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chapter one Why I Study Talent Development When my first child, Keaton, was born, I had no intention of introducing him to chess and developing his chess talent. I was not a chess player myself, and like most parents, I just wanted him to be healthy and happy. I never anticipated that he would become a six-time National Scholastic Champion, earn a full-ride college chess scholarship, achieve the International Chess Master title, and become a leading player and coach. And I never imagined the essential roles I would play in his development. My Story as Talent Parent My job as a college professor was flexible and allowed me to spend a lot of time with Keaton. Whatever interested him, we did. We reenacted and embellished stories by personifying Keaton’s stuffed animals. “Three Billy Goats Gruff” became a caravan of bunnies battling a venomous snake guard- ing the garden bridge. We drew his favorite story characters and posted his top 100 drawings on walls, counters, and cabinets in our kitchen gallery. Mostly, we talked. As we cooked, a conversation could boil up about corn and branch to farming, pesticides, and natural foods. Through our interac- tions, Keaton developed deep interests in revolving topics such as dinosaurs and the Pony Express. When an interest arose, I fed it. His dinosaur interest was met with new books, dinosaur-themed makeup games, museum out- ings, and backyard excavations for allosaurus bones. His Pony Express inter- est was met with trips to the Marysville, Kansas, Pony Express Barn stick horse mail-toting gallops around our house and a sit-down with our local postmaster general.