“Say never give up,” Orrin “Checkmate” Hudson, a two-time world open speed chess champion, said to a room of students one morning during summer break. Chess sets were spread across tables, with children and their parents raptly listening to Hudson’s booming voice. They repeated after Hudson, who sat at the head of the table wearing a shirt that read “Brains before bullets.”
“Say, my mind is a pearl. I can change the world. I have everything I need to succeed,” he continued as they relayed his words. “I have my mind. I have my ability. I have my talent, and I have time.”
The words of affirmation are a core part of the morning at the Be Someone, Inc. headquarters in Stone Mountain. A life-size chessboard sits on the front lawn of the building, and motivational banners are plastered in and out of the nonprofit organization, making its goal clear: to empower children, help at-risk youth, and teach them to make the right moves through the power of chess.
Essentially, Hudson wants to motivate youth to “Be Someone.” It’s a goal that began 25 years ago in Queens, New York, when he heard the news that seven people were shot in a robbery over $2,000. That incident galvanized him into action, jumpstarting a mission to reduce crime and violence and stop the school-to-prison pipeline.
“Bad things continue to happen when concerned people fail to make boss moves. I made a boss move and started Be Someone to stop the violence and to teach young people the new weapon of choice: a king, a queen, and a pawn, not a gun,” Hudson said. “My method is, think it out. Don’t shoot it out. The only way to fight is to use your head.”
He’s implemented that method through private coaching sessions, seminars, and parent-teacher workshops, teaching diverse communities of all ages. Hudson also hosts an annual summer chess camp to motivate students while they’re on break and will take place on June 23-27 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Through these programs, he’s trained over 100,000 kids to think critically, helped promote self-esteem, and built character; he said he’s on a mission to train one million.
It’s a full-circle moment as Hudson was once one of those at-risk youth. Hudson shared that he grew up in public housing and was constantly in and out of foster homes in his hometown of Birmingham, Alabama. As a teen, he was involved in a gang, committing petty crimes until one of his teachers, James Edge, pulled him to the side and told him that he wanted to teach him how to think independently through chess. Soon, Hudson said he started making better decisions. Those decisions led him from a path of failure to being voted “most likely to succeed” in his senior year of high school.
After graduation, he served in the U.S. Air Force and worked as an Alabama State Trooper, but the game of chess never left his side. Hudson went on to become the first African American to win the Birmingham City Chess Championship in 1999 and 2000. Now, he’s teaching tomorrow’s champions.
“Teaching children to think makes my heart sing,” Hudson said. “It’s so rewarding getting children who are lost on the right track. I teach the children as though my life depends on it, because it does. And we have to teach children to pause, ponder, pivot, pray, and proceed because if you do the first thing that pops in your head, it’s usually a trap.”
As Hudson challenged his students to games of timed chess and wall chess, it was clear that the love of the game went both ways. Hudson stimulated their minds through rap songs and vocabulary, and they eagerly engaged with him while soaking in the skills needed to declare a checkmate. It was in their squinted eyes, thoughtful pauses, and glances toward Hudson to see if they made the right move. He was constantly teaching, coaching his opponent and spectators with every shift of a chess piece.
“I’m always learning. I love chess because it’s life. It’s about sacrifices. It’s about recognizing patterns. It’s about the moves you make determining the path you take. It’s about managing resources. The opposite of wealth is not poor; the opposite of wealth is mismanagement of resources,” Hudson said.
Hudson boasted that many of the students are on his level and on their way to becoming chess champions themselves. Irma Allen, the mother of two of Hudson’s students, said the introduction to chess began to positively impact her children over the last year.
“I started noticing that my eldest son wanted to start to emulate him [Hudson] a bit as far as leadership roles. He started working on his vocabulary. Then Leon was more introverted and soft-spoken. He’s actually started to project his voice more. It’s become much more than just chess at this point,” Allen said.
Hudson said hearing and witnessing chess’s impact on his students’ lives is the most rewarding part for him. He shared instances where his intervention over the years has saved young people from going to jail or committing violent crimes. “It’s rewarding having parents telling me, thank you for saving my child’s life, thank you for getting them out of the game. Thank you for showing him that there’s a better way. Thank you for getting him a job.”
Chess is a game of life, and Hudson is determined to win and bring as many people along with him as he can. His commitment to that has been recognized nationally. In 2012, he received the Dr. Martin Luther King Award for Social Justice and the FBI Distinguished Community Award in 2013. In 2016, Hudson won the DeKalb CEO Burrell Ellis Community Hero Award, and in 2018, he won the Georgia H.W. Bush Points of Light Award and was honored at George H.W. Bush’s funeral in Washington.
He hopes to leave a legacy where the mention of his name brings tales of inspiration, fulfilled potential, and achievement of lifetime goals for children in underserved communities.
“My name is Orrin C. Hudson. The C stands for checkmate. Checkmate means you win, and it’s not over until you win. My commitment is helping people win,” Hudson said. “I just want people to say that because of Orrin, I didn’t give up. Because of Orrin, I made a better decision. Because of Orrin, I choose love. I choose peace. I’m not gonna do any violence. I want people to win. I’m living my dream.”
Be Someone, Inc. will host a leadership camp at 949 Stephenson Rd from July 28 to August 1, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
