How the Real Sam Gamgee Contacted J.R.R. Tolkien When He Learned His Name Was in ‘Lord of the Rings’
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Celebreabird shared the fascinating story of how a man with the name Sam Gamgee wrote author J.R.R. Tolkien in 1956 because he found out that his unusual name was used in The Lord of the Rings after hearing the radio series and wanted to know how the author came to use that particular name.
A surprised Tolkien responded to Gamgee in a very kind manner, stating that he was very familiar with the family name and that the namesake character was quite beloved, and after further correspondence, Tolkien then offered to send all three volumes of LOTR to Gamgee. This exchange is known as Letter 184".
18 March 1956 As from 76 Sandfield Road, Headington, Oxford
Dear Mr Gamgee,
It was very kind of you to write. You can imagine my astonishment, when I saw your signature! I can only say, for your comfort I hope, that the Sam Gamgee' of my story is a most heroic character, now widely beloved by many readers, even though his origins are rustic. So that perhaps you will not be displeased by the coincidence of the name of this imaginary character (of supposedly many centuries ago) being the same as yours. The reason of my use of the name is this. I lived near Birmingham as a child, and we used gamgee' as a word for cotton-wool'; so in my story the families of Cotton and Gamgee are connected. I did not know as a child, though I know now, that Gamgee' was shortened from gamgee-tissue', and that [it was] named after its inventor (a surgeon I think) who lived between 1828 and 1886.
TIL that Tolkien once got a letter from a man named Sam Gamgee who just found out that his name was in the LOTRMore About Samwise
byu/cestrumnocturnum inlotr
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ThanksChip Beale!