September 2017 - 36

Henry Francis 1926-2017
By Paul Linxwiler

F

or an entire generation of players,
Henry Francis was the Bridge
Bulletin. A 25-year editor at the
Boston Herald Traveler and an
experienced player and director,
Francis was the perfect choice as
captain of the magazine when the
League moved from the East Coast to
Memphis in 1972, and his flair for the
job made him popular with players
across the world. During his 25-year
tenure as executive editor, Francis
relished playing the role as the king of
bridge press, and it was this persona
that charmed legions of fans.
In addition to being at the helm of
the Bridge Bulletin magazine, Francis
edited Daily Bulletins at the North
American and world championships
for three decades. His experience as
a newspaper editor made him adept
at handling the tight deadlines and
long hours required for producing
those publications. Francis was also
editor-in-chief for three editions of the
Official Encyclopedia of Bridge, the
massive compendium of bridge history,
trivia, biographies and records.
The ACBL twice presented Francis
with its top accolades for his long and
distinguished service.
In 1998, Francis was named the
ACBL Honorary Member of the Year.
And in 2003, Francis was inducted into
the ACBL Hall of Fame as winner of
the Blackwood Award.
Frank Stewart, the longtime Bridge
Bulletin columnist and a former
member of the editorial staff, praised
Francis in a 1997 article from the
magazine about Henry's retirement:
"What a superb editor Henry has been.
He could come up with a perfect headline, and he could suggest just the right
change in wording to make a sentence
sparkling clear. He could analyze a
hand and write about it with flair, and

36 Bridge Bulletin September 2017

he could do a profile of a player
with insight and taste. He could
conceive articles and he could
read proof and he could handle
a reader's complaint and he
could do layout and he could
do budget. He had the energy
and intellect to do a half dozen
things at once and do them
well."
Brent Manley, who joined
the editorial staff in 1989 and
took over as executive editor upon
Francis's retirement in 1997, wrote,
"Henry was my first boss at ACBL, and
he was the best boss I ever had. We got
along well because of our love of bridge
and nearly identical backgrounds in
the newspaper business.
"Henry was always supportive and
patient with my missteps as I learned
about magazine editing and production. He was a good teacher and he
was a role model for me as a manager.
I learned a lot. Our skills matched well
in producing countless issues of Daily
Bulletins at the NABCs.
"Because he served for years as a
tournament director before becoming
Bridge Bulletin editor, Henry had a
wealth of wonderful stories from that
part of his career. The Bridge Bulletin
staff heard many of them multiple
times, but we never tired of Henry's
stories."
At his Hall of Fame induction in
2003, Francis shared several such
stories, including this one about his
introduction to top-level directing that
was sparked by an unfortunate incident at a club game in Boston.
"I was called to the table to make a
mundane ruling about a revoke. The
man and woman against whom I made
the ruling protested, so I repeated the
ruling ... straight out of the rule book.
"The next day, I learned that the

husband had suffered a heart attack
and died. The woman, who was
understandably upset, blamed me for
his death, and even went so far as to
file charges. Nothing ever came of the
charges, of course, but soon afterwards,
I was invited to become part of
the directing staff of the Eastern
States Regional with the great Harry
Goldwater. Goldwater (notorious for
some of his quips) had asked me to
come because he wanted the guy who
'can kill people with his rulings.'"
Francis said that Goldwater immediately assigned him to the floor of the
tournament and instructed Francis to
pull no punches.
"I want five appeals tonight!" said
Goldwater.
Francis complied. "I had six," he said,
proudly.
Henry Francis, 91, died at his home
in Memphis on Aug. 1. He is survived
by his wife, Dorthy, and five of six children from his first wife, Rose, who died
in 1974, and many grandchildren. The
extended Francis family includes children and grandchildren from Dorthy's
first marriage.
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of September 2017
