Season Starts

It was great to see two new members last night - we offer a warm welcome to Andy and Nick . It was also great to see so many members back again after the summer.

The highlight of the evening was the award of Life Membership to John Cannon in recognition of his sixtieth year as a club member, forty years as Secretary, 13 years as Chairman , his History of Horsham Chess Club (see link on this site) and inestimable other services to make Horsham the successful club it is now.

Characteristically John's first comments were to recognise the excellent efforts of Julie Denning :

"As some of you are aware, Julie Denning recently concluded a 3-year term as
Southern Counties Chess Union President, having previously been Vice-President.
Julie also holds a number of other administrative chess posts. For the Sussex
County Chess Association, she has been Delegate to the SCCU Council for 8 years
and to the English Chess Federation Council for 7 years and is the Sussex County
Grader (which significantly includes the Mid-Sussex League and involves a huge
amount of work). Julie also represents the MSL on the ECF Council and is a former
MSL Fixtures Secretary and Web Editor.
On the national stage, Julie has served as a Non-Executive Director on the Board of
the English Chess Federation for the past 3 years and her current 3-year term will
finish at the AGM in October 2020.
I would like to congratulate Julie and thank her for this vast amount of dedicated
service to the chess community and point out that her sterling efforts have
undoubtedly reflected well on Horsham Chess Club and will continue to do so."