So, what did you shell out for your first US Chess, or USCF, dues?
I don’t remember – it was too long ago (1985). But it would have been half of whatever the going rate was for adults at the time, because it was a special 6-month introductory membership. I found the offer in the back of the user manual for my newly-purchased “Sargon III” chess-playing computer program (for my newly purchased Apple IIe computer, with a whopping 128K of memory and two floppy disc drives – no hard drive).
I paid $5.00 in 1963 or 64. They doubled the cost to $10, but let existing members convert to sustaining at the current sustaining price. For just $5.00 more in a ten year period paying $10 a year, it was possible to become a Life Member.
I don’t remember as a minor back in 1974. It was $30 per year in the '80s when I paid $600 for a life membership. That $30 would be over $70 today based on inflation.
I first joined in December 1968 to play in the Pan Am Games at the University of Chicago, so it was probably $10.
$10 so I could enter my first tournament, a 5-round weekend “Wamsley” at the old Chicago Chess Club at 64 E. Van Buren, in about 1968. I think the EF was $10, also.
Bill Smythe