In February 2023, I discovered the March 5, 1971 issue of the Stanford Chaparral, the school’s student humor magazine, containing the byline Dick Geikie.

I was amazed at the similarity of Dick Geikie to Dick Gaik, the penname of Richard Gaikowski.

The article in the Daily was about a computer music class. Computers are a known interest of Richard Gaikowski, who was an accomplished coder and a bit of an internet pioneer. At the time, I only had a scan of the cover of this issue, which appeared to be the front page of section two of the issue.

This discovery led to finding 6 bylines and additional staff box credits for Dick Geikie in the Stanford Daily student newspaper between June 25 and August 3, 1971. One of the bylines is the Chaparral computer music article re-printed in the Daily (or so I thought, more on that later this post).

Dick Geikie byline and name mentions in the Stanford Chaparral and Stanford Daily.

CHAPARRAL – March 5, 1971
The previously described issue. The Dick Geikie byline appears on page 1 of Section 2 of this issue. Be sure to read below for key information about this “issue.”

DAILY – June 25, 1971
The Stanford Daily printed an article by Dick Geikie on page seven titled Work-Study Program Initiated, about a program for Stanford Hospital workers.

DAILY – July 9, 1971
The Stanford Daily reprinted the March 5 Stanford Chaparral article by Dick Geikie about Computer Music. The article appears on page eight of the issue.

Now I thought that was strange, I had never known that the Chaparral and Daily to share articles, but it made sense to me after I thought about it. Both publications were in newsprint format in those days, and I imagined the Daily needed content during the summer session. Dick Geikie likely suggested to the Daily to rerun it. I added a new column to the spreadsheets I was making: Chappie – Daily Overlap.

In the staff box of that Daily issue, Dick Geikie is listed under the heading Staff.

DAILY – July 13, 1971
Dick Geikie finally made the front page of the Stanford Daily with an article, Campus Hosts Sixty Summer Workshops, about programs at Stanford that were available to the general public. For those looking for rational ways non-students could be on campus and not be out of place, here is some evidence. Presumed non-student Dick Geikie himself writes an article about it.

And if that sort of mild coincidence weren’t enough, this issue’s Once Around the Quad campus calendar has a listing for a regular closed meeting of the Radical Libertarian Alliance that very night, July 13, to be held in the Chaparral office.

“Who’s writing this shit?” I bemused.

I had thought that politics might have brought Richard to Stanford. I had thought that something like “radical libertarianism” might be right up his alley. “Buzz cut guys who called cops pigs” just sounded so much like Richard. A mix of right and left politics reminded me very much of my long conversations with Richard in the 1990s. Now here was someone named Dick Geikie in the same issue as the Radical Libertarians, in a “regular closed meeting” AT the Chaparral office. Who would believe it? I could hardly believe it.

DAILY – July 27, 1971
Dick Geikie co-wrote an article about the demise of the Midpeninsula Free University. That article contains an interview with Tim Coburn, a long-time Chaparral member and future editor. Tim Coburn was also a Chaparral evangelist. While working on the Chaparral book, I learned of at least five people who said they joined the Chaparral staff in the 1970s on the advice of Tim Coburn.

DAILY – July 30, 1971
The Daily printed an article by Dick Geikie titled Med Clinic set up in San Jose. The article includes a photo also credited to Dick Geikie. The Daily staff box of this issue lists Night Lackeys “…who wished to remain anonymous.”

DAILY – August 3, 1971
Page seven of this Daily issue lists Dick Geikie in the staff box under the heading Other Lackeys. The staff box shares the page with a Once Around the Quad listing for a Radical Libertarian Alliance meeting in the Chaparral office that night, with Dr. Eugene Bleck giving a talk on educational vouchers at the regular closed meeting.

DAILY – August 6, 1971
The bottom of the front page of this issue contains the article, Sci-Fi Medium for Speculation, by Dick Geikie. He is also listed in the staff box under the heading Night Staff, which also includes “and the masses.”

In May 2023, I visited Stanford and examined paper copies of the Chaparral issue, in the archives of the Chaparral and its alumni organization, the Hammer & Coffin Society, in both bound volumes and loose issues, as well as the collection at Stanford’s Green Library.

the Chaparral issue with the Dick Geikie byline is a fake, some sort of prank

It is a certainty that the Chaparral issue in question is a fake, or prank, in that it is entirely composed of Stanford Daily articles from July 7, 9, and 23, 1971. The assumed “reprint” of the computer article was not a reprint at all–it was the original from the July 9, 1971 Stanford Daily. The fake issue is made to appear that it is Section 2 of the real March 5, 1971 Chaparral. The masthead contains the words “Special Edition” and has the date of March 5, 1971, but was actually created sometime after July 23, 1971, the date of the last lifted article from the Daily.

And there’s more. The issue is 4 pages long, with pages 2 and 3 completely blank! Yes, I typed that. Pages 1 and 4 are normally laid out, albeit with lifted Daily articles, but 2 and 3 have nothing on them.

Not only is the fake issue recorded as real at the Library, not only is included in the bound volume records of the Chaparral and H&C, but it is folded into the copies kept in manila envelopes—loose unbound issues that are also part of the magazine’s archive process. Meaning: it was intentionally placed in the archives, intentionally made to look like it was from March 1971.

The featured photo of the fake issue is of a bike tire with the bike missing, presumably ripped off. The title of the caption is“THE MISSING LINK.”

Whether intended or just coincidence, THAT is funny. I have begun calling this issue “The Missing Link” because of this caption.

Here is the link again. The “Missing Link” issue starts on page 9, after the first 8 pages of the REAL March 5, 1971, Chaparral issue.

Attempts to identify Dick Geikie have been unsuccessful. Attempts to prove Dick Geikie was not Dick Gaik have been unsuccessful. Stanford University has confirmed that no Dick Geikie nor Richard Geikie ever was a student. In the 1970-71 Chaparral, there are a total of 29 total names with bylines or listed in the staff box. Three of these names are obvious joke names. Of the remaining 26 legitimate-looking names, I have been able to verify 25 of them, either by Google, other internet search, yearbooks, froshbooks, newspaper archives and the like. The sole name I have not been able to verify nor find is Dick Geikie.

I also have not been able to find another Dick Geikie byline in any other newspaper, only the 6 in the Stanford Daily. Even if it turns out this is not relevant, there sure are a lot of funny coincidences.

I have not seen it mentioned or conjectured anywhere that Gaikowski visited Stanford, but there is documented editorial and personnel overlap between the Stanford Chaparral and Good Times, so the idea that Gaikowski could have visited is entirely plausible. The Chaparral and the Daily also shared the same building in those days. There has always been overlap between the two student publications, and even more so in the protest era of the late 60s and early 70s.

Was Richard Gaikowski at Stanford writing under the pen name Dick Geikie? If so, that is a confirmed instance of Gaikowski modifying “Gaik.” If so, the probability rises that “GYKE” is also a modification.

Does “Geikie” take the Concerned Citizen letter’s “joke” one step farther by including “key” with “Gaik”?

Did Dick Geikie produce the fake Chaparral and slip it into the archives of the Chaparral and Hammer & Coffin Society? If so, why?

Who was Dick Geikie? Inquiring minds want to know…

Pages 384 and 395 of The Chappie – 125 Years of Issues, on sale here.