Mornington Crescent is a street in north London, which gives its name to a nearby station on the London Underground's Northern Line. This was closed for most of the 1990s for essential rebuilding work, and was reopened in 1998 by Humphrey Lyttelton.
A memorial plaque to the late Willie Rushton, a founder player of the game of the same name (see below), was installed at the station in 2002. The street also features in the music hall song:
- "They made me a present of Mornington Crescent, and they threw it a brick at a time."
Mornington Crescent is also the name of a deliberately obscure game introduced by the BBC Radio 4 programme I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue, in part as a parody of chess commentary.
Players successively name streets in Greater London or railway stations on the London Underground network. No player is disqualified and the first player to say "Mornington Crescent" wins. Although no player is disqualified, repeatly saying the same station is disallowed, and players cannot move if they are in 'knip'.
During play, the panelists often invoke obscure but authoritative-sounding rules and names of gambits. It's generally assumed that these "rules" are randomly conceived, the more ludicrous sounding, the better. For example "we're stuck in a Dollis Hill loop", or "once Tooting Bec has been declared, this move is not allowed unless two or more players are in Knip."
The chair Humphrey Lyttelton often introduces variants and alternative rules, for example the French version ("Chateau d'Eau"), or the King Edward Rules. For a list see here: http://www.isihac.co.uk/games/mcvariations.html
Another part of the culture surrounding the game is the correspondence it generates from listeners: letters from Mrs. Trellis of North Wales, who is presumably fictional, and writes to express her bafflement by the game, are read out on the show.
For those who want to play the game of Mornington Crescent themselves, see the game of Mornington Crescent at York