Monday, July 21, 2008

Notable July chess activities in Canada

The Canadian Youth Chess Championships were just completed in Québec.

The Canadian Open Chess Championship is being hosted in Montréal from July 19 to July 27. The weblink at the FQE can be found over here. The only Manitoban I could find listed was Weixi Liu, in the under 2000 Section, although perhaps it is worth noting that former Manitoban Jack Yoos is playing in the Open Section against the big boys. The ChessTalk Discussion Board is reporting the results and pairings on a regular basis over here and here in English, and over here in French. MonRoi is also posting live games, results, and so on ... although I cannot vouch for a good connection and timely updates. Viewers need to set up an account, and some people have been having problems, but I think it should work fine. Here is a link to Monroi.

At the same time, the Chess Federation of Canada is having its Annual General Meeting from July 21 to July 22 (today and tomorrow) . Given recent events, tournament chess players in this country would be wise to follow the results of this meeting carefully. There will be, no doubt, sharp discussion on the respective boards. Here is a link to the CFC website.

NEWS FLASH: Larry Bevand of Chess and Math has noted the following for today's part of the meeting:

About 20 people present (which is a good turnout for this kind of thing). People present included former CFC President Maurice Smith (who chaired the meeting), Ken MacDonald who was the secretary for the occasion, Former CFC President Les Bunning and the Prez to be David Lavin.

The grass routes motion presented by Bob Armstrong and gang was declared out of order by the chair...it is expected to resurface tomorrow. There was heated discussion about the team captain for the women's team.

The FQSE is no longer the Quebec affiliate for the CFC.

Otherwise, the reports were read and the whole thing came to an end early (around noonish) which is a first! The incoming board meets tomorrow beginning at 9 am.
Bevand noted that "
I was not there so what I am giving you is based on what I was told."

Friday, July 18, 2008

Exclam! will be preserved in the Manitoba Legislative Library

J. Ken MacDonald, with some help from a few friendly Manitobans, has done the work to bring together a complete collection of Exclam! (and its previous incarnation). The latest news has Ken arranging to preserve the entire collection in the publicly accessible Manitoba Legislative Library.

The Library website is over here.

Here's what Ken wrote in ChessTalk:

My thanks to our friends in Winnipeg who helped me complete my run of this fine publication.

I have found someone who wants to accept/preserve the complete run of this publication. Matthew Handscombe has told me they will become a part of the Manitoba Legislative Library. They will rest among the largest collection of Manitoba newspapers in the world.

They have just been sent to him, but eventually will be found at:

http://www.gov.mb.ca/chc/leg-lib/index.html

If anyone could help me determine where Quebec or British Columbia chess newsletters might or might not be maintained, I would try them next.



Well done, Ken!