March 12th, 2026

Curt Fennell passed in March of 2025 after a brief but vicious battle with Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, due to his time stationed at Camp Lejune as an active-duty Marine. He was many things; a webmaster, an actor, a singer, a Marine Corps veteran, a friend, a husband. But to me, he was just Dad.

I have to admit, I’m struggling to come up with the right words for this. I barely have the words to explain the impact he had on me as a dad, let alone the impact he had on others and the Dolphins fan space. But for him, I’ll do my best.

My dad was one of my favorite people in the whole world and I miss him every single day. He was kind, he was funny, and he loved terrible jokes. He was quiet and introverted, and could come off as grumpy before you got to know him, but beneath that he was a not-so-secret marshmallow. We shared a love of science fiction, fantasy, and musical theater.

To fellow webmasters and fans of his site, my dad was affectionately known as the Godfather. He founded this site in 1993, predating the official Miami Dolphins webpage (not to mention predating me, his daughter) and making it the oldest Dolphins website in existence.

He brought home countless glass awards from Web Weekend (an annual event where the team invited the webmasters of Dolphins fan sites to Miami). I don’t know for certain how many he had, but he had enough that my mother made him cull his collection when they moved to Florida in 2019.

When my dad passed last year, my mom and I were overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support from the Dolphins community. We even received condolence flowers from the team themselves. I wanted to thank you all for your kind words and support. I don't think I'd truly realized his impact on the community until he was gone. Unlike my dad, I'm not really a football fan (blasphemy, I know), so I hadn't interacted much with the Dolphins community before.

As the new webmaster, I have some pretty big shoes to fill, but I am so grateful to have the community in my corner as I do so. Admittedly, I don’t know much about being a webmaster, and I know even less about football, but this site is part of my dad’s legacy. It didn’t feel right to put the site in someone else's hands. I didn't want to lose this piece of him. So, I’m going to do my best to run Phins the way he would’ve wanted. For both my dad, and the community who loved him so much.

So, with much love and many thanks,

Thea Fennell
Goddaughter

I'd always love to hear more about my dad. If you have stories or photos to share, or even if you just want to say hello, you can reach me at thea@phins.com.