"September 1955. The dying embers of one era, the dawning of another. It's been five months since Sir Winston Churchill retired as prime minister. In another four Elvis Presley will release Heartbreak Hotel, his first worldwide hit. Food rationing is over. Frozen fish fingers, courtesy of Clarence Birdseye, have just arrived. Change is also in the air at the Manchester Guardian."
"On 8 September a young chess master from Croydon, Leonard Barden, writes his first column. His subject is a Russian teenager, Boris Spassky, whose games, Barden notes, all show the controlled aggression characteristic of a great master. The writing is lively and accessible. The judgment impeccable. Spassky will go on to become world champion. Meanwhile, Barden is on the foothills of a journey that, 70 years, 14 prime ministers, and nearly 4,000 articles later, is still going strong."
Leonard Barden began a weekly chess column in September 1955 at the Manchester Guardian, profiling rising talents such as Boris Spassky. He wrote consistently for seventy years without missing a week, producing nearly 4,000 articles and surpassing Jim Walsh to set a Guinness World Record for the longest-running continuous chess column. Barden turned 96 and also holds the record as the longest-serving daily newspaper columnist after a 63-year run with the Evening Standard that ended in 2020. He was British chess champion in 1954, represented England in four Olympiads, and played a central role in the British chess renaissance of the 1970s and 1980s.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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