Evaluating Gygax
How much is too much?
In 1961, a furious Mary Jo Gygax pounded on the door of what she thought was the house of a trollop her husband had slunk off to. It was a freezing Chicago winter, she was pregnant, and had a crying baby in her arms. When one of Gary’s friends answered the door, she stalked in looking for him, and was drawn to a smoke-filled basement with men playing Gettysburg. Gary got a talking-to.
They agreed to move the gaming to their busy house. Seven years later, Gen Con would begin, and over the course of the whole decade he would be corresponding with gamers, writing to magazines, and gaming quite regularly.
That this would cause tension in a marriage that would produce five children is almost an understatement. Consider: Gygax commutes by train to Chicago for work and back and does so much gaming/writing it’s like he’s constantly doing other things than taking care of them. Now, his children have all said he was a good father, and I’m not about to contradict them on it. However, the impact this would have on Mary Jo, coupled with the hard years beginning in 1970 when Gary lost his insurance job, make their eventual separation the result of a long build-up.
I’m busy enough with my own two kids that any real writing is done when they’re asleep or at their grandparents’ house. While I’ve decided to call the incredible work ethic Gygax shows in 1974 by his own last name, I’m not sure it’s desirable. While it gives us the fantasy adventure game, and he works hard to get TSR off the ground with Blume and Kaye, I can’t help but think it a vice when he consistently tries for something new, and so is gone at cons or promoting the game. Again, consider his wife, their home, and the duties required for upkeep. She would eventually turn to drink, and Gary to cocaine.
But at the same time, we need to remind ourselves that Gary was still a proud man, and getting fired with few prospects must have been a real blow. Yes, he cobbled shoes to get by, but the family was on food stamps for years during one of the worst economic downturns in decades. That he would swear in his heart by Crom that he would conquer wargaming is a believable image. That he would type furiously in order to hammer Arneson’s rough material into a workable shape is only natural once he grasped how special it was.
While quibbling is what we all do, I have to also add that once the separation does happen Gygax lived like a bachelor’s dream: a mansion, women, success, and a Saturday morning cartoon. That he had also been driven from his church is also relevant here, due to the Satanic Panic. I doubt his own faith was shaken, despite all these things.
Considering that many of these problems stem from the eventual mainstreaming of D&D due to the Egbert case, it’s worth keeping in mind some advice from Seneca: even a successful man should remain disciplined. Although Gary did not like the Conan movie, the scene where success drives Conan to a stupor is relevant as a cautionary tale.
We did get a good cartoon, though.
