The updated bylaws have been submitted for the club officers to review and approve.  More Chess posters were posted around town.  One at the Brentwood library and one taken to Catholic High School and one posted at the Rendezvous Coffee shop down town. Yesterday, I went to J-Wo Designs and approved the T-shirt design and it was decided to put the website on the back of the shirt as the lettering would be too small to see on the sleeve.  The shirts should be done in the next couple days per J-Wo. Of course, it was mentioned once again, that our website name is too long. I can only smile when I hear this as this website thing is all new to me and I do wish I had made it shorter and tagged it as a dot org.  I understand I can change it and link the name change.  Perhaps we may do that in a year or two.  I also priced getting the scoresheets printed again and it appears 1,000 will be around $100 depending on which copy shop we use.  And finally, wonderfully, Walt Ressmeyer sent me multiple photos and club articles.  These have been added to the updated Photos page and include things from 1972 to the mid-2000's.  Please check them out.

More outreach efforts were made on February 17, 2010 with a visit to Missouri State University where flyers were posted in various Halls and outside posting boards.  I also dropped by the Fine European Market @ 3630 S Campbell Ave  Springfield, MO  65807 and noted that Walt had already dropped by and placed our poster there.  I spoke with one of the owners, Veronika Lukanov, she was most gracious in allowing us to post at her business.   If you haven't been there, please drop by for a variety of wonderful foods from all over Europe and check out the deli and fresh baked breads.  Note, too, that many new items have been added to our Memorabilia page and the T-shirts have been ordered and should be available by early March.  A photo of the shirt will be posted when we receive them.

Today I made it to the remaining two high schools in Springfield, Kickapoo and Hillcrest in hopes that our poster will be displayed for those students interested in chess.  I also managed to drop by Junior High, Hickory Hills and was advised they would even make mention of the club on their announcements.  While at Kickapoo, a parent overheard me mention the Chess Club and she was interested for a place for her child to play, but did not think the club would accept such young players.  I assured her we do and in fact we want young players as that is how I started out and developed my love of the game.  I also stopped by Just For Him and added there website link to our Links. They sell chess sets and boards and I would hope if someone sees our poster there, they would perhaps purchase a set and come over to play.  If nothing else, drop by there just to take in the fine cigar aroma!  Finally, I spoke with the fine people at J-Wo Designs on West Kearney about T-shirt costs and I will present that to the club this Friday.  I added a link to their website to our Links page as well.

In order to advertise the club, we are working on a club logo, t-shirts with the logo on them, perhaps a window/bumper sticker with the logo and of course the club poster which is the front page of the website.  Today, I visited two Junior High Schools, Jarrett and Pershing, three high schools, Glendale, Central and Parkview, one University, Drury, and the downtown YMCA and one business, Crosstown BBQ, Steve, the owner has visited our club on several occasions, and I either left or posted our poster at these locations in hopes of letting people in the community know chess is alive and well in Springfield.  I still need to visit Hillcrest and Kickapoo and some other junior highs and other businesses in the next few days.  I also wrote the Springfield Greene County Park Board and asked if we could have our site linked to theirs and I have added several links to our link page of other chess clubs and/or businesses that have some connection to chess either loosely or directly.   We are hoping that our site shows up on Google soon and we have written them asking that our URL be added to the search engine.  Of course, if you have any interest in promoting our club, let us know or drop by the club to get a poster.  And remember you can follow us on Facebook and Twitter.