''The Chess Monthly'' was a short-lived monthly

chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to dist ...

magazine produced from January 1857 and May 1861 in the United States. Edited by professional diplomat and linguistics professor

Daniel Willard Fiske Daniel Willard Fiske (November 11, 1831 – September 17, 1904) was an American librarian and scholar, born on November 11, 1831, at Ellisburg, New York. Biography Fiske studied at Cazenovia Seminary and started his collegiate studies at Hamil ...

, it was co-edited for a time by

Paul Morphy Paul Charles Morphy (June 22, 1837 – July 10, 1884) was an American chess player. He is considered to have been the greatest chess master of his era and is often considered the unofficial World Chess Champion. A chess prodigy, he was c ...

. The magazine was based in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

. Eugene B. Cook (1830–1915) and

Sam Loyd Samuel Loyd (January 30, 1841 – April 10, 1911), was an American chess player, chess composer, puzzle author, and recreational mathematician. Loyd was born in Philadelphia but raised in New York City. As a chess composer, he authored a numb ...

edited the

chess problem A chess problem, also called a chess composition, is a puzzle set by the composer using chess pieces on a chess board, which presents the solver with a particular task. For instance, a position may be given with the instruction that White is to ...

s section. Running for only five volumes, the magazine is perhaps best remembered today for a series of articles written by Silas Mitchell regarding The Turk, the chess-playing machine that perished in a fire in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...

prior to the publication of the magazine.

References

* * Tom Standage, ''The Turk: The Life and Times of the Famous Eighteenth-Century Chess-Playing Machine''. Walker and Company,

, 2002. * Gerald M. Levitt, ''The Turk, Chess Automaton''. McFarland and Company Inc. Publishers,

Jefferson, North Carolina Jefferson is a town in and the county seat of Ashe County, North Carolina, United States. The population was 1,611 at the 2010 census. History The North Carolina General Assembly created a special commission in 1799 to found a county seat for As ...

, 2000. * Moravian Chess Publishing Hous
Volume Listing.

''Chess Monthly'', Volume 3, 1859

''Chess Monthly'', Volume 4, 1860

The Chess Monthly archive at HathiTrust
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chess Monthly Chess periodicals Chess in the United States 1857 in chess Magazines established in 1857 Magazines disestablished in 1861 Defunct magazines published in the United States Monthly magazines published in the United States Magazines published in New York City 1857 establishments in New York (state)