Description:International chess master, Mr Harry Golombek, makes a move in his display at Stafford’s Earl Street Institute, when he played simultaneously 30 opponents from the Stafford and English Electric Chess Clubs, winning 24 games, drawing three and losing three. The local players did very well to win three and draw three of the games. Winning members were Mr N G Dowell, Mr J Fludzinski and Mr R M Nickels. The three who drew their games were Mr R J Daly, Mr J A Grant and Mr S Kelly.
Mr Golombek was British chess champion in 1947, 1949 and 1955. He represented England in several Chess Olympiads including in Helsinki 1952, Amsterdam 1954, Moscow 1956, Munich 1958, Leipzig 1960 and Varna in 1962. He was appointed an international judge of the ruling body of the chess world. At the outbreak of the Second World War he was recruited into Bletchley Park, the wartime codebreaking centre, where he worked in two sections, one of which was responsible for solving the Enigma encryption machine used by the Germans to transmit coded messages Later in 1966 he was awarded an OBE.
This photograph was published in the Staffordshire Newsletter on Saturday 26 March 1955. Reproduced by kind permission of the Staffordshire Newsletter who retain copyright.