Chess Champs Together, Like It Or Not
BROWNSVILLE, Texas, June 29, 2007
(CBS) At the Texas State Chess Championship, after two days and nearly 200 competitors, it’s now down to the final pairing: young Mr. Mendez and young Mr. Spada, two fourth-graders with a lot in common, CBS News correspondent Steve Hartman reports.
When you ask them questions, the answers might surprise you. My toughest chess competitor is: “Him,” Mendez says. “Him,” Spada says.
When I grow up, I want to be: “A lawyer,” Mendez says. “A lawyer,” Spada says.
My first name is: “Fernando,” they each reply.
I live in: “Brownsville, Texas,” Menendez says. “Brownsville, Texas,” Spada says.
If I couldn’t play chess I would: “Be bored,” Menendez says. “Die!” says Spada.
They’re known on the circuit simply as The Fernandos. The kids have been arch-rivals since kindergarten. Last year they tied as national champs in their age division.
“It’s a huge coincidence,” Spada says. Kind of.
See, even though Brownsville is in the second-poorest county in the nation, it’s actually known for producing chess champs.
“In a lot of areas, chess is considered maybe sort of a nerdish activity, and in Brownsville chess is the cool thing to do,” says Russell Harwood, the Chess Program Director at the University of Texas at Brownsville.
He says it all started in 1989 when a schoolteacher named J.J. Guajardo introduced the game to his classroom as a motivational tool. Within a couple of years, those kids had won state and soon it seemed like every kid in town was into chess.
Here is the full story on CBS TV.
Well done Fernando!