CCLA Webserver TD Glen Shields, 1951-2015

All Things Chess
1

I am sad to report that Glen D. Shields, webserver TD for the Correspondence Chess League of America, died last week at age 63.

Outside of chess, like many residents of Kingsport, Tennessee, he worked for Eastman Chemical (at least at one time–they have substantially downsized in recent years). He was a named inventor on United States Patent 6,262,149, which broadly deals with a type of organic polymeric coating.

Glen was a passionate advocate for the webserver version of the sport of correspondence chess, and his enthusiasm was a factor in my decision to adopt server play almost exclusively. In addition to his CCLA duties, he was an arbiter for the ICCF North American Pacific Zone server tournaments and an active, accomplished ICCF player, with a rating of 2401 on the 2015/3 ICCF rating list and two correspondence IM norms earned in 2014 (enough for the title, which he was scheduled to be awarded at the upcoming ICCF Congress).

The first of these norms came as he won a preliminary section of the ongoing 37th World Championship. The second came in Section 110 of the ICCF webserver master norm series. This game from WS/MN/110 against Brazilian Charles DeToledo secured Glen his eighth point of the tournament and his second IM norm. Glen’s kingside attack with Black is breathtaking, and although engine assistance is allowed in ICCF play, I can’t see an engine finding this.

[Event “WS/MN/110”]
[Site “ICCF”]
[Date “2014.1.31”]
[Round “-”]
[White “De Toledo, Charles Mann”]
[Black “Shields, Glen D.”]
[Result “0-1”]
[WhiteElo “2331”]
[BlackElo “2361”]

1.g3 d5 2.Bg2 e5 3.d3 Nf6 4.Nf3 Nc6 5.O-O Be7
6.c4 O-O 7.cxd5 Nxd5 8.Nc3 Be6 9.Bd2 h6 10.Rc1 Qd7
11.Ne4 Rfd8 12.Nc5 Bxc5 13.Rxc5 Qd6 14.Qc1 a5 15.a3 Nde7
16.Rc3 Qd7 17.Re1 f6 18.Nh4 Rac8 19.Rc5 g5 20.Nf3 Bd5
21.Rc3 a4 22.e4 Be6 23.Be3 Kh7 24.Qd1 Nd4 25.Bxd4 exd4
26.Rc1 c5 27.Nd2 b5 28.e5 f5 29.g4 c4 30.gxf5 Nxf5
31.Ne4 Kh8 32.Nf6 Qf7 33.Ne4 Qg7 34.Qd2 Nh4 35.Nd6 Nxg2
36.Kxg2 Bd5+ 37.f3 g4 38.Kf2 Rf8 39.f4 Qg5 0-1

2

Glen was a wonderful, responsive presence at CCLA. He solved most member problems within a matter of minutes or hours at most. He will be missed very much by the correspondence chess community. RIP, Glen.

3

Concur, Brian. And congratulations on your just completed ICCF tournament victory!

4

Thanks. I would not have been able to play in that tournament without Glen sorting out problems I had accessing the ICCF web server. He was a very helpful person who clearly loved the correspondence game. We’ve lost a true chess gentleman.

5

I joined ICCF 3ish years ago and had some contact with Glen. He was a first class man and he made my introduction to ICCF very comfortable. A sad loss for the chess community