Perpetual Chess Podcast

This week on Perpetual Chess, Tony Ballard, who is serving a 294-month prison sentence for attempted murder, tells the remarkable story of how chess has changed his life. Tony joined me via phone from a minimum security rehabilitation facility in Wichita, Kansas, where he currently lives. As you will hear Tony discuss, he had a difficult upbringing, and made some very regrettable choices in his early years, but while in prison, a love for chess took hold, and Tony credits the game as a transformative tool in his life. Tony is now working with a non-profit called The Gift of Chess. Their goal is to promote chess as a learning tool both within the prison system, and outside of it. Tony is taking online university classes and hopes to work in youth outreach when he is fully released from prison in 2025. This is a truly inspiring story of the many ways that chess can impact one’s life! Please read on for timestamps and links referenced.  0:00- We discuss Tony’s background, especially as it relates to chess.  3: