Nineteen Twenty Seven
In the year 1927, two of the greatest chess players of all time faced off in an epic battle. The reigning champion, Jose Raul Capablanca, was up against the determined challenger, Alexander Alekhine, who was vying for the coveted title of World Chess Champion. But 1927 was not just about this clash of titans. That year was chock-full of events and tournaments that helped shape modern chess as we know it.
In this blog, we'll dive deep into the events and tournaments that made 1927 one of the most significant and exciting chess years ever.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
- Women's World Chess Championship 1927
- World Chess Championship 1927
I'd like to mention three events that took place in this year, that haven't been documented enough for me to devote a section to each of them.
The 1927 USSR Championship
The 1927 USSR Chess Championship was the fifth edition of USSR Chess Championship. It was held from the 26th of September to the 25th of October, 1927. Fedir Bohatyrchuk and Peter Romanovsky were the winners, both with 14.5/21. This event featured a young Mikhail Botvinnik, and Alexander Genevsky. Botvinnik went on to become World Champion for over a decade and Genevsky went on to die in a Nazi air strike (R.I.P)
The First Uruguayan Championship
The Uruguayan Chess Championship is the national chess championship of Uruguay. The first Championship took place in 1927 and was won by José Gabarain.
The First Costa Rican Championship
The yearly national chess championship of Costa Rica is known as the Costa Rican Chess Championship. Played for the first time in 1927, it's first winner was Rómulo Salas.
In the 1924 Paris Olympics, Chess was said to be added to the Olympic Games. Unfortunately, this never happened as it was hard to differentiate between amateur and professional players. This was one of the reasons the international governing body of chess, FIDE was formed. FIDE was formed on the 20th of July and in 1927, they held the first official Chess Olympiad.
The Chess Olympiads are held every two years, with the previous Olympiad happening in 2022. I actually watched the games live (in real life) on the 31st of July and got a chance to see a lot of chess players 
Schedule, Teams, Venue, Format
The first Chess Olympiad was held from July 18th to July 30th, 1927, and consisted of 16 teams. There were 4 players on each team, and some teams had a backup player (in total, there were 70 players). The tournament was a round-robin format and there were 15 rounds played. The tournament was held in the capital city of the United Kingdom, London.
The Hungarians - The Winners
Geza Maroczy had just come back after a long period of retirement. He was born on the 3rd of March 1870 and had success in the early 1900s. From 1908 to 1927, Maroczy worked as an Auditor but after the Communist government was overthrown, he had no other way of making money except Chess. He came back in great form and did extremely well in the Olympiad and had some success throughout the 1930s. In 1950, he was awarded the GM title.
Géza Nagy was born on the 29th of December and was the Hungarian Chess Champion in 1924. He was awarded the IM title in 1950. Árpád Vajda, born on May 2, 1896, was a chess master. He held a Doctorate in Law and State Science and served as the chief of police in Budapest. He was also awarded the IM title. Kornél Havasi was born on January 10th, 1892. He was unfortunately killed Nazis in the Holocaust, just like his other teammate Endre Steiner. Steiner was born on the 27th of July, 1901 and played in 6 Chess Olympiads for Hungary. Havasi and Steiner both died before the concept of a "title" was invented and hence they never received the titles they definitely could've had.
The Games
MAROCZY vs VUKOVIC
Vladimir Vuković was a Croatian chess writer, theoretician, player, arbiter, and journalist. He was born on the 26th of August, 1898.
NAGY vs KOSTIC
Borislav Kostić was a Yugoslav chess grandmaster, born on the 24th of February 1887. He was a popularizer of the game.
VAJDA vs ASZTALOS
Lajos Asztalos was a Hungarian chess International Master, born on the 29th of July, 1889. He was also a professor of languages.
WOLF vs STEINER
Siegfried Reginald Wolf was an Austrian chess master, born on the 19th of December 1867. He had played 3 Chess Olympiads.
HAVASI vs PRYCE MITCHELL
Pryce Mitchell was born on the 9th of April, 1873, and was a former British Amateur Champion. He was very prominent in chess clubs and has won a brilliancy prize for an amazing game he had in 1914.
In 1924, a tournament took place in New York and it consisted of 11 spectacular players. The favourite to win that tournament was, of course, Capablanca. He was the World Champion at the time and was doing extremely well.
Shockingly, Capa only won second place and was 1.5 points behind Lasker, who at that point seemed like a man of the past. Lasker was the former World Champion and his years of prominence seemed like they were over a decade ago. Yet the 56-year-old pulled off the unthinkable and won the event with 16/20. This allegedly led to some banter between Capa and Lasker which resulted in Lasker not responding to the invitation for the sequel, the 1927 event. To invite Capablanca, they'd have to give him an appearance fee, but they did so anyway.
Now, in this moment, 1927, Capablanca needed to find someone to play in the World Championship match. There were many who challenged the Cuban - Alekhine, Nimzowitsch, Reti, Bogoljubov and Maroczy. Capa asked for many things in his search for a challenger and one of them was to play in the New York tournament of 1927. Both Alekhine and Nimzo gladly joined the tournament, while Bogoljubov did not join, and was hence replaced by Rudolf Spielmann, who was more than glad to join.
Frank Marshall, the American Champion, and Dr Milan Vidmar, the foremost European expert in electro-dynamics and chess player, also joined the event.
Note: Now uh... I must contradict myself. Alekhine did not join because Capablanca said that this tournament would act as a qualifier for the WCC. Alekhine playing Capablanca in the World Chess Championship had been fixed months earlier and Alekhine only joined because the organizers assured him that he would be playing Capa in the WCC.
The tournament took place in the city of New York, USA from the 19th of February to the 23rd of March. The prize money was $2,000 (around $35,000 today) for the winner.
Capablanca - The Winner
Jose Raul Capablanca is still considered one of the best Chess players and some even call him the "GOAT" of Chess. It's no surprise he won this event. This tournament is one of Capablanca's best tournaments as he had no losses throughout it.
Capablanca's Brilliant Game:
The above game got Capablanca the "best game" prize.
An international chess tournament was organized by the British Empire Club in London, UK during the autumn of 1927. It was held from October 10th to the 24th and twelve of the strongest chess masters from around the world were invited to take part. On October 9th, a banquet dinner was served to the players at the Empire Club in London where the time control for the tournament was announced. The time control was set at 30 moves in two hours, followed by 15 moves every hour.
The participants included some of the greatest chess players of the time, including Frank James Marshall, Aron Nimzowitsch, Richard Réti, and Savielly Tartakower. Milan Vidmar and Efim Bogoljubov, who were considered two of the best chess masters in Europe, also attended the tournament. The field was completed by Edgar Colle and strong British players and tournament regulars such as William Winter, George Alan Thomas, Victor Berger, Fredrick D. Yates, and William Fairhurst.
The only notable absences were the world champion Jose Raul Capablanca and his rival Alexander Alekhine, who were both in Argentina at the time, competing for the world crown. Aron Nimzowitsch and Savielly Tartakower tied for first place and won the tournament. The prize for the best game of the tournament was awarded to the game between Yates and Nimzowitsch.
The First Women's Chess Championship
The first ever Women's World Chess Championship took place 41 years after the first Men's World Championship. It took place as a side event to the Chess Olympiad originally.
Schedule, Teams, Venue, Format
The Championship was held in London, from the 18th of July to the 30th of July, 1927. There were 12 players in the event - Vera Menchik, Katarina Beskow, Paula Wolf-Kalmar, Edith Holloway, Edith Michell, Edith Charlotte Price, Gisela Harum, Florence Hutchison-Stirling, Marie Jeanne Frigard, Agnes Stevenson, S. Synnevaag and M. Daunke. It was a round robin tournament.
Vera Menchik - The Winner
Vera Menchik, who was born in 1906 in Moscow to English and Czech parents, made her chess debut at the age of 14. After her family relocated to Hastings, England, in 1921, Vera joined the local chess club and started receiving coaching from Géza Maróczy and James Drewitt. In 1925, she defeated the British Women's Championship and established herself as the best female player in the country.
Menchik did not lose once during the tournament. She had one draw and hence scored the high score of 10.5/11. She was 1.5 points ahead of the second placed player, K.Beskow. She became the Women's Chess Championship, and held on to her title till she was killed.
The World's Chess Championship of 1927
As I stated earlier, Capablanca was the reigning Champion and had a lot of requirements for the Challenger. Money was the key factor in deciding who played Capa.
Both Alekhine and Nimzowitsch played the 1927 New York Tournament but Nimzowitsch was poor and the money demanded proved to be extremely high for him (and not only him). Alekhine was able to pay the demanded amount of $180,000 in today's money and was the challenger of the Championship.
Venue, Schedule, Players, Format
The historic 1927 World Chess Championship was scheduled to start on September 16, 1927, in Buenos Aires, the capital city of Argentina.
Both Alekhine and Capablanca are considered Chess players of legendary status and are extremely well-known players. I'll give you a summary of the two.
Alexander Alekhine
Alexander Alekhine was born on the 31st of October, 1892, and was one of the best players of all time. Alekhine's family taught him the game and he was very talented at the game. He was invited to play in the 1914 St. Petersburg tournament and he ended up third place, in a tournament full of leading chess players at the time.
He soon became a renegade in 1920, and he moved to France, where he was very vocal about his hate for the country he was born in. He had many great tournaments in the 1920s and was definitely one of the top five players.
Jose Raul Capablanca
The Cuban-born legend learned the game of chess ate age 4 and was a prodigy. Just before he became 13, he beat the national champion of Cuba. He was one of the best middlegame and endgame players of all time as well.
At one stage of his career, Capablanca lost only one game for ten years. It definitely made him extremely overconfident.
London Rules
The Buenos Aires match was the only one played under the London Rules, which had been agreed upon on 9 August 1922 by Capablanca, Alekhine, Bogoljubow, Maróczy, Réti, Rubinstein, Tartakower.
Capablanca proposed these rules after his win against Lasker in 1921.
- The first player to win the six games would ultimately win the World Championship.
- Playing sessions would be limited to 5 hours:
- The time limit would be 40 moves in two and a half hours.
- The champion must defend his title within one year of receiving a challenge from a recognized chess master.
- The champion would decide the date of the match.
- The highest bid by a challenger would be accepted.
Now it's unknown what would have happened if both the players won 5 games each. The vague and simplistic wording of the rules signed allow for anything to happen.
The First Game
Alekhine shockingly drew first blood! Capablanca was the heavy favorite for this Championship as he had beaten Alekhine in the New York tournament earlier. It definitely looked like Capablanca did not prepare against Alekhine's strong French defense.
Rounds 3 - 31
Capablanca quickly bounced back in the third round and then he went on to win the seventh round as well. After 3 more draws, Alekhine was able to win two games in a row and was in the lead (round 11 and 12 were won). Twelve rounds into the Championship, it was 3-2 for Alekhine. 8 quiet draws later, Alekhine won again (round 21) and he looked like he was going to win the Championship easily.
However, a significant shift occurred, and it appeared as though Capablanca could still win the Championship. Alekhine suffered greatly in rounds 28, 30, and 31, but his outstanding defense saved him. In the 29th round, Alekhine was absolutely destroyed by Capa with the Queen's Gambit.
Round 32
After suffering this defeat, Capablanca lost his motivation and drew the next game as white in just 18 moves. He probably knew that Alekhine was better than him (at least at the time) and he would lose the event. He tried very hard to win in round 34, but all was in vain and he lost this game as well. Alekhine did it. He won the World Chess Championship, 6-3.
Legacy
The Club Argentino de Ajedrez in Buenos Aires has preserved numerous photos and scoresheets from the 1927 World Chess Championship.
Find more of them here: Article by Edward Winter
The End of the Blog
Originally, this was @AstroTheoretical_Physics's idea, but as he had more interesting things to write, he allowed me to make a blog on the topic if I wanted to. Credit to Edward Winter, Wikipedia, chessgames.com and Chess.com.
Thanks for reading my posts and have a great day!
