Who was the worlds first chess champion?
The first international chess tournament was the London Tourney of 1851, won by Adolf Anderssen of Germany. http://math.uww.edu/faculty/mcfarlat/177hist.htm [Apr 27 04 9:33 AM] rlaj writes: The first OFFICIAL championship chess tournament was played in 1866, also in London, with sandclocks to restrict the length of a game. This tournament was won by Steinitz, a Bohemian (Czechoslovakian) Jew, who then became the world’s first OFFICIAL chess champion, holding this title until 1894.
