John Rocco Roberto celebrates Christmas in 2004 in his usual self-deprecating style.
Two years ago, in December 2007, John Rocco Roberto passed away. Not only was he one of the founding fathers of modern Godzilla fandom, helping establish G-FAN and G-CON, but he was a friendly, funny, down-to-earth guy. I had several phone conversations with him that I still cherish to this day. When he wasn't telling me about what things were like in the good old days of the '90s, he had me in stitches with his unique sense of humor.
John sent me the above photo during Christmas in 2004. I recently remembered that I still had the picture and wanted to share it. It really captures the lighter side of John's personality.
I only wish I'd be receiving more photos like it.
I have respect for this man. Just too bad that he and JD split up, with John forming Ultra-Fan (later Kaiju Fan). He will be sorely missed. May I suggest a link:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=by-g2KEHoG8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9cF67pFQYWU
I've seen those YouTube links, Evan, and enjoyed them. Also, just to clarify, Ultra-Fan was actually founded as a sister publication to G-FAN, the idea being that Ultra-Fan would cover TV topics that G-FAN didn't. When J.D. and John split, John kept Ultra-Fan (which had been renamed Kaiju-Fan after the now-defunct Ultracom in L.A. complained about the Ultra-Fan title) as his own publication, and it became a "rival" fanzine. Kaiju-Fan was a quality magazine. Thankfully, I have the entire run.
ReplyDeleteThanks for clearing that up.
ReplyDeleteThe G-cons are now the stuff of legends, those were great days with John, Guy, and everbody. Great memories, John is very muched missed.
ReplyDeleteIm a student of his, and I really loved him. As a teacher, as a friend. its been about to be 3 years on Dec.6th and i think about him all the time.
ReplyDeletei miss him dearly.....and i miss his jokes.
he used to let some of his favorite student, that were willing to learn, come to his room during lunch time and he'd order chinese food.
he got in trouble for it, and we'd skip the next week and then we'd do it again :)
he was awesome.
Often during his free periods we'd see him working on these sites. it was his place to get away....and DE-stress himself from school, and home.
im sure this means nothing to most of you....
but i thought it would be nice to share with someone who knew him.
Thank you so much for commenting. I'm glad to have the perspective of one of his students.
ReplyDeleteThanks everyone for posting here and for saying such great things about my brother. He is missed dearly but always in our minds and hearts. Thanks again
ReplyDeleteMike Roberto
Many thanks for stopping by, Michael. It's a nice surprise and much appreciated.
ReplyDeleteI've been watching some old G-con videos (ones that I attended even back then) and it was good to see JRR and others we lost like Guy Tucker. Really makes me yearn for a time when we were just happy to meet a fellow G-fan. JRR prophesied a few things in Evan's videos (see above) that was impressive. Thanks for doing this tribute.
ReplyDelete