2025 Project Status Update

The Gygax Memorial Fund, Inc., a non-profit organization founded by Gary's widow, has worked for many years to get approval to build the memorial in Gary's hometown of Lake Geneva, WI. In 2024, during the 50th anniversary year of Dungeons & Dragons®, the city fully granted the land for the memorial in Gary's favorite place, in his favorite park, and accepted the future donation of the memorial to the City of Lake Geneva.

But how did we get here? Well in short, it was a long and difficult quest.

Our early fundraising efforts were good but without an approved location and final design for our project, fundraising became less of a focus. Instead, the GMF worked toward securing acceptance of the memorial by the City of Lake Geneva and the location Gary wanted in Library Park.

In the initial years of the fund (2009 to 2013) we raised $15k from individual fans and $50k in corporate donations (including $18k for the Premium Edition Book sales donated by Wizards of the Coast). Then, in 2012-2013 a wonderful donor stepped in and pledged $175k. We were elated but still had been unable to convince the City of Lake Geneva to permit us to build the memorial in Library Park, where Gary wished to be the site of his memorial. Shortly after this time, Gary’s widow became ill, and the project slowed. However, she still succeeded in getting the city to grant a site for the memorial. Unfortunately, after investigation, the site, Donian Park, ended up being restricted from building any such project within its boundaries.

Frustrated by the lack of progress and still recovering from her illness, Gary’s widow decided to bring on a new vice president, Paul Stormberg, to begin a campaign to re-invigorate the project. Unfortunately, just before Paul joined the GMF in 2019, our largest donor expressed that they did not think the site for the memorial would ever be approved by the city and, thus, the project never be completed. After a long discussion about a new direction for the fund and new design for the memorial, it was ultimately agreed to return the majority of their donation in 2022, with the hope the donor would rejoin the project when it was clear the city was willing to move forward.

Paul Stormberg was then named president of the GMF and immediately began a series of initiatives within the City of Lake Geneva to convince the city and its officials of Gary's impact on the City and the world:

All of these initiatives, their dedication ceremonies, newspaper and television coverage, and the many presentations to the various local civic councils, commissions, and boards, led the City to realize Gary's impact and importance to the town and the rest of the world. This culminated with the Park Board granting the use of the land in Library Park, the Planning Commission to approving the design, and the City Council to accept the donation of the memorial in 2024, on the 50th Anniversary of D&D®.

Of course, none of this was without cost. Over the 16 years of the fund’s existence, expenses have included: accountants, tax preparation, attorney fees, travel (over 10k miles on our President’s truck in one year!), convention appearances, city presentations, dedication ceremonies, artists, surveyors, architects, sculpture consultants, domain and website management, etc. It all averaged out to about $4-5k of expenditures each year. It took time and considerable effort but we have accomplished our mission of securing the site and design for the project.

The expenditure of these funds donated to the project were absolutely essential to accomplishing our goal. Were it not for those early contributions and the necessary expenditure of those funds to keep our quest going, it would have been impossible to convince the city to support a memorial to Gary, let alone secure the prestigious location in Library Park, the absolute crown jewel of Lake Geneva.

Fiscal Responisibility

The GMF has been managed by a professional accounting firm since our inception, we have reported to the state of Wisconsin every year and remain in good standing as a non-profit. We have filed our taxes every year and remain in good standing with both the state and federal government as a non-profit. We have posted all of these documents and our loss and earnings statements to our website or they are freely available online since we are a public non-profit. You can see exactly how the money has been spent. In short, we have done everything we are required to do by law and then some, to be transparent and in good standing with the State of Wisconsin and the Federal Government.

You can verify all this information from our publicly available resources here:

From those documents you will see we have spent about $4-5k+ per year, on average, and a break down of how all funds were spent. You will also see we agreed to return a portion of a major donor's pledge, mentioned above, in 2022, when they felt the city would not grant us Library Park and therefore never allow the memorial to be completed. We remain hopeful the donor will re-engage as we go forward with the Kickstarter.

There was major spending in 2022 and 2023 as we ramped up our initiatives, promotions, and city-wide festival, Dragon Days. All essential for convincing the City of Lake Geneva to grant us the site and accept to donation of the memorial. And, despite the documents saying we have a negative balance, that is just our current liabilities and total balances owed. In fact most of these liabilities will be cleared by fundraising income from our recent Dragon Days Fantasy Festival on October 4th and 5th, 2025.

Renewed Fundraising

That brings us to today, with a renewed fundraising campaign on Kickstarter to finally realize what the fans have wanted for years.

Our Kickstarter began October 1st, 2025, on the anniversary of Gary Gygax founding his company TSR to publish Dungeons & Dragons®--a game that would change the world. All previous donors will receive commensurate rewards to those participating in the Kickstarter and those donors who wish to add to their donation will receive credit toward their new donation level.

So, roll for initiative! Be our hero and help build this amazing memorial for fans of Dungeons & Dragons®, dedicated to Gary Gygax, in his hometown of Lake Geneva, WI.