Lyudmila Rudenko
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Lyudmila Vladimirovna Rudenko was a Soviet chess player and the second women's world chess champion, from 1950 until 1953.
Lyudmila Rudenko c. 1928
Vera Menchik
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Vera Francevna Mencikova, was a Russian-born Czechoslovak chess player who primarily resided in England. She was the first and longest-reigning Women's World Chess Champion from 1927 to 1944, winning
Lyudmila Rudenko
…a train to evacuate children from the Siege of Leningrad. She described this as the most important accomplishment in her life. Women's World Champion Vera Menchik died in 1944 during an air raid. After the war, in the winter of 1949–1950, the World Chess Federation FIDE held a tournament in Moscow to determine…
After Menchik won the 1926 London Girls' Championship, she gave a 13-board simultaneous exhibition (pictured) at the event, scoring +9–2=2.
Grand Hotel Panhans, the site of the World Championship match between Menchik and Graf in 1937
Menchik had two wins against Max Euwe (pictured in 1945 with his daughter), the World Champion from 1935 to 1937, in four tournament games. For this reason, Euwe was one of the players named "president" of the Vera Menchik Club.
Menchik on a 2001 stamp from Yugoslavia