So I was over on the "Old School Gamers" group on Facebook the other day* and there was a discussion thread about the Holmes edition boxed set going on, and people started chiming in about the differences between their various boxed sets when they got them. I am a sucker for any discussion about Holmes edition D&D, so I dutifully read through every single comment when I noticed that nobody had mentioned getting a boxed set with the same contents as mine. So I felt it was practically my duty to comment this- "That's the boxed set I started with. Mine had chits instead of dice and came with module B2. There was a coupon for free dice though."**.
Less than a minute later James M. Ward says to me; and this is the way I will always tell the story, since he responded immediately after my post; he says- "Another trivia point if anyone cares. Dr. Holmes wasn't hired to do the set. He actually did all of the work and sent it into Gary to see what he thought of the effort. I know this because I was there the day it came in the mail. The rest is printing history.".
First, I can not imagine anyone not being interested in learning that bit of D&D history. Second, wow! It's like he was talking to me personally. I love the internet for making it easier for us all to communicate, and I am even starting to like Facebook again, because of this group. Jim Ward isn't the only old TSR guy there either, I see Tim Kask posting stuff there all the time and some other familiar names too. Jeff Dee comes to mind.
*I'd have told this story earlier, but I wanted to write the Dawn Patrol report first.
**Although here I corrected a typo from the original.
That is fascinating. Thanks for passing this on. To think, we might never have had any basic introductory boxed sets if it hadn't been for Holmes.
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