The Giant Chessboard
Near Morro Bay, California
Tucked into the waterfront near the Embarcadero is one of Morro Bay's most delightful oddities, a chessboard so large that the players walk out among the pieces to move them. The squares form a concrete court, and the towering chessmen are carved of solid redwood. The pieces are heavy enough that moving one is real work.
The redwood came from a fitting source. The wood was salvaged from two old redwood water tanks that had once served the city. The giant chessboard was dedicated in the nineteen seventies and has been a local favorite since.
Local volunteers built it from a design by a Cal Poly architecture student, and the stairway beside it was built of the same recycled redwood. In nineteen eighty two a woman named Nancy Castle began staging Chess Live here, a game played by living people dressed as the pieces, with pawns costumed as waitresses, surfers, or even a dog. The next year the Morro Bay Chess Club built chess tables and benches next to the board, and visitors are welcome to join the club on Saturdays beginning at noon.
According to the city, the only other outdoor chessboard in the United States is in New York City. Locals and clubs still hold matches here, hoisting the great redwood pieces from square to square with the harbor glittering just beyond. It is playful, homemade, and utterly Morro Bay, a monument built not to a battle or a founder but simply to a game.
