Irish Championship 1949

[ Information | Pairings & results | Crosstable | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | Openings | Annotations | Sources ]

Sources and notes

Sources
ICU web site
  • Tournament page (top 7 players and scores)
  • ICU games archive, as of February 2016 (Kennedy's 7 games, probably via his son David Kennedy)
  • Paddy Kennedy, David Kennedy, February 15, 1999
  • Paddy Kennedy 1929-1966, reprint of obituary from The Times (June 13, 1966 p. 13, per Gaige (1987))
J. J. Walsh manuscript The score of Duignan - Diskin, round 3, which won the Brilliancy Prize, is from J. J. Walsh's unpublished manuscript of selected Irish games, 1896-1967
Newspapers
  • Cork Examiner:
  • "The Irish Chess Championship", July 12, 1949 p. 6 (announcement, time control)
  • "Chess Championship opens in Galway", July 18, 1949 p. 6 (opening ceremony, round 1)
  • "Cork player beats Irish champion", July 20, 1949 p. 7 (round 3 plus adjourned round 2)
  • "Irish Chess Championship", July 21, 1949 p. 6 (rounds 3 and 4)
  • July 22, 1949 p. 7 (scores after round 5)
  • "Irish chess title for P. B. Kennedy", July 23, 1949 p. 10 (Kennedy's round 6 result)
  • "P. B. Kennedy maintains record", July 25, 1949 p. 6 (round 7, Kennedy's family background)
  • "P. B. Kennedy won with full points", July 27, 1949 p. 7 (round 7 results, all final scores)
  • "Presentation to Irish chess champion", January 28, 1950 p. 9 (presentation by Cork enthusiasts)
  •  
  • Connacht Sentinel:
  • January 25, 1949 p. 3 (announcement)
  • "Irish Chess Championship to be played in Galway", July 12, 1949 p. 1 (announcement, controller, time control, preliminary list of competitors)
  • "Irish Chess Championship at U.C.G.", July 19, 1949 p. 1 (rounds 1 and 2, partial results from round 3)
  •  
  • Connacht Tribune:
  • "Irish Chess Championship to be played in Galway", July 16, 1949 p. 22 1 (announcement, controller, time control, preliminary list of competitors)
  • "Irish chess congress at U.C.G.", July 23, 1949 p. 15
  •  
  • Evening Herald:
  • "Chess surprises", July 25, 1949 p. 8 (partial results from round 7)
  •  
  • Irish Independent:
  • "Munster players make good start", July 18, 1949 p. 7 (partial results from round 1)
  • "Kennedy and O'Sullivan share chess leadership", July 19, 1949 p. 7 (round 2, adjourned games from round 1)
  • "Kennedy's win over chess champion", July 20, 1949 p. 7 (round 3, adjourned games from round 2)
  • "Ulster players lead in chess bid", July 21, 1949 p. 10 (partial results from round 4, adjourned games from round 3)
  • "Kennedy beats Ulster chess champion", July 22, 1949 p. 8 (round 5, adjourned games from round 4)
  • "Won chess title at first attempt", July 23, 1949 p. 7 (round 6, adjourned games from round 5; erroneously implied that round 6 was final round)
  • "Chess championship surprises", July 25, 1949 p. 10 (partial results from round 7)
  • "O'Sullivan placed second in Galway chess tests", July 26, 1949 p. 8 (partial results from round 7, tie-break method, tie-break applied to determine second place only)
  • December 31, 1949 p. 8 (results of the year)
  •  
  • Irish Press:
  • "Irish chess tests for Galway", July 13, 1949 p. 7 (participants, method of qualification for each)
  • "Munster chess man doing well", July 19, 1949 p. 9 (round 2, adjourned games from round 1)
  • "Six Counties champion leads in Irish chess", July 21, 1949 p. 7 (round 4, adjourned games from round 3)
  • "Chess title at his first attempt?", July 22, p. 6 (round 5, adjourned games from round 4)
  • "Takes chess title at first attempt", July 23, 1949 p. 9 (partial result from round 6; erroneously implied that round 6 was final round)
  • "Irish chess issue open again", July 25, 1949 p. 10 (partial results from round 7)
  • "D. O'Sullivan runner up for chess title", July 26, 1949 p. 8 (one result from round 7, tie-break method and result)
  •  
  • Irish Times:
  • "Surprises in chess championship", July 18, 1949 p. 6 (three results from round 1)
  • "Young chess player is leading", July 22, 1949 p. 6 (leading scores after round 5)
  •  
  • The Kerryman:
  • "Aunascaul student wins chess title", August 6, 1949 p. 13 (result, family background and link to Kerry)
  •  
  • Nenagh Guardian:
  • "For chess championship", June 11, 1949 p. 5 (North Tipp. Vocational Educational Committee minutes, dealing with John C. Hickey's application for leave to attend an Irish course at Cararoe from July 5-29, and to attend the Irish Chess Championship in Galway)
  •  
  • Sunday Independent:
  • July 24, 1949 p. 12 (photo of Kennedy in play against O'Hanlon)
  • October 9, 1949 p. 8 ("Munster is Wide Awake", "P. B. Kennedy's success in the Irish championship has certainly given a great stimulus to chess in Munster. ...")


Notes
Key In "Pairings & results",
  • "qual" denotes method of qualification
  • "(age)" denotes the player's age on his or her birthday that year, regardless of whether that birthday fell before, during, or after the event, except possibly for John Casey, who was 18 years old during the event
  • "x-ch" denotes former Irish champions
  • "ol" denotes members of the previous Olympiad team (Buenos Aires 1939)
  • "ch#" denotes the number of championships the player played in, including this one
Débuts and final appearances Boyd, Casey, Dundas, Flood, Jackson, Kennedy, and Maher all made their Irish championship débuts. Whelan never played again.
Qualification The method of qualification for each player is as given in the Irish Press, July 13, 1949 p. 7. Maher was the Inter-Universities champion. Jackson was the Civil Service nominee, but the 1949 Civil Service champion was Austin Bourke (Leinster Express, May 21, 1949 p. 4). Munster's three nominees were split between North and South Munster, and in 1949 it was South Munster's turn to have two representatives; they nominated Kennedy and Casey (Cork Examiner, February 23, 1949 p. 6).
Clubs Club affiliations are from various newspaper reports from the 1948-49 season.
Anomalies Frank Killeen and Barney O'Sullivan appear to have played each other twice, in round 2 and 7, and similarly T. Vincent Maher and P. W. Whelan appear to have played each other twice, in rounds 5 and 7. Killeen had been paired against each of the other three already, but had conceded walkovers to Maher and Whelan.
Uncertainties The result of Maher - Whelan, round 5, and the pairings involving Maher and Whelan for round 6 are uncertain. Maher and Whelan each scored 1 out of 2 over these two rounds, and between them played Barney and Dónal J. O'Sullivan in round 6. Whoever played Barney won, and whoever played Dónal J. lost. The scores at the end of round 5 were Barney O'Sullivan 1, Dónal J. O'Sullivan 2½, Maher 1½ plus this game, and Whelan 1 plus this game. It therefore seems most likely that Maher won this game, and then played Dónal J. O'Sullivan (2½ points each), and that Whelan played Barney O'Sullivan in round 6 (1 point each)
Disambiguation John Casey, b. 1930 or 1931, is given as "John Casey (2)" to distinguish him from John Casey, ca. 1895-1968, who was Leinster champion in 1944, and who played in the Irish championships of 1939, 1940, and 1947.
Records Kennedy's record as the only player to win an Irish championship with a perfect score in a tournament still stands. Two players scored 100% in match-based championships: J. J. O'Hanlon in 1915 (3-0 versus R. G. Dixon Addey in the final) and T. G. Cranston in 1931 (4/4 against two opponents to qualify for the final, then 3-0 versus O'Hanlon in the final) (cf. Irish Championship page, Irish Chess History web site). In the pre-ICU era, William Henry Krause Pollock scored 8/8 in the 2nd Irish Chess Association Masters in 1886, but was not resident in Ireland and so was not eligible for the title of Irish champion, which went to Richard W. Barnett (4½/8, 4th place) as highest placed Irish resident (cf. Irish Men's Championships, Mark Orr, The Irish Chess Archive, c. 2001 (via the Wayback Machine)).

Kennedy's record of finishing 2½ points ahead of the field in a tournament was equalled by Colm Daly in the 1998 championship, a 9-round event, but has never been broken.
Versions
  • v1.0 (30 Jan 2021): first published version.
  • v1.1 (7 Apr 2023); added "Schedule" entry in Information → Basic data; corrected typo; changed "tie break" to "tie-break" (one place); changed "age" to "(age)" in Pairings & results, and modified Sources and notes → Notes → Key accordingly; modified format to show direct link to "Sources and notes" page from every page, rather than having to go via Information → Basic data; added _tables file in directory; added XML directory and file
Contributors Seán Coffey, David McAlister
Author Seán Coffey


IRLchess: Irish chess history & records.
Version 1.1, published 7 April 2023. Comments/corrections? .
Download pgn file.