Introduction to Gary Gygax

 I've noted that I am not a game geek. That said, Dungeons and Dragons was my defining hobby through middle and high school. My twin brother and I bought and filched what what became a too large collection of D&D rule books, supplements, and settlings, much of which satisfied an itch to collect things and look at art work. Much of it went unused and little read. Essentially all of my allowance went to D&D, and if I could have played D&D every week I probably would have. But I couldn't quote a book, couldn't reference a rule beyond THAC0, was unaware of who the authors or game designers were, could not name a single RPG aside from D&D, never went to a gaming convention, had only a handful of Dragon magazines, and get this, was unaware of who Gary Gygax was. Never even heard the name until 1989 or 1990, seven or eight years into playing D&D.

Gary Gygax.  The first time I heard the name was from an odd encounter in my house with a visit from a friend of my Mom's which included her bringing over her son. I have no idea what the woman's name was, but I think his name was Troy. Mother and son were both fat and looked older than they probably were due to bad health. Apparently Troy wanted to meet us to talk D&D, and he was down in our Valdosta Georgia visiting from Atlanta.  I don't know if he was a college student, senior in high school, or what, but he impressed me as someone much older than myself. I guess maybe he was on a mission to recruit us to a gaming convention. Dragon Con remains huge in Atlanta, and I think Troy was involved in organizing Dragon Con somehow. The encounter took place when I was in 8th grade, 1989 or 1990. Leif and I were playing AD&D 2nd edition at that point. Troy looked at our books in disgust, and wanted to see our collection of Dragon magazines to reference a few points. We had only one, which had come out perhaps that month, or a month prior. He quizzed us about rules and personages and famous D&D titles and on and on. Leif and I have a way of shutting down when we don't know how to respond socially to a situation, and we did then. Most of his questions we met with silence, utter lack of eye contact, and exuding awkwardness so thick you could eat it with a spoon. Troy launched into a tirade against David "Zeb" Cook (whoever that was) and AD&D 2nd Edition, plus the Blume brothers (again, who the fuck?), and a frothy defense of Gary Gygax (again who? some guy akin to the right hand of God maybe?). It all went way over our heads. So now I knew the name Gary Gygax and that he had something to do with inventing D&D. And that was it for years to come. I could not have cared less. TSR painters Clyde Caldwell, Larry Elmore, Keith Parkinson, and Jeff Easley, sure I would have liked to know more about them if it didn't require too much energy on my part. Gary Gygax? No, I'm fine. 

Over a decade later I learned more about the guy. I remember when he passed away reading a headline "Gary Gygax failed his last saving Throw" and I thought, hey, that's the guy who started D&D. After that I started reading more about him and the origins of role playing games, but by then we had the internet and Wikipedia, so little effort required. 

To this day I 'm not concerned about Gary Gygax. I don't need to know about the man to have me one hell of a D&D session. But I am a father now and realize that we should give credit where credit is due. So thank you moms everywhere; thank you Jesus for being you; and somewhere down a long list I say thank you to Gary Gygax. Thank you for creating RPGs. 

And here is my first Dragon Magazine, issue #162.  I would have encountered Troy in the fall of 1990. I started playing D&D in 1982, at the age of six. I bought my first Dragon at the age of 15. That provides a sense of how disinterested in the details of the game I was and largely remain.