jan howard finder

[calimac]

who died yesterday at 73, though he always seemed far younger than his years, deserves to be remembered as, among other things, perhaps the first, and the most dedicated, professional Tolkien fan. By which I mean, Tolkien fandom for its own sake is what aroused his interest and enthusiasm. He wasn't noted for the creative or scholarly work he personally did; instead, he was the cause of it in other people. He liked to organize things, and he liked to enthuse about them: he organized some of the first scholarly Tolkien conferences in the 1960s, which eventually resulted in a book titled A Tolkien Compass with a couple of dandy pioneering papers in it, and he renewed the series of conferences in later years; the last time I saw him, at the Reno Worldcon, he was talking about the last one he'd done and the next one he planned. (Most of these were on the east coast, and I never had the chance to attend one.) As a general enthusiast, and as someone whose other fannish interests included costuming, he was equally burblish about the movies, and do I remember him also talking about organizing tours, trans-Pacific flights included, of New Zealand? It's just the sort of thing he'd do. It was impossible to criticize or look down on jan for the width and indiscriminacy of his enthuasisms: he was just too cheerful, innocent, and warm-hearted a guy.

Just don't ask me to explain about the wombats.

Comments

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

He did always seem young. I am so sorry he's gone.

[jane-dennis.livejournal.com]

First, thanks for his preferred lower case. And also for a space to talk a bit. Facebook is full of ppl who love and will miss jan. It speaks well of him, fer sure. I hope I may be a bit wordier on LJ. And not in Lin's way.

The first Conference On Middle Earth (oh, he loved the adolescent joke on the acronym) was held at the U of Illinois in April of 1969 at the main campus (Urpaign IL, as jan always called it, because he'd lived there). Which is when I met him. I was 17 and a freshman at Macalester up in St. Paul, but was so fascinated by the idea of ppl getting together to talk about the Books that I went on a mini-quest myself to get there. It completely changed my life. And I think changed his too. Because although i couldn't convince him to attend St. Louiscon later that year, which I count as my first SF convention, because his Conference was definitely sercon, he paid attention, and became aware of the bigger circle of SF/F cons. Oops.

The second CoME was held in Cleveland in 1971. I was at that one too, but it was somewhat less memorable to me. The talks at the first CoME were nearly all just brilliant. I do own A Tolkien Compass, but it's still back in Lex. I hope.

jan actually went to his first SF con in the UK, sometime after he went to Germany working for the Army. Then he was in Italy for a bit, same job basically, and then back in the US as an actual fan. In between, he did go to Aussiecon 1 (the lucky bastard), and apparently became enchanted by wombats while there. We'd kept up through letters, but when he got back to the US, and the Wombat theme seemed to be a big deal in his letters, I - minimum wage slave I was, but with access to a heat press - took a red tshirt and put some white letters on it. The front said WOMBAT ENTERPRISES, and the back said THE WOMBAT.

And I'm not even sorry now. It's time had come.