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Looking back at the OP, it seems the OP's Dad thinks fantasy started in recent years.
In fact, there's been a thriving fantasy publishing history since the early 19th century, and even earlier. After all, what is A Midsummer Night's Dream if it isn't fantasy?
Fantasy in the 19th and 20th centuries drifted in and out of the "weird" category, and the magazine "Weird Tales" carried a great deal of fantasy in the 1930s.
King Solomon's Mines isn't fantasy-- the mines were a popular myth of the era, and the warriors of Kukuanaland, while warriors of a mythical kingdom, are closely based on reality. The "She" books are fantasy, having as they do a central character who lives forever by bathing in a magical fire.
William Hope Hodgson, a leading fantasy writer, is noted for "The House on the Borderland" (1908) which is very definitely fantasy, way before Tolkien, and nothing like him.
If we just look at post-Tolkien fantasy, it's obvious that there's an awful lot of derivative stuff riding on that particular bandwagon, but there are plenty who do not. I mentioned R A Lafferty, definitely post-Tolkien and owing nothing at all to him, as one I've read.
I'm not much of a fantasy reader, so I haven't kept up with the current scene, except Terry Pratchett. And, as I say, Lafferty.
I note that the Wikipedia entry on Fantasy as a literary genre is very scant indeed.
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