Duke Seifried

Bruce "Duke" Seifried (August 19, 1935 – September 29, 2018) was a creator and seller of military and fantasy miniatures for wargames and fantasy role-playing games. During his time as an executive and salesman at several miniature and game companies, he forged a bond between wargaming military miniatures and fantasy role-playing miniatures.

Early life Bruce Seifried, later nicknamed "Duke", was born in Janesville, Wisconsin. His father created and collected 54 mm military miniature soldiers, but did not allow young Bruce to touch them. When Bruce was older, his father gave Bruce some of his old casting molds he had sculpted in the 1930s. This led to Seifried teaching himself how to sculpt and cast his own.

Seifried had read The Lord of the Rings before it had become well-known, and corresponded briefly with J.R.R. Tolkien; later, when he was in England on business, he arranged to meet with the author. During his visit, Seifried offered to sculpt "some pewter Hobbits, Dwarves and Goblins" for Tolkien.

Heritage Models By 1976, Seifried was suffering from cash flow problems. Jim Oden, who in 1974 had founded Hinchcliffe Miniatures and opened The Royal Guardsmen, a Dallas retail store that sold military miniatures, was having the same problems. In January 1977, they agreed to merge Custom Cast and The Royal Guardsman into a new company, Heritage Models, With Gygax out of the way, the rest of the company was divided into three new divisions, resulting in the lay-offs of more than 70 employees, including Seifried. Shannon Appelcline described Seifried's layoff as "probably the most stunning, as he was in charge of TSR's new miniatures manufacturing — and was someone who really knew the business. Some suggested the reason was political, as Seifried had been among Gary Gygax's top supporters."

Awards and Legacy 1989: Midwest Wargamer's Association Award for Services to Wargaming. 1995: Jack Scruby Award 2010: Presented with Game Master Lifetime Achievement Award by the Historical Miniatures Gaming Society (HMGS), which was thereafter renamed the "Duke Seifried Game Master Lifetime Achievement Award".