Emru Townsend

Emru as I remember him.

Emru Townsend passed away last night after a lengthy battle with leukemia.

I can't remember how and when I first "met" Emru. He was probably the one to contact me in the days when the internet was mostly usenet groups and email lists. He approached me to write about the production of Monster By Mistake and I was grateful for the opportunity. He was the editor of fps, a Canadian magazine devoted to animation and my TV special was an early example of an all-cgi half hour. He gave me another chance to publicize the show when it went to series and I continued to write reviews for fps thereafter when it migrated to the web.

Emru and I were also members of Apatoons, a private publication about animation that's been going on longer than The Simpsons.

I only met Emru face to face two or three times, and I think that all the meetings may have taken place at the Ottawa Animation Festival. The one thing that struck me about Emru in person was his great baritone voice, one that was made for radio.

Emru was someone who made things happen. Lots of people have ideas or complain that the world is deficient in some way. Emru turned ideas into reality. Creating a magazine from scratch and getting it distributed is not an easy task, and it doesn't get any easier when the subject matter is animation. Emru attracted people like a magnet and was able to organize them so that there was a tangible result.

That organizational ability served him well during his illness. He used all his media savvy to publicize his situation; he needed a bone marrow transplant and had to find someone who was a match. He and his family (especially his sister Tamu), mounted a campaign that included a website and blog, email lists, newspaper articles and radio interviews, all focused on publicizing the need for people to provide samples for the bone marrow database. His ethnic group, the Afro-Caribbean community, is under-represented and one goal of his crusade was to register more people in that community so that they would have an easier time if they were unfortunate enough to be in Emru's position. For all the work that Emru did with fps, with the Siggraph organization, with the larger animation community, it will probably be dwarfed over time by the work done by him, his friends and family to expand the bone marrow database. We'll never know how many lives that database may save in the future as a result of their efforts.

Emru's illness was not easy or pleasant. In addition to the effects of the disease itself, he suffered with the problems associated with chemotherapy: exhaustion, fuzzy-headedness, and mouth sores. It suppressed his immune system, so he spent time in hospital wards where he could only be visited by people wearing masks and gowns as he was in danger of infection. There were other complications having to do with his heart rate and his legs swelling. Through all the treatments and over 40 transfusions, Emru wrote about his illness. There was no self-pity in those reports; Emru approached his illness like a journalist, documenting everything he went through dispassionately. This is what's known as grace under pressure.

Emru found a match for the transplant and underwent the procedure in September. Unfortunately, it didn't relieve his condition. He knew several weeks ago that there was nothing else doctors could do for him and that it was only a matter of time. Time ran out yesterday evening.

I've lost a friend, animation has lost an advocate, and the Townsend family now has a hole it in that will never be filled up. Emru is survived by his wife Vicky, his son Max, his sister Tamu, and his parents and in-laws. I know something of what they went through and I don't envy them the pain and uncertainty that has dominated their lives since Emru got sick. There's nothing left to say except that I hope that his family can find solace from how much we'll miss him and most especially from the way Emru lived his life. We're richer for having known him.

Good Photograph

Emru Townsend, founder and editor of fps, has been suffering from leukemia and monosomy 7. His family, especially sister Tamu, have been campaigning to raise awareness of bone marrow registration. If somebody needs a bone marrow transplant and no members of their immediate family are a match, the next step is to search databases worldwide, hoping to find someone, somewhere, who can provide a match. The Townsend family has worked hard not only to locate someone for Emru but also to increase the size of the database so that others in need have a better chance of finding a match.

The reason this is a good photograph is that Emru had his bone marrow transplant on September 16. He is posing here with the donor stem cells. I certainly hope that the transplant does its job and starts Emru on the road to recovery. He's a longtime booster of animation in its many forms and the sooner he can resume his normal life, the better for us all.

If you're interested in details of Emru's story or how you can add yourself to the bone marrow registry, the best place to go is here, where Emru and family have documented his experiences.

You Can Be a Hero!

I avoid putting personal material on this blog. For one thing, I'm a private person. For another, I assume that readers come here for a discussion relating to animation, not about what I had for breakfast.

This really isn't about me, except as background material. My mother died last summer from Hodgkins Lymphoma. My father currently has pancreatic cancer. I've spent a fair amount of time at Memorial Sloan Kettering, the cancer hospital in New York City where both my parents received treatment. Sitting in the waiting rooms and walking through the hallways, it's astounding how many people are being treated for cancer. While some of these people may have engaged in behavior or occupations that put them at risk, the majority are just unlucky. Cancer doesn't discriminate much in terms of age, sex or ethnicity.

I went to school briefly with Glenn McQueen, the Pixar supervising animator who passed away several years ago from cancer. Recently, two people I admire, musician Jeff Healey and artist Dave Stevens, both died of cancer at relatively young ages.

Since my mother became ill, I've lost my innocence. Cancer was something exotic that didn't touch my life. Now, the damned thing is everywhere. Another friend, Emru Townsend, is battling leukemia and a condition called monosomy 7, which complicates his treatment.

You may know fps. It started as a print magazine about animation and has become a website. Emru is the founder and runs it. He's also worked as a technical writer for animation software companies, so if you're in the business, you may have read some of his words. He's using his media savvy to publicize his situation, hoping that print and the internet will help his cause. The best thing about it is that no matter what happens, his campaign will definitely help others.

Emru needs a bone marrow transplant. The tough part is finding somebody who is a genetic match. All it takes for a potential donor to be tested is a saliva swab or a blood sample. The odds of you being the person who matches Emru are, frankly, pretty low. But the odds of you matching somebody needing a transplant are higher. Emru is urging people to provide samples to the world-wide database. With every additional sample, the odds for Emru and those with similar needs get better.

If you have encountered cancer, you know how tough the treatment is and how stressful it is to contemplate an uncertain future. Anything that offers hope is a valuable gift. You may offer someone that gift by providing a sample. The terrible irony is that someday you may need that gift and Emru's campaign may provide it for you.

Visit healemru.com for more details and click the graphic above to learn more about how and where to provide a sample.