My Personal Project - Byron Morris

My name is Byron Morris and for My Personal Project I decided to build a chess set and create a book on the history of chess and the pieces. The idea was to expand my personal knowledge and teach others the history and interesting facts about chess.

I have been actively involved with the game for more that seven years reaching number three in Australia for my age. In the past 12 months I have been helping with the Thursday afternoon Somerset Chess training. During these sessions I have been given the opportunity to train preparatory and Junior students, which I found I really enjoyed.

It will be a massive help having knowledge about the history of the game and famous people which have played, I’m hopeful that by sharing this knowledge more people will remain involved in chess at Somerset.

The manual part of my project was constructing a chess set. This gave me the opportunity to learn new skills such as sawing, tiling and modelling. My real interest came out of the research for my book. I investigated the evolution of the game since its beginning to current day, its proposed connection with advanced learning and mathematics and the famous people who have played both socially and professionally. For example, did you know that of the 43 presidents of the U.S.A over the last 220 years, 24 of them played and enjoyed chess including George Washington and Barack Obama, or that Albert Einstein use to play regularly.

I believe that as I work with young people teaching chess at school and as a part time job with Gardiner Chess outside of school over the next few years I will enrich their interest with my knowledge.