Dr. Jeanne Cairns Sinquefield

In 2008, Dr. Jeanne Cairns Sinquefield founded the Saint Louis Chess Club (STLCC) with her husband, Rex, and they later provided the funding to move the World Chess Hall of Fame to Saint Louis. Through the STLCC, they have helped to bring the benefits of chess to thousands of students throughout the Saint Louis metropolitan area and revitalized chess throughout the country. Passionate about the Scouts BSA, Jeanne instigated the creation of its chess merit badge, which has now been earned by over 225,000 scouts. With fellow scouts, she created Chess2Go, a compact portable chess set in 2012. In 2019, Jeanne wrote a book about chess notation, Learn to Read and Write Chess. The same year, she established the Cairns Cup, a world-class women’s chess tournament that was held again in 2020.