D&D General Garys House Tour

Two weeks ago Friday, My wife and I were headed up to Milwaukee for the air show, and I made her stop in Lake Geneva to see a couple DND "Sites." One of the sites was Gary Gygax's house at 330 Center Street.

While I was out front taking pictures, the owner approached and asked, "Are you here for the 11AM tour?"

"Theres a tour?" I asked, clearly having failed to google stuff appropriately. Heres the Website I should have located previously Home - Birthplace of DND

Long story short, I got to wander around the house, saw the dining room where Gary first played with Dave, Roll a dice at the dining room table and see both the office where DND was first "codified," and the basement with sand table where the guys war-gamed. The tour was hosted by the owner, Yolanda, who couldn't have been more gracious.

Needless to say, I was very excited, my wife less so.


Dan

That’s awesome!
Did the tour cost anything?

Marc Radle said:

That’s awesome!
Did the tour cost anything?

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Donation requested. I also bought a T Shirt.

GwaihirAgain said:

While I was out front taking pictures, the owner approached and asked, "Are you here for the 11AM tour?"

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I guess if people keep doing weird things like standing in front of your house and taking pictures of it, you might as well try and monetise it.

I think my wife would divorce me if I did this. She still reminds me of the time she watched Monty Python and Clash of the Titans in clay-mation.

Morrus said:

I guess if people keep doing weird things like standing in front of your house and taking pictures of it, you might as well try and monetise it.

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-The owner told us that when they first bought the house, they had no idea of its history. But they noticed that cars would slow down and take photos, and people were knocking on the door and asking if they could see the basement, So they did some research and learned all about it.

aco175 said:

I think my wife would divorce me if I did this. She still reminds me of the time she watched Monty Python and Clash of the Titans in clay-mation.

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I got a lot of reminders I was a nerd, she wouldn't go in the house, she went into town and had a beer and waited for me to finish.

GwaihirAgain said:

people were knocking on the door and asking if they could see the basement

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Wow. That’s so rude.

aco175 said:

I think my wife would divorce me if I did this. She still reminds me of the time she watched Monty Python and Clash of the Titans in clay-mation.

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Funny little story...

When my wife and I were dating she knew I played games with friends at the campus Union building on the weekends. She didn't know what the games were and really didn't care.

Time passes, we are engaged and planning our wedding.

She comes home from work talking about honeymooning in this cute little resort town called Lake Geneva she had read about in a magazine. All I can say is "wherever you'd like to go". I mean, our wedding is the first weekend of August.

She reserves a cute cabin and plans a few excursions in the area. She even agreed to let me plan a day of activities. Well, 3rd ed. was just releasing, and GenCon was just up the road...

It was on that Friday as we stood in the convention center in Milwaukee that she realized what exactly she said "I do" to.

Also, here are some pictures of Horticultural Hall, Site of the first GEN CON, its a block from Gary's house. Very Pretty.