in advance!

Reply

Robert Cyr January 22, 2016 at 7:55 pm

List of CT Chess Champions from the 1970s to today – Bob Cyr (CSCA Historian) – more to come once data is compiled.

CT State Champions

Regular time control

2015 M Ian Harris
2014 M Gary Shure
2013 M Ian Harris
2012 M Gary Shure
2011 IM Bogdan Vioreanu
2010 M Nelson Castaenda
2009 GM Sergey Kudrin
2008 GM Sergey Kudrin
2007 GM Sergey Kudrin
2006 GM Sergey Kudrin
2005 GM Sergey Kudrin
2004 GM Ildar Ibragimov
2003 M Edward McHugh
2002 GM Ildar Ibragimov
2001 M Rick Bauer
2000 M Rick Bauer
1999 Kerry Leahy and Harris Appelman
1998 Michael Casella
1997 Adnan Kobas
1996 Adnan Kobas
1995 Adnan Kobas
1994 Michael Casella and Richard Bauer
1993 James Bolton
1992 Rick Bauer
1991
1990 Gary Shure
1989 Richard Bauer
1988 Richard Bauer
1987 Ken Plesset
1986 Zoran Lazetich
1985
1984 Richard Bauer
1983 Richard Bauer
1982
1981
1980
1979 Jon Tisdall and Eric Godin
1978 Paul Espinosa
1977 John Stopa
1976 Larry Abrams
1975 Roger Pahl

Reply

Dave Gertler March 14, 2016 at 3:29 pm

Hi Dana,

Dunno if you’re still working on this project / following this thread, but ….

The records on Delaware’s state website go back only to 1991 (two years before I moved here). Since then, I’ve been champ or co-champ 13 times (counting this past weekend); my friendly rival Charlie Bouzoukis has 11 titles in that span. I’m not trying to seek glory, but if you’re still doing this series and would like to include me, I’d be glad to send you games or other info.

-Dave Gertler (big fish in a small state)

Reply

admin March 14, 2016 at 8:57 pm

Hi Dave,
I’m still very interested in getting more complete records of the state champions. So if you know which people won in which years, please send the information. Also, I’d love to see a game or two! However, I must say that I’m not longer doing the series of lectures on state champions at ChessLecture. I finally “retired” from ChessLecture last year, feeling as if I had pretty much said everything I wanted to. However, I’d still be glad to continue by means of blog posts. I’d like to invite you and anybody else who has been a state champion to send one of your favorite games, perhaps one that won you the state championship or that was particularly crucial to winning (e.g. a win in the penultimate round that set you up for first place).

Reply

Dave Gertler March 15, 2016 at 4:20 am

Hi Dana,

Below is a quick copy-and-paste of the Delaware champions list from http://delawarechess.org/tourament-results.htm [sic – the URL does include “tourament”]

If multiple names are listed for a year, they are considered co-champions. In years with no names, the championship was not held.

(One edit I made: Yi Song was listed as “Women’s Champion” for 2006, but in fact she was overall state c0-champion [tied with me]. I wonder how many other women have ever held a state champion title?)

2015 Dave Gertler
Charlie Bouzoukis
2014 Drew Serres
2013 Dave Gertler
2011 Philip Saponaro
2010 Dave Gertler
Charlie Bouzoukis
Prasanna Kannappan
2009 Charlie Bouzoukis
Dave Gertler
2008 Jim Erskine
Philip Saponaro
2007 Charlie Bouzoukis
2006 Dave Gertler
Yi Song
2005 Charlie Bouzoukis
2004 Charlie Bouzoukis
Dave Gertler
Chase Butler
2003 Charlie Bouzoukis
2002 Dave Gertler
2001
2000 Charlie Bouzoukis
1999 Dave Gertler
1998 Charlie Bouzoukis
Dave Gertler
1997 Charlie Bouzoukis
Dave Gertler
1996 Dave Gertler
1995 Dave Gertler
1994
1993 Paul Powell
1992 Jim Erskine
1991 Charlie Bouzoukis

Here’s the decisive last-round game from this past weekend’s championship, in ChessBase format. (The tournament is open to players from other states, and in fact a Maryland master won the tournament, but I was the highest-scoring DE resident and hence the state champ.) My opponent was the 2014 champ. It’s not an exceptional game overall, and the sudden-death (G/90 + 5-second delay) time control led to some hasty decisions, but I like the moves I found to force the final breakthrough (from 29. … Rf3 on) – one of those cases of chess geometry just working out beautifully.

[Event “DE Championship”]
[Date “2016.03.13”]
[White “Serres, Drew”]
[Black “Gertler, David”]
[Result “0-1”]
[WhiteElo “2091”]
[BlackElo “2222”]

1. e4 Nf6 2. Nc3 e5 3. f4 d5 4. fxe5 Nxe4 5. Nf3 Be7 6. Be2 O-O 7. d3 Nxc3
8. bxc3 c5 9. O-O Nc6 10. Bf4 d4 11. Qd2 dxc3 12. Qxc3 Be6 13. Qd2 Qd7 14. Bg5
Rad8 15. Rfe1 Rfe8 16. Bf1 Bd5 17. Bf4 Bxf3 18. gxf3 Qd4+ 19. Be3 Qxe5 20. Bf2 Qh5 21. Bg2 Bf6 22. Rab1 b6 23. Re4 Rxe4 24. fxe4 Be5 25. h3 Rd6 26. a4 h6 27. Rd1 Rg6 28. Kh1 Rf6 29. Bg1 Rf3 30. Re1 Nd4 31. Bxd4 Rxh3+ 32. Kg1 Bxd4+ 33. Kf1 Rh1+ 34. Bxh1 Qxh1+ 35. Ke2 Qh5+ 0-1

Regards,
Dave

Reply

Richard J. Cichelli September 22, 2016 at 10:43 am

Do you have any records of Delaware State Champions in prior years?

I won the Delaware State and Open titles in 1965, 1966 and 1967. I was a member of the Wilmington Chess Club. It met at the YMCA.

I’d like to know if there is any history from those days in your records.

I haven’t played in rated tournaments in decades, but for a while after my active tournament days, I participated in the International Computer Chess Association.

Reply

Richard J. Cichelli April 4, 2017 at 4:38 pm

I checked newspapers.com and found that I should revise the above

“I won the Delaware State and Open titles in 1964, 1965 and 1966.”

I still proudly have my 1964 trophy.

I believe Milton Paul was champion in several prior years So was William (Bill) Bergman.

Reply

Allart Kok October 13, 2016 at 10:51 am

Sorry Richard, I have no records. My brother, unfortunately with the name Bessel Kok, of all the strange coincidences (the chess benefactor by that name might be of relation to a great uncle) was junior chess champ out of Maryland at about the time you played. I have no further information.

Reply

G November 25, 2016 at 9:31 pm

List of New Jersey Champions 1946 – Present
New Jersey State Champions 1946 – Present

1946 S. H. Kowalski
1947 A. Stern and J. Faucher
1948 Joseph A. Faucher
1949
1950 Franklin Howard
1951 Edgar T. McCormick
1952 Edward Baker
1953 Franklin Howard
1954 Pvt. Peretz Z. Miller
1955 Franklin Howard
1956 Lev Blonarovych
1957 Matthew Green
1958 Weaver Adams
1959 Orest Popovych
1960 Walter Shipman
1961 Orest Popovych
1962 Matthew Green
1963 Lev Blonarovych
1964 George M. Kramer
1965 Michael Hailparn
1966 Kenneth Clayton
1967 George M. Kramer
1968 Robert Wachtel
1969 George M. Kramer
1970 Robert Gruchacz
1971 Robert Gruchacz
1972 Edgar T. McCormick
1973 Steve Stoyko
1974 Dr. Leroy Dubeck
1975 Saul Wanetick
1976 Pal Benko
1977 Tyler Cowen
1978 Pal Benko
1979 Stephen Pozarek
1980 Kenneth C. Potts
1981 Robert M. Miller
1982 Dr. Edward Allen
1983 Steve Stoyko
1984 Dr. Edward Allen
1985 Dr. Orest Popovych
1986 Michael Valvo
1987 David Floreen
1988 Steve Stoyko
1989 Max Dlugy
1990 Ron Henley
1991 Aviv Friedman
1992 Anatoly Lein
1993 Anatoly Lein
1994 Anatoly Lein
1995 Anatoly Lein
1996 David Levin
1997 Sherwood “Woody” McCelland
1998 Sherwood “Woody” McCelland
1999 Alexander Stripunsky
2000 Dean Ippolito
2001 Orest Popovych
2002 Dean Ippolito
2003 Albert Kapengut
2004 Todd Lunna, Tom Bartell
2005 Tom Bartell
2006 Evan Ju
2007 Anatoly Volovich
2008 MacKenzie Molnar
2009 Dean Ippolito
2010 Dean Ippolito
2011 Dean Ippolito
2012 Alex Katz
2013 Yaacov Norowitz, David Hua

Reply

Dave Carter December 3, 2016 at 8:35 pm

I am the current Vermont Champion and have all the yeaars most years from 1972 to present except 1976, 1977, 1980 and 1989. Anyone have the Chess Life and Review Yearbook issues for these years? The yearbooks had lists of State champions.

Reply

admin December 4, 2016 at 3:28 pm

Sad thing is I used to have them but I sold them or gave them away (I don’t even remember which).

Anyway, if you feel like posting the almost-complete list, that would be great.

Reply

Dave Gertler December 4, 2016 at 3:39 pm

I still have CL&R / Chess Life for those years, will look up those Vermont champs when I get a chance.

Reply

Dave Gertler December 25, 2016 at 6:38 pm

I just looked through my Chess Life collection. I couldn’t find any yearbooks (either within issues or published separately) for the years 1976, 1977, or 1980. However, I can report that the Vermont co-champions for 1989 were Arnold Dubow and Pavel Overreiper.

Reply

Robert Cyr December 31, 2016 at 6:01 pm

Dear sir or madam:

I have updated the list of Connecticut chess champions. There were a few errors in the initial report. Below is the most current list of winners. I also encourage you to visit the New Britain Chess Club of Connecticut’s (the largest chess organization in CT) website, especially the historical section that I created.

CT State Champions

Regular time control

2016 NM Ian Harris 21 players
2015 NM Ian Harris 16 players
2014 NM Gary Shure 16 players
2013 NM Ian Harris 14 players
2012 NM Gary Shure 22 players
2011 IM Bogdan Vioreanu 26 players
2010 FM Nelson Castaneda 19 players
2009 GM Sergey Kudrin 10 players
2008 GM Sergey Kudrin 21 players
2007 GM Sergey Kudrin 32 players
2006 GM Sergey Kudrin 22 players
2005 GM Sergey Kudrin 37 players
2004 GM Sergey Kudrin 36 players
2003 NM Edward McHugh 11 players
2002 GM Ildar Ibragimov 25 players
2001 FM Richard Bauer 29 players
2000 FM Richard Bauer 18 players
1999 NM Kerry Leahy and NM Harris Appelman
1998 SM Michael Casella
1997 SM Adnan Kobas
1996 NM Adnan Kobas
1995 SM Adnan Kobas
1994 SM Michael Casella (open event)
1994 FM Richard Bauer (closed event)
1993 NM James Bolton (open event)
1993 Robert Milardo (closed event)
1992 FM Richard Bauer
1991 SM Michael Casella
1990 NM Gary Shure
1989 FM Richard Bauer
1988 FM Richard Bauer
1987 NM Ken Plesset
1986
1985 NM Zoran Lazetich
1984 FM Richard Bauer
1983 FM Richard Bauer
1982 William Quandrum
1981
1980
1979 NM Jon Tisdall and NM Eric Godin
1978 NM Paul Espinosa
1977 NM John Stopa
1976 Larry Abrams
1975 Roger Pahl
Quick

2016 Ian Harris
2015 Ted McHugh
1997 John Guzman and Anthony Purpora
1996 Edward McHugh, Kerry Leahy, and John Ellis
1995 Adnan Kobas and Michael Casella
1992 Kenneth Sarner and Hanon Russell

Blitz

2016 Ian Harris
2015 William Torres
2014 Dennis Prawira
2013 Dennis Prawira
2012 Edward McHugh
2011 Harris Appelman
2010 Edward McHugh
2009 Harris Appelman
2008 Edward McHugh
2007 James Nitz
2006
2005
2004 Edward McHugh
2003 Harris Appelman
2002 Gildardo Garcia
2001 Edward McHugh and Harris Appelman
2000 Nelson Castaneda
1999 Kerry Leahy
1998 Michael Casella
1997
1996 Edward McHugh
1995 Edward McHugh
1994 Edward McHugh
1993 Richard Bauer and Kerry Leahy
1992 Richard Bauer and Zimel Livshits
1991 Michael Casella
1990 Michael Casella
1989 Michael Casella
1988 Mihaly Szlovak
1987 Mihaly Szlovak
1986 Eric Godin
1985
1984
1983
1982
1981
1980
1979 Arkadijs Strazdins
1978 Arkadijs Strazdins
1977 Arkadijs Strazdins
1976 Arkadijs Strazdins

Reply

Dave Gertler December 31, 2016 at 7:28 pm

Just as a followup to Robert Cyr’s great list: I’m guessing that the 1982 CT champion who is listed as “William Quandrum” is actually my old friend William Quanrud (a strong expert who was a Yale student at that time).

Reply

Andrew Rea January 21, 2017 at 2:47 pm

re CalChess Labor Day Tournament, almost surely the predecessor is likely to have been the Northern California Open. I spent one year in San Francisco, July 1983 – March 1984, at which time the California Chess Federation divided into two federations. I was in Monterey for not quite a year, 1987, during which time I played Labor Day weekend in the Northern California Open. It is my guess that the champion was IM Cris Ramayrat, but that can stand be researched!

Reply

Kevin Sheldrick February 5, 2017 at 3:35 am

Interesting that u have at least one guy who’s won the state championship 17 times. The record here in Australia for state championships by one person is a for guy named Haydn Barber, who won 15 state championships titles (14 Western Australia & 1 New South Wales).

Reply

David Kuhns March 22, 2017 at 5:14 pm

Minnesota now has a (nearly) complete list of state champions from 1894 to present. I will be posting that shortly.
I see you posted this in 2012, has your list been updated per the posts, and where do I find the list of all states?
New York seems to be the oldest and longest running (1878) and they have an updated list on their site. It looks like they might have a gap at 1904 and 1905.
Thanks for the info!
David Kuhns

Reply

Robert Cyr March 25, 2017 at 7:31 pm

Dear Sir:

The CSCA recently held its annual state chess championship.

The winner was USCF NM Edward McHugh. Forty-one players competed in the two section-tournament.

Reply

Dave Gertler March 26, 2017 at 12:42 am

Dana – Two weekends ago, I won the Delaware championship again (my 14th time). It was an open tournament, and two higher-rated out-of-state players finished ahead of me, but I had the clear top score among DE residents. Despite happening in 2017, this apparently makes me the 2016 champion.

Here’s a crispy little win from the penultimate round:

Darrin Berkley (2035) – David Gertler (2221)

1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4 Bc5 4. Nf3 d6 5. Bb5 Nge7 6. fxe5 dxe5 7. Nxe5 O-O 8.
Nxc6 Nxc6 9. Bxc6 bxc6 10. d3 f5 11. Na4? Bf2+! 12. Kxf2 Qd4+ 13. Ke1 fxe4 14.
Qe2 exd3 15. Be3 (I’ve been playing sharply and well, but here Qh4+ is much
stronger – that move never occurred to me.) Qxa4 16. Qxd3 Be6 17. Qd4 Qa5+ 18.
c3 Qb5 19. b4 Rad8 20. a4 Qf5 21. Qc5 Qd3 22. Bd4 Bg4 0-1

Regards,
Dave

Reply

Cancel reply

Leave a Comment

Previous post:

Next post: