| Corey Brown |
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| By Joel Benjamin | |
| March 18, 2007 | |
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Dear Mr. Benjamin,
In light of the recently concluded Black History Month, it occurred to me that Maurice Ashley should be honored by the World Chess Hall of Fame. 1. He is the first African-American Grandmaster of Chess. 2. He has taught chess to many students in NYC. 3. He helped organize a big chess tournament. What will it take? If you don't have an answer, I wonder if the people at the World Chess Hall of Fame and Museum have an answer. Respectfully, Corey Brown Another question is whether Maurice should be inducted into the U.S. Hall of Fame (the wing for American players and chess personages). For that, points 2 and 3 are not all that relevant - lots of people have done those things. But becoming the first African-American grandmaster is a truly significant achievement. It does create a compelling argument, and I would not be surprised to see Maurice enshrined someday. The USCF Hall of Fame Committee (which I briefly served on) used to nominate and vote on candidates; currently the Hall of Fame Museum nominates candidates themselves for the committee to vote on. The tradition has been to honor people with relatively long records of chess service. While I don't think you should have to be "old" to get in, I think the policy makes a fair bit of sense. While I wouldn't object to Maurice's induction, he wouldn't be first on my list. The Hall waited far too long to honor Walter Browne, and finally got to Yasser Seirawan last year. [Though his induction ceremony occurred last May at the Olympiad, he is curiously not listed on the website] I think it is high time the U.S. chess community recognized the achievements of Larry Christiansen. Larry was the first player to become a GM (in 1977) without first garnering the IM title. He has won three U.S. Championships and played on numerous national teams. That's where I would go next.
Joel Benjamin
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