Ken Inwood v Thomas Landry

British Boys’ under-18 championship, Hastings, 17 April 1953

The 1953 British Boys’ Under-18 Championship attracted 38 entries and was run on the Swiss System, with nine rounds between Monday evening, 13 April, and Friday night, 17 April. The winner, K. F. H. Inwood, of Tiffin’s School, was the London Chess League’s nominee; he beat T. A. Landry, of William Ellis School, in the last round, by a good king’s-side attack, after the latter had overlooked the winning of a pawn earlier. Landry and G. Jessup, also of William Ellis School, shared the second and third prizes with 6½. M. F. Collins, Sandbach School, Crewe, P. Gough, King Edward VI School, Norwich, J. T. Farrand, Haberdasher’s Aske’s, Hampstead, and A. Hall, of the same school, with P. Starling, of Middlesbrough, all scored 6. Amongst the also-rans was Anthony Leggett, who went on to win the Nobel prize in physics. In the opinion of Sir George Thomas, the general standard of play was higher than last year, but there was no boy outstanding.

Thomas Anselm Landry (19 August 1935 – 11 January 1996) went to Pembroke College, Oxford and played in the Varsity match of 1955. Tom Landry was a noted draughts/checkers player, who held the record for winning the London Championship 11 times in all and also the 1983 Northern Ireland Championship. He was president of the English Draughts Association and personally financed (and played in) the 1973 Great Britain vs America draughts match. He wrote books on the subject. He was a stockbroker and insurance consultant.

Here is the key game from the last round with both players on 6.5/8. The game shows the Inwood hallmark: first a period of calm and balance in which he is always the equal of his opponent and then an inexplicably easy finish against a defence that disintegrates.

The top four members of the England team in the Glorney Cup 1953 were recruited from the event. Ken was on top board with Landry on board two.

Ken, who is 86 and has been a member of Kingston Chess Club for more than 70 years, recently entered a nursing home in Woking. We wish him well.