Today Oz has an even stronger grip. I frequently dress as L. Frank for students and fans, and pass off bits of his wit and life as if I were he. My wife joins me as Maud, complaining about my midnight note taking on her wallpaper! The cause of this affliction is clear -- The International Wizard of Oz Club. What noteworthy author’s relative could ask for anything more? Innumerable researchers work long hours to gather and interpret my great grandfather’s life and work – and publish their findings in a magazine called The Baum Bugle.
What do I owe to the Club and the Bugle? Why, everything Oz. They’ve made Oz not just a “dream,” but a real place to my family and to all fans everywhere. Robert A. Baum
Bob Baum actively supports the IWOC as a board member, featured presenter at Club events, and source of extraordinary contributions to our publications.
I was 15 in 1957, but it was years before I knew the Oz Club existed. L. Frank Baum was my great grandfather and a subject of conversation on occasion. There was a sense of pride in his accomplishment, but it did not have the power over me that it has today. I simply took the extraordinary collection around me for granted -- having no idea it meant something outside the family.
That began to change when Peter Hanff and Dick Martin found my grandparents, Rob and Edna, and their collection of books, scrapbooks and “Oz stuff.” Their interest and that of Fred Meyer exposed me to the Oz virus. I struggled through periods of youthful resistance. My collecting was spotty. As a Club member I ran hot and cold -- making it infrequently to local conventions.
That changed when I inherited the Family collection. Handling the inscribed books, photos and clippings that became mine brought the legacy home. The Oz virus took hold.
