EJAY wrote:

I think one had to win a Grandmaster tournament to get the Title of
Grandmaster.1935 Botvinnik tied for 1st Place with Salo Flohr.Both
Lasker and Capablanca played also.It could be as former Champs they
could declare Botvinnik a Grandmaster.This is purely speculation on my
part.

You missed an important fact in the question: it is about the USSR GM
title, not anything else. And so any answer, of course, must be USSR-related

Botvinnik seems to have been declared FIDE GM at the FIDE congress of 1949
-- though I'm not 100% certain if the decision was ratified then also.
Most accounts state that the GM title was created in 1950, but in 1949 the
BCM report from the FIDE congress seem pretty clear on the subject, as does the
1950 report.

--
Anders Thulin anders*thulin.name http://www.anders.thulin.name/