He’s King of the Game : Retiree Coaches Young Students in Making the Right Moves

It was more than 20 years ago that George LaPiana decided the neighborhood children playing outside his Carson home could use a diversion. So he challenged them to a few chess matches.

LaPiana, then about 60, and his wife, Hope, set up tables and chessboards in their back yard. The matches continued for about a month before the children’s interest began to wane.

But LaPiana, who hadn’t played chess regularly for decades, was hooked. A retired process operator at a local oil refinery, he decided to devote his time to teaching Carson youths the fine points of the intellectual board game.

Since then, LaPiana-coached youths have routinely won local and regional chess championships. A team coached by LaPiana and teacher Donald Dear at Stephen M. White Junior High School recently tied for fifth place at a national junior high school chess tournament in Dearborn, Mich.

And LaPiana, 82, shows no signs of slowing down. He coaches the junior high school team twice a week, and, as a part-time city Parks and Recreation employee, teaches chess classes once a week at two parks.

“I don’t have anything else to do,” LaPiana said. “Rather than climb the walls at home, I (teach chess). If I was mechanically inclined or anything like that, I got plenty of work around the house to do; I just don’t like to do it.”

But Hope LaPiana, 77, says that her husband is motivated by more than just an aversion to housework.

“He finds that it’s something he can do to really help the kids,” said Hope, who also assists in the chess classes. “It’s something that keeps up his own skills. Chess is something you really have to practice at. He really enjoys it.”

The relish with which LaPiana approaches his work is evident the minute the lunch bell rings at White Junior High. LaPiana, as he does every Tuesday and Thursday, hurriedly strides over to Dear’s classroom, where the chess club meets during the lunch period. Soon, LaPiana and the students, toting pizza slices and sodas, pair up and arrange kings, queens, pawns and other chess pieces.

Dear said LaPiana’s classes in the parks supply him with tournament-prepared players, while also providing chess club members additional instruction.

“Of course, playing George, like playing any other adult, is a big help, too,” Dear said.

Dear, who in his spare time serves as mayor of Gardena, formed the chess club in the late 1970s. Under his guidance, White Junior High teams have won six consecutive Los Angeles Unified School District city chess championships.

LaPiana said chess is especially beneficial to youths because it keeps them mentally stimulated at an age when boredom can lead to trouble. His car sports a bumper sticker that says “Push Pawns, Not Drugs.”

“It’s a great thing to teach them discipline and patience and give them a little self-confidence,” LaPiana said.

It also helps teach them to play by the rules, he said. “A lot of these kids, all they want to do is beat somebody. They don’t care how they do it. We had to teach them that chess was a game that you don’t cheat at.”

Forrest Anderson, 28, a sports coordinator at Veterans Park, said LaPiana taught him to play chess when he was 5. LaPiana also tutored Anderson’s younger brother, who went on to win a city chess championship.

LaPiana “was the kind of guy who would use his own car to take us to chess tournaments, and these were pretty far, like Anaheim Hills,” Anderson said. “George is one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met and his wife is just super. They are both just super people.”

Anderson said the chess experience taught him to become a “thinker.”

“You’re using your mind in a different way and developing it,” he said.

LaPiana said he first played chess as a teen-ager at a Milwaukee Boys’ Club. He is still drawn to the game, he said, because of its competitive aspects.

Ninth-grader Romulo Broas, a national tournament competitor, shares LaPiana’s fire for competition. He likes the game’s tactics.

“It’s like war,” Romulo said.

During a recent chess club match, the boy went about playing schoolmate Chris Ledesma in the manner of a field general.

“Bye, Chris,” Romulo said as he strategically placed pieces in striking distance of Chris’ king. Soon, Romulo took one of Chris’ pawns with his rook, leaving the king no place to move.

“Checkmate,” said a beaming Romulo.