The Drueke Imperial Player’s Choice Chess Set

One of the many chess sets created by William F. Drueke & Sons Inc., the Imperial Player’s Choice is among the most iconic. The Player’s Choice sets were designed for tournament play and were introduced around 1963. The renowned American chess prodigy, Bobby Fischer, was photographed with this type of chess set while preparing for the famous 1972 World Chess Championship match against the Russian World Chess Champion Boris Spassky. 

This chess set is the largest of the Player’s Choice sets, with its king standing tall at 5 inches. The black pieces are made of Cycolac, a unique plastic used by the Drueke company, with a pattern that makes them look wooden. It is also called pseudo-wood. 

One aspect of this chess set is its box. Made of walnut, the coffer has a hinged lid with two compartments to separate the colors. The characteristic knight piece of the Drueke logo is on the inside of the lid, bearing the company’s name and location. Each knight piece in Drueke chess sets mimics the logo’s design.

Bruce Hedman, the donor of this and many other Drueke chess sets, believes this chess set and its wooden box were sold around 1977 or 1978. Its model number is 38B, titled The Imperial Coffer. 

There are three sizes of Player’s Choice chess sets. The smallest is the Analysis chess set, with the king measuring 2 ½ inches tall. The Tournament size is in the middle, with a 3 ½ inch king piece. The largest is this set, the Imperial chess set, with its 5-inch-tall king. All Analysis and Tournament chess sets are ivory and black, while the Imperial pieces are all made with Cycolac, the material creating the illusion of their being made from wood.

William F. Drueke & Sons Inc. was founded in Grand Rapids, Michigan, in 1914. It began producing chess sets on the home front, becoming the first American company to create and distribute chess sets. Before World War I, Americans imported chess sets from Europe, but when the war broke out, countries diverted all their resources from chess sets to war supplies. This created a gap in the market, which William Francis Drueke filled stateside. Drueke partnered with Waddell Manufacturing to develop the first American-made chess set. 

After the war, Drueke’s company expanded beyond chess sets, and it began manufacturing toys and other games such as cribbage and rhum–a card game from the time. He adopted the knight piece as his logo and continued until the stock market crash in 1929, when he lost virtually everything.

Around 1920, William Francis Drueke helped launch the American career of the European chess prodigy Samuel Reshevsky. As a child in Poland, Reshevsky was well-known as a prodigy, easily beating chess players around Warsaw. In November 1920, he and his family moved to the United States. With Drueke’s help, Reshevsky not only played in chess clubs but also in department stores where Drueke sets were sold. When photographed for the cover of Chess Life, Reshevsky sat behind a Drueke set. 

In 1932, William F. Drueke restarted the company in his basement, importing chess sets from France after losing all the manufacturing equipment during the Great Depression. Until 1935, Drueke sold only chess and cribbage sets. After 1935, the company was prosperous enough to expand into a larger space and to start selling other games and game pieces, such as dominoes, poker chips, and dice.

During World War II, Drueke sold millions of his Play-A-Way series, which included games of chess, checkers, backgammon, dominoes, and cribbage, to the United States military for soldiers to take overseas. Also in 1941, Drueke submitted a patent for “American Design” chess pieces. This design featured octagonal bases and was either black, ivory, or red. 

After William Francis Drueke’s death in 1956, the company went to his children. Each of whom owned a stake in the company, but his two sons, William (Bill) Jr. and Joseph (Joe), took over. This is when tournament-size pieces began to be developed. By 1963, the Player’s Choice line was made available as an option for tournament play. In 1986, Bill and Joe sold the company to investors, and the branded chess sets continued to be produced by the Carrom Company. 

Over the years, Drueke chess sets have been featured in chess magazines. Many editions of Chess Life and Chess Review feature ads selling the sets, while others include photos and articles featuring the American-made chess pieces. Two 1965 covers featured Drueke sets: the first in April with Samuel Reshevsky, and the other in December with Pal Benko. Beginning in 1963, the United States Chess Federation (USCF) made the Tournament Player’s Choice set with a king size of 3 ½ inches its official chess set.

This section is written with special thanks to articles written by Bruce Hedman on Chess.com and William Drueke III in Duncan Pohl’s book Vintage Chess Sets of the United States.

Bruce Hedman collected a sizeable amount of Drueke chess sets to analyze in order to best write a history of the company, and more specifically, the chess sets sold throughout its tenure. In an article he wrote on Chess.com, Hedman provides interpretations of the company’s chess sets with detailed sections on eras in its history. He goes into detail about each set he had in his possession, the subtleties of Drueke’s logo, the materials of chess sets, and the different models created. His number of over 50 Drueke chess sets is now a part of the World Chess Hall of Fame & Galleries collections. 

When he is not researching and writing about William F. Drueke & Sons, Inc. and other chess-related topics, Rev. Dr. Bruce Hedman is an associate math professor at the University of Connecticut, Hartford. He holds a Master of Divinity and a Ph.D. in mathematics and serves as both a professor and an ordained pastor at Abington Congregational Church in Pomfret, Connecticut. His special interests include chess, math history, and Jungian psychology, and he has published works on each topic. 

Written by Carrie Harper, Graduate Research Assistant