Tom Uffner: Mad Scientist of Inebriation
For anyone who ever hung out at the Deer Park Tavern in Newark, DE from 1989 until about 1999, you’ll be sad to hear that a prominent fixture in that area’s local scene passed away of cancer earlier this week. Tom Uffner, otherwise known as “that dude who sold me some good weed” or the Mad Scientist of Inebriation will no longer be on the scene.
Usually sporting a tie-died shirt, long hair and beard, Tom’s easy-going personality and unique speech pattern might’ve gotten him beaten up in faster-paced environs, but in the college town of Newark, his monotone drawl and economy of words were seen as disarming and endearing. Tom was well-liked by most, but the people who liked him best were those looking to score high-quality pot.
Tom was respected as the main marijuana connection to most college students, musicians and stoners in Newark during the entirety of the 1990s. On any given night at his main haunt, the Deer Park Tavern, Tom would be casually minding his own business and nursing a beer while dozens of potential pot buyers orbited around him. And he was revered by these people with guru-like status. He was also like the only pretty girl at a party full of frat guys. Everyone wanted what he had, but he usually played hard to get.
And Tom was no typical stoner. It was rare that anyone ever smoked with him. He was smarter than that and was very clever about keeping his side hustle on the downlow. He was also a very intelligent person in general, which surprised you after you got past his Tommy Chong-like appearance and barbiturate-slow speech pattern.
But in 1996, Tom’s legend caught up with him as he somehow ran afoul of the law. I remember talking to Tom over a few beers in the game room at the Deer Park as he told me details of his trial and upcoming sentence. He was scheduled to be behind bars for a little more than a year for charges of possession with intent to distribute a good amount of high-end weed as well as several hits of acid.
He didn’t seem angry, worried or upset about it. It went with the territory that he traversed with eyes wide open, and we discussed him writing a column for Big Shout Magazine of his thoughts on his days in prison, while still incarcerated. He of course was an advocate for the legalization of marijuana and he wanted a soapbox to talk about that. Unfortunately, this never transpired because a few months later I sold the magazine and then lost touch with Tom for about a decade.
I was never a customer of Tom’s, so that’s not how we met. I actually met him through my younger brother who was pursuing a Computer Science degree at the University of Delaware while I was finishing up my English degree there. Tom was a classmate of my brother’s and I think he actually introduced me to Tom at the Deer Park.
Years later I would run into Tom there hundreds of times and we would usually stand with beers in hand, silently people watching. I appreciated that he didn’t feel the need to keep verbal patter going to avoid uncomfortable silence.
But when we did talk, he would enlighten me on his scientific theories on inebriation. The most memorable thing he ever told me was his theory that his buzz traveled along a bell-shaped curve, depending upon how many beers he had. He actually felt more inebriated within the first 2-3 beers and then drank himself into clarity during beers 4-7. But upon drinking his eighth beer, he would hit a wall. I never forgot that and have referred to his theory ever since.
He also became scientific with his alcohol consumption. He was no beer connoisseur, so since beer quality didn’t matter to him, he knew he could achieve the sweet spot of his inebriated state drinking Pabst Blue Ribbon. By drinking that beer instead of the more-expensive Guinness Stout, he figured by every fourth beer he could treat himself to a shot of Jameson whiskey with the money he’d saved by drinking PBR instead of Guinness.
The last time I saw Tom was at the first ever Ticked Off Music Fest Lyme disease benefit concert I hosted at the World Cafe Live at the Queen in Wilmington, DE in June of 2013. Tom was there supporting a mutual friend who had Lyme disease and he helped run our info booth. It was great to see him, but because I was hosting, speaking and also playing in a band I had hastily assembled just for that gig, I didn’t have time to catch up with him. I was also unnerved that one of his eyes was protruding a bit and I didn’t have time to ask him if he was having health difficulties.
I was later to find out that Tom had cancer deep in his sinuses and that was the reason for his eye trouble, but it would be almost six years before he would succumb to the illness.
Tom, I will always cherish our conversations, your gentle nature, and your wry way of looking at the world. You were a true original and the world is worse for your passing.
Special thanks to Margaret Melson for the vintage photo of Tom and the PBR/Guinness story.
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