Born in
Alderley Edge, Cheshire, Fairhurst was thirteen when he taught himself to play chess from a collection of books at the family home. During this developmental stage, he was inspired by the teachings of
Siegbert Tarrasch and consequently his playing style was based, for the most part, on dogmatic strategic concepts. By eighteen, he was Cheshire County Champion and a little later, moved to Lancashire, where he established a reputation as one of the leading players in the North of England. As an amateur, he had little opportunity to play in international tournaments, but he did compete at
Scarborough in 1927, finishing second, tied with
Frederick Yates, ahead of several recognised masters including
Efim Bogoljubov, Sir
George Thomas and
Victor Buerger. He defeated not only the hugely experienced Bogoljubov, but also the first-prize winner,
Edgard Colle. It was around this time, in his twenties, that he edited a well-respected games section in the magazine
Chess Amateur. In 1931, he went to live in Scotland and laid the foundations for a chess boom north of the border, winning the
Scottish championship a record eleven times between 1932 and 1962. A gifted
blindfold player, he held a twelve-board simultaneous blindfold exhibition in 1932 at the Glasgow Polytechnic Club, winning nine games and drawing three. A year later, he drew a six-game match with the then Austrian master
Erich Eliskases, a player of noted strength and very much a rising star in world chess. In 1937, Fairhurst won a fiercely contested
British Championship in
Blackpool. Playing team chess, he represented Great Britain many times, in a series of matches with
Czechoslovakia, the Netherlands and Russia, held between 1937 and 1954. Playing board one, he spearheaded the Scottish
Chess Olympiad team on six occasions between 1933 and 1968; his victims included the Danish champion and future world championship contender
Bent Larsen, who was close to his peak. In 1947, he played in a radio match with Australia and at the end of the year, achieved a creditable fifth place at the
Hastings International Chess Congress of 1947/48. His next performance at Hastings was similarly praiseworthy, finishing the 1948/49 event in a tie for fourth place. In 1950, chess organisers took advantage of the fact that the leading players of England, Scotland, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa were all gathered in Britain at the same time. An impromptu first (unofficial)
Commonwealth Chess Championship was arranged and held in
Oxford. Fairhurst won the event, ahead of
Daniel Yanofsky,
Robert Wade and
Wolfgang Heidenfeld, among others. He later lost a match to Wade in
Glasgow in 1953. As the best of his playing days drew to a close, Fairhurst continued to give generously of his time and money, for the furtherance of Scottish Chess. He was made President of the Scottish Chess Association (SCA) from 1956 and forged new links with the
British Chess Federation. At the end of his allotted tenure, he took control of the SCA, appointed himself President and retained the right to choose who joined him on the board. For a while, this was an improvement over the muddled state that the SCA had previously endured. Later however, his influence became overbearing and following a controversy about team selection for the
Lugano 1968 Olympiad, where he tried to block the inclusion of a player, he was deposed and asked to appoint a successor. His business interests caused him to move to New Zealand around 1970. While there, he played in the
New Zealand Chess Championship and decided that he liked the country so much, it would make an ideal venue for his retirement. He competed at the
Nice 1974 Olympiad for his new adopted country, playing board one and registering a 40% score; an outstanding result for a seventy-year-old. == Bridge designer ==