As usual, I am very late in responding to the sad news of Tom Tenney's death.

Perhaps, my Tom Tenney anecdotes will make up for my tardiness.

The first (of three) anecdotes occurred during the MLA convention in Chicago, in 1995, as I recall. Dave Sloane, Tom, and I went the Art Institute for the afternoon. Tom left early, leaving Dave and me to wander what happened. When we inquired about it to taxi valets outside the building, Dave described Tom as Colonel Sanders of Kentucky Fried Chicken fame. The valet went loopy. He was ecstatic that he had out Colonel Sanders in a taxi.

The second involved an ALA conference in Baltimore. Several of us (Twainiacs and Humor Studies) had a tradition of visiting David Tomlinson at his house before and after his stroke. This story occurred at the last one, as I recall, probably 1997 or 1999. When it came time to leave, I ended up driving back to the hotel as Tom's passenger in his van. Now, if any one of you has been Tom's passenger, you know how the experience could produce white knuckle syndrome. In this case, he actually drove up a freeway ramp in the wrong direction. Fortunately, no crash occurred, we both survived, and we arrived at the hotel safely.

The third anecdote also involved Dave Sloane, Tom, and me and occurred at the last San Diego ALA conference. I had a rental car, and we all were free the Sunday afternoon after the conference ended, so we decided to drive down to the border, park the ca,r and walk over into Tijuana. I was interested in finding some Cohiba cigars, Dave was, as usual, interested in humor magazines, and Tom had an even more interesting pursuit: "Tijuana Bibles." We must have gone to twenty or more shops and stalls in markets in search of the "Bibles." He found many Mexican compact comics but no authentic "Bibles." If you don't know what Tijuana Bibles are, an internet search can provide that information.

As others have attested, Tom was an authentic human being, and I am happy to have had the pleasure of my experiences with him (although the Baltimore ride was decidedly scary).

Joe Alvarez
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"So it goes." - Kurt Vonnegut