Our Daily Dead

By way of the ubiquitous AP comes news that Gary Gygax, who co-created the fantasy game Dungeons & Dragons and helped start the role-playing phenomenon, died Tuesday morning at his home in Lake Geneva. He was 69.

Young Gary had been suffering from health problems for several years, including an abdominal aneurysm, said his wife, Gail Gygax.

Gygax and Dave Arneson developed Dungeons & Dragons in 1974 using medieval characters and mythical creatures. The game known for its oddly shaped dice became a hit, particularly among teenage boys, and eventually was turned into video games, books and movies.

The founding of Dungeons & Dragons is considered to be the beginning of all modern role-playing games and thus, according to Wikipedia anyway, the beginning of the entire role-playing game industry.

An interesting predecessor to D & D was originated by one Jeff Perren and then expanded by Gary Gygax. Chainmail was a set of medieval minature rules with fantasy supplements. Chainmail players controlled armies rather than single characters as is done in D & D.

~~The ODDones for OurDailyDead.com

Technorati tags: Gary Gygax, Dungeons & Dragons, Dave Arneson, Jeff Perren, Chainmail

American chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer passed away Friday at a Reyjavik hospital at the age of 64. Fischer’s spokesman Gardar Sverrisson confirmed the chess genius’ death, but did not provide the cause of the death, although Fischer has been ill for some time.

Fischer is best know for beating world chess champion Boris Spassky of the Soviet Union in 1972. His victory occurred at the height of the Cold War. The chess matches were ironically held in Reyjavik, which led to Fischer being proclaimed the U.S. first world chess champion in over 100 years.

The chess prodigy was born in Chicago, raised in Brooklyn and became a U.S. chess champion at 14 and grandmaster at 15. You can try your skills using this Chess Grandmaster Game or at the Grand Master Corner if you are so inclined.

Controversy hounded the American chess champion over the years. Fischer lost his title when he refused to defend it versus Anatoly Karpov of the Soviet Union. He became a recluse afterward and was only heard whenever he made political statements, centered on anti-Semitism.

In 1992 Fischer reemerged by wining an exhibition match against Spassky at Sveti Stefan, a resort island in Yugoslavia. But he violated an international sanction to punish then Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. He became wanted in the U.S. for violation of the sanction, renounced his American citizenship and was naturalized by Iceland in 2005 to avoid deportation to the U.S.

Before he moved to Iceland, Fischer lived undetected for several years in Japan.

If you are thinking about a pilgrimage perhaps stop in at Travel Iceland - “…not only closer than you think, but far different than you ever imagined.” Or maybe you should read through the Iceland forum over at the ODD friend Trip Advisor.

~~The ODDones for OurDailyDead.com

Technorati tags: chess grandmaster, Bobby Fischer, chess, Boris Spassky, Reyjavik

We suppose that having played Pomp and Circumstance for the Rev. Jerry why then shouldn’t we offer up the same for on-Decker Lady Bird Johnson?

And here is an interesting snippet from Marianne Means via the Seattle PI:

“I thought she was terrific, and always will. Just imagine abruptly coming onto the national stage sandwiched between Jackie Kennedy, the most elegant first lady of our time — 17 years younger and prettier, to boot — and an emotional, complicated president baffled by a strange foreign war not of his making that he could not control.”

Perhaps President Johnson’s bafflement with the Vietnam war was just too close to home for President Bush and his daddy. Thus instead of attending Lady Bird’s memorial, they chickened out and stayed home sending their wives where they themselves feared to tread.

~~The ODDones for OurDailyDead.com

Technorati tags: Pomp and Circumstance, Rev. Jerry, Lady Bird Johnson, Marianne Means, Jackie Kennedy, President Johnson, Vietnam, President Bush