Under the Flag of Tata Steel - Wijk aan Zee 2011

Report by Michael Negele

Popular meeting point of chess friends: the Café De Zon
Popular meeting point of chess friends: the Café De Zon

Steel blue hours among KWA friends

Again a quite sizeable group of 14 members of the Ken Whyld Association used the traditional major chess event at Wijk aan Zee – now operating under the name of Tata tournament – for an informal meeting. Thanks to the good preparatory work of Guy Van Habberney, Rob Spaans and Ron Bleeker this time we had a comfortable conference room in the pavilion free of charge at our disposal. For that explicit thanks to the organization. (The spitting distance to the toilets inspired Guy and Tony Gillam to a "KWA toilet-gate", but there was no conspirative affair, more inspirational.) The treasurer of the Max Euwe Centrum, Albert Riemens presented a new donation model to support the MEC which however turned out to be attractive due to tax savings only for Dutch people. Naturally we can only wish our friends at Amsterdam "good luck" with this initiative.

Arrived at Wijk: (from left) Tony Gillam, Guy Van Habberney, Jurgen Stigter, Bert Corneth, Bob van de Velde and Henri Serruys.
Arrived at Wijk: (from left) Tony Gillam, Guy Van Habberney, Jurgen Stigter, Bert Corneth, Bob van de Velde and Henri Serruys.
As already mentioned in our little preview, this time the KWA was above-average present.
As already mentioned in our little preview, this time the KWA was above-average present.

Afterwards our chairman Guy Van Habberney told about the plans for 2011, i.e. the official KWA meetings at Bozen in May and Cleveland in August, as well as the two informal meetings at the house of Klittich in June and November and on the occasion of the book markets at the Amsterdam MEC.
Then a short report was given on the cash audit 2009 and 2010 performed in the morning in the house of Bert Corneth, as well as on the budget 2011.

Michael Negele with the Tata advertising car
Michael Negele with the Tata advertising car

For the first time I was "on trial" as treasurer, I thank Bert Corneth, Henri Serruys and of course my predecessor Guy Van Habberney for the complaisant confidence. The financial cushion of the KWA is considerable, you will soon find the corresponding information in the member section.
The currently already realized change of the account from the Netherlands to the Targobank in Germany was announced as well. [> KWA Club Account]

Then we discussed in detail our intended book projects, the redesign of our web site which is "gotten long in the tooth", and the new start of the database project. After all eight book projects for 2011 and 2012 are on the financing list, the first – volume 2 of the bibliography of the Yugoslavian chess literature by Prof. Dušan Drajić – is already "in print".
Advance orders by paying in the expenses (including postage) of 12 EUR / 15 US$ are explicitly desired. [Yugoslavian Bibliography II]

What would such a meeting be without a little bartering of books where especially our new member Leo Hovestadt excelled as a "good customer" of mine.

In the end I presented quite extensively my finds about Antonius van der Linde which I had made in the Hessian Regional Library at Wiesbaden in his estate kept there. (Van der Linde was director of that library from May 1876 to March 1895.) Now hope remains that one of my Dutch friends delivers the "key" to the source of Van der Linde’s wealth.

Leo Hovestadt receives a copy of the Yugoslavian Bibliography at his "KWA debut".
Leo Hovestadt receives a copy of the Yugoslavian Bibliography at his "KWA debut".

Thereafter – about 4 pm we moved to the grandmaster tournament whereupon several of us got stuck at the bookstalls in the foyer. All in all the day passed by much too fast, so unfortunately I couldn’t personally welcome the two new members Georges Bertola (Switzerland) and Dirk Jan ten Geuzendam (Netherlands, as editor-in-chief of New in Chess already for years on cordial terms with the KWA).

For 2012 the Tata tournament is already entered in my datebook, certainly it guarantees again some enjoyable "blue hours".

Michael Negele

You will find additional 30 photos in this gallery.

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