Posted by Damon C. Sasser on January 9th, 2012 on his REH: Two-Gun Raconteur blog.
“With honors well deserved” is the last line in Glenn Lord’s obituary and refers to the military honors given at a veteran’s graveside. In Glenn’s case, he got quite a send-off. A nine member honor guard was present, with a seven riflemen firing off a 21-shot salute, followed by the playing of taps and the folding of the flag ceremony and presentation of the flag to Glenn’s widow, Lou Ann. When infantryman Lord was slogging his way across the frozen landscape of Korea — tired, wet, cold and dirty — I doubt he could have imagined one day he’d be given such honors. That’s because he would be the first one to tell you he was not in Korea for the glory, he was just doing his job, defending his country.
But now the final note from the trumpet has echoed across the ether, and everyone has given their honors to Glenn, paid in the form of heartfelt tributes and remembrances, what does the future hold for Howard Fandom as everyone turns their attention to other matters?
The answer is Howard Fandom will never be the same. Only one person has a higher standing in Howard Fandom and that is Howard himself. You can’t lose someone that important and have it not affect everything from the top down. This is not to say everyone active in Howard Fandom won’t continue to do what they were doing prior to December 31, 2011, but special care has to be taken to ensure Howard’s Legacy lives on. In other words, the game has to be brought up a notch or two. Make no doubt about it, even though he had not been the agent for Howard’s work in many years, he still worked quietly behind the scenes, particularly in the area of scholarship.
As I noted above, everyone is moving on to other matters and the same is true on this website and blog. While we just wrapped up week of posts paying tribute the Father of Howard Fandom, fear not — Glenn will not be forgotten here on the TGR website. Shortly, a permanent page honoring Glenn will soon be placed online and from time to time you’ll see see posts about Glenn and the incredible contributions he made bringing the many lost Howardian treasures to light.
The future of any legacy is very fragile thing, but worry not – we will be handling it with care here on the TGR blog and will continue to give both Howard and Glenn the honors they so well deserve.