“Clogs and Plungers”
The unhappy story of the Denver Chess Club
by Pete Short
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I have played chess off and on in Colorado since 1998. In fact, I have played in 88 Colorado Rated Tournaments in that time and 72 of those tournaments have been played on Tuesday Nights at the Denver Chess Club. Since most of the 72 DCC Tuesday Night Tourneys lasted over the course of 4 or 5 Tuesdays in a month and recently I have not been able to play in all games, lets say that my “experience” spans over 208 Tuesdays or 4 solid years of Tuesday Nights. To be fair, I often exaggerate and sometimes I am not so good at Math. So whether I have spent 3 or 5 years of Tuesdays playing chess at the Denver Chess Club in its various locations, I will respectively submit, I have the bona fides to tell a few tales, spin a few yarns, and share some rather interesting observations during that time.
In real estate, the three most important things are Location, Location, and Location. Bobby Fischer was the first outspoken proponent that playing conditions in chess must be improved. Since I play with headphones, and according Shannon Fox, have an apparent undiagnosed case of Tourettes Syndrome (I rock back and forth in my chair almost as much as Randy Schine and sometimes vocalize over the music with draw offers and post game analysis), my only real wish is something Ernest Hemingway titled in one of his 1926 short stories – “A clean, well lighted place” to play chess. Let’s start there with my miniature tome on the Denver Chess Club.
On a bright note, we have yet to play in a Greyhound Bus Terminal. Wait, most bus terminals are well lit. The first location of the Denver Chess Club I played chess at in June 1998 was a miserable Denver Public Schools remedial education center called PS1 on Bannock Street. My mental health advisor and longtime friend, Shannon Fox, drug me there and everything about the place was horrible. Poor lighting, a hearing impaired tournament director (Martin Kelly) who bellowed, and the bathroom (a common theme you are about to read about) had been frequented prior to the tournament by a parade of little boys who obviously made wagers on who could drench the pipe work near the ceiling and on the floors in lieu of the porcelain. The smell from the “boys” room was not appreciably better from the tournament area. A win, two draws, and a loss later I took my first sabbatical from the Denver Chess Club. In fact, the experience kept me away from any tournament chess for almost 4 years.
A lot happened in the World between June 1998 and February 2002. One of the apparent good things was the closure and ultimate bulldozing of PS1. Well, like a “recovered” alcoholic who backslides, I found myself at the chess board again and that meant going to the new Denver Chess Club on Bannock Street at the VFW located, you guessed it, in the building right next to PS1. Thus began a period of apparent harmony. Once you looked past the haggard drunks on the smoke filled first floor that comprised of a bar and made it to the second floor, there was a large, well lighted dance hall-like playing room with nice folding tables and chairs. And more importantly, lots of windows to look out constantly to ensure your car was not being broken into.
VFW Post 1 Bannock Ave Denver
It was a Renaissance in Denver Chess with notable players in attendance like IM Mike “Boots” Valvo, Andy “Attention to Detail” Rea, Imre Barlay, James McCarty, Mikhail and Philip Ponomarev, and Brian Wall. An entire crop of wunderkind like Tyler Hughes, Josh Suresh, Mitesh Shridhar, Amarjin “Parmesan” Nemekhbayer, Ted Doykos, Jesse “Little Fester” Hester, the Herbst brothers, and the Derbyshire clan. The club was well managed with the diligence of club manager LaMoyne Splichal and weekend tournaments of substance were organized by DCC President JC MacNeil and his sidekick VP Paul Grimm. Of course there were plenty of non-notable notables there as well in addition to a strong stable of class players for whom I do not have room to call out. But as an example of the non-notable notables, I will point your attention to the Wilhite Brothers (who after every loss in which they played 1. h3 informed you that “You got lucky”) and Wayne Trapp (who ran out with the money that was given to him to create the first DCC Webpage).
But what made it great for me was the number of my Raytheon co-workers who were normally in attendance – John D. Mitchell, Don Romano, Tim Brennan, Francisco Baltier, Robert Bechman, and Shannon Fox. I could look past the controversy of expelling Philip Ponomarev for fighting (which ultimately led to the resignation of the entire Executive Office), the hand generated pairings, the months it took for ratings to appear on my USCF ratings page, Election Tuesdays where games did not commence until the polls closed at the VFW Precinct, and the jackass who managed the VFW who was constantly leering at the chess players from behind the bar.
But all good things must come to an end and for the Denver Chess Club; it manifested itself with “Toilet Gate 2003”. You got it, a clogged toilet in the VFW, attributed to a Denver Chess Club Player, and we found ourselves out on the street. News Trucks and Reporters summoned by yours truly to put public pressure on the VFW only bought us one more Tuesday Night and then we were without a place to play. As my great friend Tim Brennan reminded me, before we left that night I scribbled a rather unflattering note to the VFW “Jackass” Manager on a bar napkin and slid it under his office door. My apologies to Andy Rea for having to bear his subsequent rage (Note to self: check statute of limitations in Colorado Codes).
You might think that with the loss of the VFW, the DCC would find a better place to play chess than above a smoky bar. No chance, thanks to the dedicated and well intended Joe Haines, we found ourselves playing chess in the “Camp Fire Girls” cabin in the woods off Sheraton. You got it – our new home was cold in the winter and sweltering in the summer – and did I mention – only one toilet that was shared by everyone. But even quaint cabins in the woods are short lived as a place to play chess as Joe Haines watched the non-profit he directed tank and the cabin sold off in auction. Not only did we lose membership in our move from the VFW, but we suffered the same privations of the pioneers just to be booted off our chess site like the Native Americans lost their ancestral lands to suffer yet another indignity.
“And an angel on high provided a holy place…” And that place was a stuffy church basement with terrible lighting. The kind of lighting where chess players actually played under utility lamps on stands when they could be found and one desk lamp someone actually brought with him to discern the colors of the squares. I could recount stories of woe from our tenure at this church, but our stay was short lived and fortunately we were asked to leave despite the constant warnings by our new DCC President Joe Haines not to resort to violence during game play and not clog the toilet. You might think I am exaggerating that prior to the pairings each week an announcement was deemed necessary for chess players not to pummel each other and practice good bathroom etiquette , after all I warned you I can spin a yarn. Sorry, the truth often eclipses fiction as the most interesting and the most appalling.
Not to sound redundant, we went to yet another Church and our current playing location on 1st Street. After you negotiate a treacherously narrow set of stairs you arrive at the subterranean playing area affectionately known as the “crypt” and the “basement bomb shelter”. I grow tired of the continuing theme, but at least since May 2009, there has been a plunger sitting in the lone urinal with a sign long ago faded into obscurity that reads – “Do Not Use” (see photo below – click to enlarge). It’s a shame that JC was a carpenter, the DCC pays $350 per month to play there and “God’s Disciples” can’t spring for plumber. Well, the bright side is we have not been kicked out, evicted for auction, or asked to leave. We have to leave because membership, which once soared in the 50’s and 60’s each week, has dwindled to the low 20’s and we can’t afford the $350 per month (despite what could cost a player around $32-$40 a month to play).
Clog and Plunger Photo taken at Denver Chess Club Dec 29, 2009
“Well Pete, perhaps this is finally the chance for the DCC to find a decent place to play?”, you might ask. Perhaps that clean, well lighted place you spoke of earlier. A place where they have abundant urinals and working toilets that are clean and perhaps they even put in those “aroma” disks to keep the smell down. Well Sir/Ma’am, if you liken this to the International House of Pancakes, the IHOP as I like to say, you may be on to something. Unlike “Houses of the Lord”, the IHOP has offered their community room for free with the implied hope that before or after you play you will gorge yourself on blueberry pancakes – those same blueberry pancakes that Fabienne in Pulp Fiction was not able to find while Butch retrieved his father’s watch that Captain Koons kept in the only place where the Gooks in the “Hanoi Hilton” would not find it – up his ass. I digress. Unless someone in Denver steps up and actually finds a University (of which there are several in Denver and where countless chess clubs across the country play), a community center (Like the Jewish Community Center that the Tucson Chess Club meets in every week), or another cabin in the woods (anyone know of a non-profit in dire straights?), we’ll all be pushing wood across syrup streaked vinyl boards at the IHOP off Colorado Blvd.
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