Champions of chess to share their passion
Couple hope to launch scholastic, club program
By Steve Young
syoung@argusleader.com
PUBLISHED: January 5, 2008
A pair of chess grandmasters have landed on Sioux Falls’ doorstep, hoping to transform the chess-playing landscape in this region with their arrival.
Alex Yermolinsky, a two-time United States champion, and his wife, Camilla Baginskaite, the U.S. women’s champion in 2000, arrived in the community a month ago.
Their ambition is to develop the largest scholastic chess program in the Midwest, taking the game into every school and youth organization in the area that they can.
They will be introduced Sunday at a free chess expo and clinic at 2 p.m. at the Sioux Falls Public Library, 201 N. Main Ave.
The couple and their two children – Eddie, 9, and Greta, 4 – came from San Francisco, where Yermolinsky was “Grandmaster in Residence” at the Mechanics’ Institute for eight years before he and the club had a parting of ways this year.
Having visited Sioux Falls for past Governor’s Cup chess tournaments, Yermolinsky and Baginskaite were encouraged by area chess enthusiasts to relocate to South Dakota.
They always liked the area when they visited, Yermolinsky, 49, said. And they liked the school system as well.
“Obviously, there are places where chess is more popular than Sioux Falls,” Yermolinsky said. “But I wanted to apply my talents someplace that didn’t have many chess players. I thought maybe I could do a better job starting from scratch. It probably would be more challenging and interesting.”
The challenge now will be trying to develop the kind of chess program that can provide a living in this area, Yermolinsky said.
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Good luck to them. But Yermo needs to chill a little if he wants things to work out.
I hope it works! If the USCF could encourage others among the chess elite to locate themselves as chess promoters and teachers in this country’s many chess-poor regions it would make a HUGE difference!!
A factor in my own chess inactivity is the lack of USCF events within a reasonable distance. The NEAREST USCF tournaments within my own state have been over 200 miles away for the past several years!
I’m considering bringing up a proposal later this year (when the Montana Open finally comes within 150 miles of my location) that Montana cede from the USCF.
I noted the Sioux Falls story a bit earlier when I visited the web sites of Montana’s neighboring USCF affiliates. Unfortunately Sioux Falls is still too distant for myself to show up at tomorrow’s event. Nevertheless, I sincerely hope it’s a HUGE SUCCESS!!
Best of luck to Yermo!