Spock and chess have gone together ever since the second pilot episode “Where No Man Has Gone Before.” The game has always been associated with intelligence and logic, so it would make sense for it to be Spock’s signature game. But not all of his encounters with Kirk on the chess board seemed to go the way he planned, which perturbed him no end. Not that he would admit it of course.

With the exception of the first two, the rest are publicity photos. A few are rarely seen, especially the last one with just Captain Kirk and the chess set.

Stay tuned - the next article on Sunday will be about the role 3D (or tri-dimensional) chess played in Star Trek and how the prop itself was created.