The Irish Chess Championship is the national Championship of Ireland as run by the Irish Chess Union (ICU), the governing body for the sport and a member of FIDE since 1933. Below are the list of winners for the Men's and Women's titles. Note that women are currently admitted to the Men's tournament. The first Irish Championship competition won by J.A. Porterfield Rynd in 1865 was run under the auspices of the Hibernia Chess Association a forerunner of the ICU.
The Irish Chess Association was founded 1885 and held a Masters tournament to decide who was Irish Champion (this was a handicapped tournament and while William Pollock won on points, Porterfield Rynd won on the handicap rules). Since its foundation in 1912 the Irish Chess Union has organised the Irish Chess Championships.
The Irish Chess Championship has run in a number of various formats from a round robin competition for those who qualified, to a Swiss system competition, to an Open competition with other nationalities playing, and the highest scoring Irish player being awarded the title of Irish Champion, the 2007, 2008 and 2009 championships were open nine-round Swiss competitions.
Read more about Irish Chess Championship: Men's Winners, Women's Winners
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—Stephanie Coontz (20th century)
“Work, as we usually think of it, is energy expended for a further end in view; play is energy expended for its own sake, as with children’s play, or as manifestation of the end or goal of work, as in “playing” chess or the piano. Play in this sense, then, is the fulfillment of work, the exhibition of what the work has been done for.”
—Northrop Frye (1912–1991)