Arthur Cyril Pearson

Arthur Cyril Pearson was an English clergyman and chess-problem composer active in the nineteenth century. One Hundred Chess Problems collects positions designed around checkmate in specified numbers of moves, presenting a diagram for each challenge and solutions at the end. Bibliographic records trace the work to the Civil Service Printing and Publishing Company in 1879, with an expanded third edition appearing in 1883. That later version added four compositions, including two four-move problems, one three-move problem, and one two-move problem. Pearson's collection belongs to a period when composed chess problems formed a substantial branch of chess publishing, valued as exercises in calculation, pattern recognition, and economical construction.