Darren Provine at Rowan University

Why Is Your Username ‘kilroy’?

This question comes up sometimes. Here are the short and long answers:

The Short Answer

Because.

The Long Answer

Giving the long answer would require a really long story, most of which probably isn't true. What's worse, it's been so long that even I can't say which parts are true anymore.

You may choose whichever answer you like better.

So what's the deal with the kilroy picture anyway?

The picture up above was created as a Suntools icon on a Sun 3/50, which was a spiffy machine at the time but is now obsolete. I made it with significant assistance from Jerry Wieber and Uncle Wayne Morrison, sometime in the summer of 1987. I don't have a link for Jerry, but you can see a picture of Uncle Wayne at http://triharpskel.com, playing a pipe next to his wife. Go there and buy a CD; I've got several and they're all excellent.

It was originally black & white. When I converted it the PNG you see above, I added transparency and colorized the fence.

As for the overall origin of "kilroy was here", and the image that goes with it, stories abound. The most plausible story I know of is at the Straight Dope website, What's the origin of "Kilroy was here"?.

There's more stuff than anyone should know at http://www.KilroyWasHere.org/.

Anything else?

Funny you should ask. I always spell kilroy in lowercase letters, even at the beginning of a sentence.