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The Tale of the Missing Hyde Park Chess Tables

See the update at the end!

November 3, 2002

The Harper Court Chess Affair

by Hadas Friedman and Abbe Friedman

About a year ago the Harper Court Foundation removed all of the chess tables from Harper Court. This was an area where people could come and play chess. The chess tables were free and attracted chess players from all over Hyde Park. These chess enthusiasts were white and black, young and old, highly educated and unemployed. No one was excluded from this -public activity, which was available to the entire community. All you needed was a chess set. Now, Harper Court is just an empty space surrounded by shops, void of any intellectual activity.

Harper court is located just south of 52nd street on Harper Avenue in Hyde Park. It consists of about 20 different shops and restaurants surrounding an empty courtyard. It is an area that provides pedestrian access from 52nd St. to 53 St. In the past, many passers-by would stop for a while to play chess, talk to each other, or simply watch chess matches being played. This is no longer the case.

   One explanation for the removal of the chess tables by the Harper Court Foundation is that the chess tables brought a lot of undesirables to Harper Court. The chess players were supposedly involved in gangs and drug activity. "There is less crime [than before]" said Dr. Wax manager, Randy Young. Margorie Fox , the manager of Plants Alive, agrees, "There are fewer gangs" [because] when there were so many people around, gangs could mingle," she said.
    Some merchants also complained about the behavior of the chess players. "Chess players were rude and insulting to young women," Wheels and Things owner, Richard Padnos, commented. But according to Nancy Stanek, the owner of Toys Et Cetera, "[I've been here for] 27 years and no one has complained about them [to me]."

   The Harper Court Foundation claims that they polled all of the stores in Harper Court to see whether or not they wanted the chess tables to be removed. Some of the store owners told us that they were never asked their opinion about the chess tables. Toys et Cetera, C'est Si Bon!, Calla Lily, and Dixie Kitchen, among others, were not polled.

When asked if they were willing to be interviewed for this story, the Harper Court Foundation did not comply. The first time we tried to interview the management they said they had to leave the office and had no time. We then tried to get a telephone interview. They told us that the decision was made on private property, so they weren't giving interviews. "We polled the stores," they said, yet a number of the stores said they weren't polled. We gave the Harper Court Foundation one more chance to talk to us. They said that they couldn't comment on the matter. We passed by the Foundation two other times to get interviews but both times the door was locked, even though we were there during their office hours.

Originally there were six chess tables in Harper court. After a while, the Harper court Foundation removed four, leaving only two tables for people to play chess. Two of the tables were returned, but not for long. The Harper Court Foundation eventually removed all of the tables. There are a few chess benches on 53rd and Lake Park Street but they are soon to be removed with the construction of the new Borders Books and Music.

When interviewed, Alderman Toni Preckwinkle said that she does not agree with the decision to remove the chess tables. According to Alderman Preckwinkle, when the board of the Harper Court Foundation authorized the removal of the chess tables, she thought it was a terrible idea.

The removal of the chess tables has resulted in a significant loss of business to many of the Harper Court stores. There are a lot fewer people shopping there. "Since the chess tables were taken out, it seems like a ghost town here," said, Larry Anderson, the manager of Copyworks, Ltd. Esperanza, owner of the Mexican restaurant Maravillas, also feels a loss of business. She said that the gentlemen were very nice, that the removal of the chess tables was a bad idea. She has lost lots of customers and said that the problems weren't as bad as some people say. Larry Anderson remarked that there were no robberies before when the chess players were there, but since the tables have been removed there have been four robberies. The chess players provided some security for the area. The more people around, the less opportunity there was for criminal activity.

Toys et Cetera owner Nancy Stanek doesn't recall ever being polled or surveyed by the Foundation. She did not want the chess players to leave. The chess players sometimes bought chessboards from her store and her customers never complained about them "It is unfortunate they left," she said. Hyde Park should be far more concerned about the meters and loosing businesses on 53rd St. than the chess players.

Ray Rogers, the owner of Sunflower Seed Health Foods, took a middle-of-the-road position. He didn't know whether or not the tables should be removed. He hasn't seen any change in his business since then. Mr. Rogers thinks they (the chess tables) were removed because they caused congestion, they became too popular, but now no one is there. His father played chess there and the store even kept a chessboard to lend to those that didn't have one. He doesn't understand the uproar.

Removing the chess tables has apparently increased business over at Wheels and Things run by Richard Padnos. He is glad the tables were removed and even helped in getting rid of them. He claims that the chess players were rude and insulting to young women. He also felt that they prevented people from entering his shop by sitting on the steps.

      Sherman Beck, manager of Art Directions, has no idea whether it was a good thing or bad thing to remove the chessboards because it did not affect his business. However, he says it affected other businesses in a bad way. He thinks that it would be okay if they came back, as long as the players didn't sit on the stairs. Mr. Beck does not remember being polled.

        M. Clark of 'C'est Si Bon!' says that it was a great idea to have the chess players in Harper Court because people were moving around, they had security, and they brought business. It's particularly quiet now. She doesn't remember any criminal activity while the chess players were there and says that she was never polled by the Foundation. The owners of Calla Lily were also not polled by the Foundation.

Randy Young of Dr. Wax said that he had never had complaints about the chess players. The removal of the benches, however, has certainly affected the atmosphere, "it seems like a dead place," he said.

Neither Artisans 21 nor Calypso Café had any comment.

Plants Alive manager, Margorie Fox, said that she    was ambivalent about the chess tables. She thinks there are now fewer gangs, but that the gangs have nothing to do with the chess players. She herself was not polled by the Foundation and has never had any complaints about the chess players.

Jim, manager of Dixie Kitchen, said that he is against [the removal] - "I like chess," he said. He had not heard any complaints while the chess tables were there. People only complained when they were taken away. Jim remarked, "The atmosphere has completely changed; there is distrust in the city - in the Chamber of Commerce.". Dixie Kitchen was not polled for their opinion.

Dr. Wake of the Hyde Park Animal Clinic also says that doesn't remember being polled by the Harper Court Foundation. He didn't think the chess players were rude, they weren't a problem. The removal has not affected his business directly at all but he still feels that the Foundation should put them back. It was a mistake for them to take the chessboards away. Harper Court exists for the community, and the board should know that.

     We also interviewed Tom Fineberg, a retired schoolteacher who now teaches an after-school chess program at the Hyde Park Jewish Community Center. He knows a lot of the chess players and says that they are good and nice people.

US. Chess Federation National Master, Eric Schiller, spent many good years playing chess in Harper Court. He is now an International and World Championship Arbiter in addition to being an International Chess Tournament Organizer and chess teacher. Dr. Schiller, who has written and published over 100 chess books, has strong comments about the board's decision. His basic points are that chess keeps people from getting into trouble in their spare time. It is a good way to let out aggression, and sharp-eyed chess players keep crime down. "The removal of the tables is such utter stupidity that it defies comprehension," he says. It is also important that the tables were a place for students (especially the Caucasians) to exchange ideas with the locals (primarily African-American) and that sort of thing is very important for a mixed community.

-- 
The authors are sixth grade students in the Hyde Park (Chicago) community.

UPDATE!

Chess players' return to a Hyde Park plaza stirs debate about acceptance in a community heralded for its diversity

By Shia Kapos

Special to the Tribune

September 26, 2003

For long stretches, only the sound of Dexter Gordon's saxophone playing on the radio breaks through the red-brick courtyard just beyond 53rd Street in Hyde Park.

A dozen men -- black and white, baby faces and beards, working and homeless -- quietly stand watch over three tables, each occupied by a plastic chess board and two hunched players.

Then there is a whoop and laughter. A game is over and the seats are swapped for a new match.

A year after Harper Court Foundation removed four concrete chess benches from the courtyard, saying players were crude slobs who scared away business, the organization has agreed to allow games to resume in the shopping plaza.

The chess players' return to Harper Court brings back a tradition started more than 30 years ago and has ignited new debate about race and acceptance in a community heralded for its diversity.

For decades, players have gathered at the tree-lined plaza to discuss politics and the world. "All these different people came together every day, and chess was the glue," said Alon Friedman, a Hyde Park resident who doesn't play chess but has become an advocate for the players, even serving as head of the Knight Court Chess Club, which was created to represent them.

"I'm glad to see them back. I like the atmosphere they bring to the court," said Lori Mathews, manager of Toys Et Cetera, one of about a dozen shops that surround the courtyard. "That changed when they left."

A compromise between the foundation, which runs the property owned by the University of Chicago, and the chess players allows games temporarily only on weekends during the daytime and only on tables that can be removed from the courtyard.

In the past few weeks, dozens of men -- with children peering over their shoulders -- have gathered at the outdoor shopping plaza for five-minute or traditional chess played on the fold-up tables that the foundation has agreed to store.

"It's a start," says Tom Fineberg, a retired high school math teacher and longtime chess coach who helped lead the yearlong petition drive to return chess to Harper Court.

He and others hope the games will become a permanent fixture -- right now they are allowed to run through September -- and to have games seven days a week.

But there are some who say that's not likely to happen.

"We'll see how long it lasts," Richard Padnos, owner of Wheels & Things bicycle shop, said about the games going on just a few feet from his shop.

While some businesses in the plaza said the chess playing over the years helped attract customers, a few, like Padnos said the chess players' presence only hurt his business.

Trash and insults

"They were loud, insulting, crude and dirty. You can quote me," he said, explaining that the men hurled garbage around the square and made crude comments to his female customers as they walked by the chess benches to get to his store.

Players acknowledge there was garbage -- from food and beer containers to cigarette butts -- left on the courtyard. Much of it was left by onlookers, they said.

"Once we realized there was a problem we started cleaning it up," said Marvin Dandridge, a 46-year-old Rogers Park resident and a legendary master chess player. "Yeah, there were some chess bums. But mostly they are working folks. I'm a social worker. There are lawyers, stock brokers and architects who come here, too."

As for comments to women, "We were unable to identify a single individual who experienced any crude remarks," Friedman said.

Some players worry that the problem stemmed from stereotyping. "You have a lot of black men, intellectual people, here standing firm on discussions about politics," says Malaah Shaheeq, a 31-year-old South Shore resident who learned to play chess a few years ago. "They are heated debates but they are never violent. I think the debating scared people because they assumed it would become violent."

Business owners say the problems in Harper Court are not about race.

"The neighborhood has just changed," says Rai Rogers, owner of Sunflower Seed Health Foods. "Hyde Park in general isn't what it used to be. There was a time when Hyde Park prided itself of not bringing in big retail. Now, look at 53rd Street and it looks like you're in the suburbs, with big companies on every corner."

City officials who worked as intermediaries between the chess players and the foundation say the main cause of the problems at Harper Court have been a lack of communication, something they say has always been at the heart of Hyde Park's successes in diversity.

"There was insensitivity on both sides," says Francoise Johnson of the city's Commission on Human Relations, the city entity that helped work out the compromise to bring back chess play.

The foundation's executive director, Leslie Morgan, who did not want to be interviewed for this story, was new to the organization last year, Johnson said. "She didn't understand the group or how to manage the crowd. Sometimes it was quite a large gathering."

Representing chess

In Hyde Park fashion, where discussion is the norm, the chess players established the chess club as a way to bring representation to and work with the foundation.

The chess group's goal, says Fineberg, is to get permanent playing time on the plaza.

Until then, many players have found a friend in the Starbucks coffee shop about a block away, where the manager allows chess games because he likes the business it attracts.

But it's not the first choice of most players, who stop first at Harper Court to see if there is a table set up for play.

"Look, most guys who come here come just to play," said Curtis Gilmore, a 73-year-old retired Chicago police officer who has been pushing pawns at Harper Court since the mid-1970s. "They don't get rowdy or obnoxious. They're fanatics but they're fanatics about chess. They just like to play."