Jan 08 #1 Scuttlebutt from the Spermaceti Press "A long weekend of Sherlockian activities, largely involving too much food and even more drink," was Michel Dirda's forecast in his "Dirda on Books" on-line conversation at , and the description cer- tainly was appropriate. The festivities began with the now-traditional ASH Wednesday supper at O'Casey's, and the Christopher Morley Walk was led by Jim Cox and Dore Nash on Thursday morning (with lunch at McSorley's). The Baker Street Irregulars' Distinguished Speaker at the Williams Club on Thursday evening was Sir Christopher Frayling, who presented a fascinating report on the genesis of "The Hound of the Baskervilles" based on new in- formation revealed in Conan Doyle's pocket diary for 1901. You'll be able to read his lecture in The Baker Street Journal later this year (see below for information on how to subscribe). On Friday members of The Hounds of the Internet met informally at the bar at Moran's Chelsea Seafood Restaurant before the William Gillette Luncheon; the luncheon featured The Friends of Bogie's at Baker Street (Paul Single- ton, Sarah Montague, and Andrew Joffe) in a reprise of their 1984 presenta- tion of excerpts from the Canon as written by Chandler, Shakespeare, Pin- ter, Joyce, and Milne. And Otto Penzler's traditional Mysterious Bookshop open house offered the usual opportunities to browse and buy. The Gillette Luncheon also featured Evelyn Herzog's announcement of 19 new members of The Adventuresses of Sherlock Holmes, a society for many years XX-rated (with regard to chromosomes), until 1991, when four men were made full members (with Investitures). At the end of 2006 men were invited to make ASHes of themselves by applying for membership, and the new members are: John F. Baesch ("Cardinal Tosca"), Peter J. Crupe ("The Noble Bache- lor"), Allan Devitt ("The Criterion Bar"), Joe Fink ("Tonga"), Alexian Gregory ("The Coptic Monasteries of Syria and Egypt"), Andrew Joffe ("The Dog That Did Nothing in the Night-Time"), Roger Johnson ("Shinwell John- son"), Robert S. Katz ("Dr. Jackson"), Brad Keefauver ("Something Hunt"), William Nadel ("These Modern Gramophones"), Andrew J. Peck ("The Date Be- ing-?"), Warren Randall ("An Impish Habit"), Christopher Redmond ("The Glamour of His Convictions"), Philip A. Shreffler ("Radix Pedis Diaboli"), Andrew L. Solberg ("Professor Coram"), Thom Utecht ("Montague Street"), Edwin Van der Flaes ("Nonpareil Club"), Bill Vande Water ("A Very Ordinary Individual After All"), and Ben Vizoskie ("Briarbrae"). The Beacon Society gathered for its annual meeting at the Algonquin on Fri- day afternoon; the group's mission is to encourage and recognize programs that introduce young people to Holmes, and the winner of this year's Beacon award was Watson's Tin Box (the society was honored for its sponsorship of an annual student essay-writing competition). The Irregulars and their guests gathered for the BSI's annual dinner at the Union League Club, and Heloise Rathbone (granddaughter of Basil Rathbone) was honored as the "highly irregular" guest at the reception, offering some fine stories about her grandfather. The dinner featured the usual toasts and traditions (including Andy Fusco's imaginative and ad-lib rendition of the Constitution and Buy-Laws), Michael Dirda's tribute to Vincent Starrett Jan 08 #2 (this year being the 75th anniversary of the publication of his THE PRIVATE LIFE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES), Betsy Rosenblatt's stirr- ing up-date of Samuel Rosenberg's NAKED IS THE BEST DISGUISE, Ray Betzner's toast to Old Irregular Vincent Starrett, a tribute in song (with words by Henry Boote) to the four senior Irregulars present at the dinner (Art Lev- ine, David Weiss, Peter Blau, and George McCormack), and much more. Mike Whelan (the BSI's "Wiggins") announced the Birthday Honours, awarding Irregular Shillings and Investitures to Betsy Rosenblatt ("Lucy Ferrier"), Dana Richards ("The Priory School"), Dave Morrill ("Count Von Kramm"), Bar- bara Roisman Cooper ("Mary Maberley"), Randall Stock ("South African Secur- ities"), John Genova ("Harry Pinner"), and Guy Marriott ("The Grand Hotel du Louvre"). Mike also presented the BSI's Two-Shilling Award (for extraordinary devo- tion to the cause beyond the call of duty) to Sherry Rose-Bond, and the Ed- itor's Medal to Roy Pilot, Al Rosenblatt, and Christopher and Barbara Rod- en, in recognition of their services as editors of books and Christmas Ann- uals published by the BSI. The Gaslight Gala, held at the Manhattan Club, celebrated "Damsels in Dis- tress" with toasts, music and song (by the Gaslight Damsels and Dudes), a skit ("That Was No Lady, That Was My Watson"), Donny Zaldin as "Carnac the Magnificent, Sherlock Style", Don Hobbs' Sherlockian video tour of "Texas, Oklahoma, and perhaps Arkansas", a raffle (a sweatshirt donated by Cynthia Wein), and an auction. On Saturday morning the dealers room at the Algonquin welcomed (as usual) sellers and buyers, and at 10:30 The Clients of Adrian Mulliner (devotees of the works of both Wodehouse and Watson) gathered for their Junior Blood- stain, which featured a dramatic reading of Marilyn MacGregor's dramatiza- tion of Poul Anderson and Gordon R. Dickson's 1953 pastiche "The Adventure of the Misplaced Hound". The BSI's Saturday-afternoon cocktail party was again at the New York City Bar Association, with entertainment in the auditorium, and wining, dining, and conversation in their reception room. The entertainment began with a performance of Jerome Coopersmith's one-act play "The Other Side" (starring Paul Singleton and Elyse Locurto as Harry and Bess Houdini, and Bob Thoma- len and Mary Ellen Rich as Sir Arthur and Lady Conan Doyle), and continued with Al and Betsy Rosenblatt's poetic report on events of the previous year and the previous evening, and Mary Ann Bradley's introduction of the ladies who have been honored by the BSI as the Woman. Ray Betzner was announced as the winner of the Morley-Montgomery Award (an attractive certificate and a check for $500) for the best contribution to The Baker Street Journal last year: his article "The Wicked Beginnings of a Baker Street Classic!" And the John H. Watson Fund benefited from energet- ic sales of raffle tickets (by June Kinnee, Sue Vizoskie, Elaine Coppola, and Carol Cavaluzzi) for a prize donated by Patricia Guy: a bottle of 1985 Masi Amarone ("A census taker tried to quantify me once. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a big Amarone," Hannibal Lecter said, in THE SI- LENCE OF THE LAMBS). Jan 08 #3 The Watson Fund (administered by a carefully anonymous Dr. Wat- son) offers financial assistance to all Sherlockians (member- ship in the BSI is not required) who might otherwise not be able to parti- cipate in the birthday festivities. The generous donors to the this year's auction were Maggie Schpak and the Curious Collectors of Baker Street (a glamorous replica of the Beryl Coronet), Joe Copolla and the Mycroft Holmes Society (an arts-and-crafts style hand-crafted bracket clock), Gail Postal (an oil portrait of Sherlock Holmes), Elaine Coppola (Google's official la- pel pin with their Sherlockian logo from May 22, 2005), and Joanne Zahor- sky-Reeves (a custom tailored replica of Sherlock Holmes' dressing gown). A Saturday-evening event was the "Lost in New York with a Bunch of Sher- lockians" dinner at Kennedy's Irish Restaurant, where Sherlockian from at least five nations joined Chrys Kegley and The Curious Collectors of Baker Street for additional festivities (including a traditional reading from Og- den Nash's THE PRIMROSE PATH). Many Sherlockians (and a few non-Sherlock- ians) also attended an evening performance of "Sherlock: Solo", a one-man play that written and performed by Victor Cahn. And Sunday morning a con- vivial group of visiting and local long-weekenders gathered at the Oldcas- tle Pub & Restaurant for a brunch arranged by the Adventuresses of Sherlock Holmes. I've not reported on everything, I hasten to add; if you want more details than I've provided here, there will be much more in The Baker Street Jour- nal, which is published quarterly and costs $26.50 a year ($29.00 outside the U.S.), and checks (credit-card payments accepted from foreign subscrib- ers) should be sent to the BSJ (Box 465, Hanover, PA 17331); and there's an option offering a subscription to the BSJ and to the Christmas Annual for $36.50 (or $40.00 foreign). You can also subscribe at the BSJ web-site at , where there's additional interesting materi- al such as some of the papers written by past winners of the Morley-Mont- gomery Awards, articles from recent issues of the BSJ, and information on the BSI's other publications. And a final note, for those who are planning ahead: The Baker Street Irreg- ulars' next annual dinner will be held on Jan. 9, 2009, honoring the 150th anniversary of the birth of Arthur Conan Doyle and the 75th anniversary of the founding of the BSI. And planning continues for the BSI's "A Study in Scarlet" excursion to Salt Lake City (Aug. 29-Sept. 1), and for the Arthur Conan Doyle Symposium at Harvard University's Houghton Library in Cambridge (May 7-9, 2009). "A REMARKABLE MIXTURE": AWARD-WINNING ARTICLES FROM THE BAKER STREET JOUR- NAL, edited and introduced by Steven Rothman (New York: Baker Street Irreg- ulars, 2007; 362 pp., $35.00), is an anthology of the writings of winners of the Morley-Montgomery Award, from Poul Anderson in 1958 to Harold Bill- ings in 2006. The award was established by Lew David Feldman in honor of Christopher Morley and James Montgomery, and honors the author of the best contribution to The Baker Street Journal in the preceding year; the antho- logy is a fine demonstration of how interesting the BSJ has been, and is. By mail: (2 Dettling Road, Maynard, MA 01754); $35.00 plus shipping: $3.95 (North America) or $9.95 (elsewhere) plus $1.50 for each additional copy. You can also order on-line at . Jan 08 #4 George MacDonald Fraser died on Jan. 2. An excellent writer, he was best-known for a long series of novels about the pica- resque coward, bully, and womanizer Harry Flashman; Fraser also wrote fine screenplays and insightful introductions to reprints of THE WHITE COMPANY/ SIR NIGEL and THE EXPLOITS AND ADVENTURES OF BRIGADIER GERARD. His Flash- man series debuted in 1969, and "Flashman & the Tiger" was first published in the Daily Express in 1975 and collected in FLASHMAN AND THE TIGER, AND OTHER EXTRACTS FROM THE FLASHMAN PAPERS (Oct 99 #4); it's a splendid tale: the "tiger" is Col. Sebastian Moran, with whom Flashman had three encount- ers (this being the third, in an empty house in Baker Street in 1894). Fraser's introduction to THE EXPLOITS AND ADVENTURES OF BRIGADIER GERARD is available on-line at ; click on "Read the introduction" (kindly reported by Cliff Goldfarb). The book is still in print, as is THE COMPLETE BRIGADIER GERARD, published by Barnes & Noble in 2005 with an introduction by Cliff, and you can read his introduc- tion on-line as well, at (use their "see inside" feature). The famous/infamous "tent joke" was unveiled to The Hounds of the Internet in July 1998, and seems to have appeared in print first in the Reader's Di- gest (Nov. 1998), and it was published here somewhat later (Dec 01 #6), and it came in second in voting for the world's funniest joke (Oct 02 #1); it's still being told, by Olivia Wilde (who appears on television in the series "House"), in the January issue of Esquire in their "Funny Joke from a Beau- tiful Woman" department. You can read the joke (and there's a photograph); go to and search for [olivia wilde]. Jim Hawkins noted the magazine's disclaimer: "Esquire cannot guarantee that this joke will be funny to everyone." is an interesting web-site with some amusing Sherlockiana: John Pforr has reported a Sherlock Holmes license plate frame (this is one of the six advertised at the site, at $14.00 each); go to and click on "auto accessories" to see all six. The Mystery Writers of America have announced the nominees for Edgars (to be awarded at their gala banquet on May 1 in New York). The nominees in- clude (best critical/biographical) ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: A LIFE IN LETTERS, edited by Jon L. Lellenberg, Daniel Stashower, and Charles Foley. Their web-site at lists the nominees in all the categories. Tom Dunn launched his The Pipe Smoker's Ephemeris in 1965, and continued to publish it for his Universal Coterie of Pipe Smokers until he died in 2005. Albert Mendez, a stalwart member of the Coterie, has now launched his own The Pipe Smoker's Thing: the first issue (autumn 2006) offered a heart-felt tribute to Tom Dunn, and the third issue (autumn 2007) has 12 pages of al- most entirely Sherlockian content. Following in Tom Dunn's footsteps, Al- bert Mendez offers copies on request, "in consideration of a small donation to help defray the costs of printing and postage." His address is 142-35 38th Avenue, Flushing, NY 11354. Jan 08 #5 There were some familiar names on the Queen's New Year's hon- ours list: Sir Ian McKellen and Roy Dotrice. McKellen, who was appointed CBE (Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) in 1979 and knighted in 1991, was appointed to the Order of Companions of Honour (CH) for services to drama and to equality; he appeared in Sherlock- ian costume in a 4-minute skit ("Hot Air Balloon Mystery Theater") on "Sat- urday Night Live" (2002). And Roy Dotrice was appointed CBE for services to drama; he played Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in the Disney film "Young Harry Houdini" (1987), and he played Douglas Stone in the BBC-2 dramatization of "The Case of Lady Sannox" (1968). Edward D. Hoch died on Jan. 17. He was a masterful short story writer, and a novelist and editor. John Dickson Carr once wrote about Hoch that "Satan himself would be proud of his ingenuity"); he had a story in every issue of Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine for more than 34 years (sometimes more than one story in an issue, writing under a pseudonym as well as his own name), and 1991 was honored as a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America. He wrote many Sherlockian and Doylean pastiches (some of them as R. L. Ste- vens); his "A Scandal in Montreal" appeared in the February issue of EQMM that was distributed at the Baker Street Irregulars' annual dinner. "To be a book-collector is to combine the worst characteristics of a dope fiend with those of a miser." Robertson Davies, in THE TABLE TALK 0F SAM- UEL MARCHBANKS (kindly, or perhaps unkindly, forwarded by Alan Rettig). "The Case of the Influential Illustrator: Sidney Paget's Sherlock Holmes" is the title of an exhibition that opened on Dec. 1 at the Church Farmhouse Museum in Greyhound Hill, London, and will remain open through May 5. The exhibition honors the centenary of Paget's death in January 1908, and the museum is located near Finchley, where Paget lived for a time and is buried in Marylebone Cemetery. There's more information about the museum at its web-site at is the URL for the web-site for the Marylebone Library's Sherlock Holmes Collection, with news of the discovery of two portraits painted by Sidney Paget; there's a link to Catherine Cooke's interesting discussion of the portraits. Interesting things turn up at auction (thanks to Wilfrid de Freitas for ob- serving this item): a copy of Mary Conan Doyle's A VISIT TO HEVEN (1899), inscribed "With the Author's loves" (Arthur Conan Doyle's daughter was nine year old at the time); it sold for 780 (plus premium and tax) at Bonhams in Bath on Oct. 30. And Alec Guinness' handwritten 20-page script for his dramatization of "The Adventure of the Dying Detective" (done in 1929, when he was a 15-year-old schoolboy) went for 360 (also plus premium and tax) at Bonhams in Knightsbridge on June 20. The Norwegian Explorers' "Christmas Annual 2007" has fine tributes to Allen Mackler and his 221B room (now on display at the University of Minnesota), a tour of other reproductions of the sitting-room, and additional scholar- ship, entertainment, and poetry; the 46-page booklet is available from John Bergquist (3665 Ashbury Road, Eagan, MN 55122) for $8.00 postpaid (checks payable to The Norwegian Explorers, please). Jan 08 #6 Lionsgate will have its premiere for "The Bank Job" in London on Feb. 25. The film had the working title "Baker Street" and claims to be based on the bank robbers who tunneled into a Lloyds Bank on Baker Street in 1971 and got away with 1.5 million; some of the culprits were caught and convicted in 1973, and of course newspapers and magazines noted similarities to "The Red-Headed League" (Nov 06 #8). A story by John Millar, spotted by John Baesch in The Express on Sunday (Jan. 6), reports that in the film it's a safety-deposit box robbery, set up by MI5 to recov- er sexually compromising photographs of a British princess, and that there was a note scribbled on the inside of the safe: "Let Sherlock Holmes try to solve this." Benton Wood ("A Scandal in Bohemia") died on Dec. 8, 2007. He was an edu- cator, chaplain, philatelist, and numismatist, and for many years the Re- corder of The Pleasant Places of Florida. He received his Investiture from The Baker Street Irregulars in 1979, succeeded the Rev. Leslie Marshall as the Chaplain of the BSI; and received the BSI's Two-Shilling Award in 1997. "World Book Club" is a 27-minute weekly series broadcast by the BBC World Service, and Harriett Gilbert's interview with Umberto Eco about THE NAME OF THE ROSE aired on Dec. 29. You can download the interview (and earlier broadcasts) at . RBC Computers made some of the Soviet "Sherlock Holmes" television series starring Vasily Livanov available on cassettes and DVDs with English sub- titles some years ago (Nov 02 #1); the company's now called RussianDVD.com (269 Brighton Beach Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11235) (800-901-5543), with a web- site at , and the DVDs are in NTSC format. Phil Bergem reports that if you order all five titles, they arrive as a boxed set. Interesting and useful things continue to turn up on the Internet: Ken Lan- za has noted Chris Haycock's web-site at , where he offers a download of the text of all the Sherlock Holmes stories, with a long list of Conan Doyle's other fiction and non-fiction, all for $19.97. Another example of how interesting the Internet can be: "The Author Trail" at offers you a chance to identify some of the sites in East Sussex, Medway (in Kent), and the Somme associated with famous au- thors (including Conan Doyle, for whom the East Sussex map provides links for Crowborough, Forest Row, Groombridge, Newhaven, Rotherfield, and Win- chelsea). Jon Lellenberg has reported an interesting review of Matthew Hughes' novel MAJESTRUM: A TALE OF HENGHIS HAPTHORN: Publishers Weekly called Hapthorn a "sleuth who combines the confident brilliance of Sherlock Holmes with the amusing voice of P. G. Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster, in a fantastical mystery reminiscent of Randall Garrett's Lord Darcy novels." A second novel (THE SPIRAL LABYRINTH has already been published, and a third is in the works. Hapthorne first appeared in six imaginative stories published in The Maga- zine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in 2004 and 2005, and they've been coll- ected in THE GIST HUNTER AND OTHER STORIES. Night Shade Books is the pub- lisher, with a web-site at , and you can read ex- cerpts from the two novels at . Jan 08 #7 Raymond Betzner has edited the 75th anniversary edition of Vin- cent Starrett's THE PRIVATE LIFE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (Indianapo- lis: Gasogene Books, 2008; 221 pp., $29.95); the new edition is a splendid tribute to Starrett and his book (which Julian Wolff said was "the greatest book about Sherlock Holmes that has ever been written"), with a facsimile of the first edition (1933), an appreciation of Starrett by Robert J. Mang- ler, a discussion of the origins of Starrett's book, and a bibliography of the many subsequent editions. $37.20 postpaid (to the U.S.) from the pub- lisher (Box 68308, Indianapolis, IN 46268) ; costs of shipping outside the U.S. available at the web-site. Gasogene has also has published BAKER STREET RAMBLES, by Leslie S. Klinger (210 pp. $18.95), reprinting his Sherlockian essays and reviews (and a ra- dio-play script) that appeared in various journals and newspapers from 1994 to 2005. $24.45 postpaid (to the U.S.); publisher's address as above). THE QUINTESSENTIAL SHERLOCK HOLMES, by Richard L. Boyer (Alexander: Alexan- der Books, 2008; 496 pp., $75.00), is a collection of five pastiches, from "The Giant Rat of Sumatra" (1976) to "The Wilton Water Horror" (2007); it's a deluxe leather-bound and boxed edition, with atmospheric illustrations by Phil Hawkins. Four of the stories are reprints, but they have been revised and expanded for this volume. The publisher's at 65 Macedonia Road, Alex- ander, NC 28701 (800-472-0438) . Boyer won an Edgar (for best novel) in 1983 for his BILLINGSGATE SHOAL, the first in his series of "Doc Adams" mysteries. The March issue of Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine has "The Adventure of the Red Circle" with annotations by Leslie S. Klinger, who also contrib- uted a guest editorial ("The Immortal Sherlock Holmes") on Holmes' enduring appeal to modern readers. Les reports that several of the annotations are new, bringing the scholarship current. Add another site to a tour of places associated with THE HOUND OF THE BAS- KERVILLES: Parnham House, near Beaminster in Dorset. The Wrenwood Hotel's web-site states that "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, awoken by the baying of the hounds during a night's stay at Parnham, is said to have been inspired by the sound to write his famous classic THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES." But the Automobile Association's EXPLORING BRITAIN'S HISTORIC HOUSES (by Penny Wicks, 1995) offers a rather different story: "In the 1920s Parnham was a fashionable country club, and its patrons included the Prince of Wales and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Conan Doyle always stayed in what is now the Coun- try Room, and was convinced that it was haunted." "The Madness of Sherlock Holmes: Conan Doyle and the Realm of the Faeries" is a 70-minute DVD written, directed, and narrated by Philip Gardiner, who has written books that include QUANTUM MIND OF GOD and GATEWAYS TO THE OTH- ERWORLD. Produced by Reality Entertainment ($24.95), the DVD explores the gnostic, theosophist, and mystic aspects of Holmes and Conan Doyle; there's a 3-minute preview at . There's also an audiobook, available at for pur- chase (10.99) or MP3 download ($10.99). And you can interviews with Gar- diner about some of his non-Sherlockian books can be heard at a metaphysi- cal talk show at . Jan 08 #8 The Toronto Public Library has made available a digital edition of Lady Conan Doyle's diary for Conan Doyles' tour of Canada in 1914. You can turn pages, zoom in and out, and click on related text notes and images; the URL is , and it's a grand example of what can be done with up-to-date digitization (and the Internet), and it is well worth a visit. Yuichi Hirayama has resumed his English-language blog about "Sherlockiana in Japan" at , and his web-site for the Shoso-In Bull- etin is at . Karen Murdock reports her discovery of Kessinger Publishing's Rare Reprints ; they publish "thousands of rare, scarce, and out-of- print books," and there are many titles available if you search for [conan doyle] or [sherlock holmes]. Patricia Guy's BACCHUS AT BAKER STREET was published some years ago (Nov 95 #6), and it's now back in print (Lincoln: iUniverse, 2007; 150 pp., $13.95) with the subtitle "Sherlock Holmes & Victorian Drinking Lore" and new (and attractive) cover art by Gianni Burato. She discusses the wine, beer and spirits found in the Canon, and the brewers, vintners, barkeepers and wine- merchants, with flavor and humor and an occasional surprise. is the URL for the latest issue of Carolyn and Joel Senter's The Sherlockian E-Times, in which they offer their S'ian calendar as well as books and other items, as well as Sherlock- ian news and web-links. Ten years ago Ramute Plioplys, a member of The South Downers near Chicago, created a series of attractive Sherlockian eggs, to hang on your Christmas tree or elsewhere; they were decorated in the Lithuanian tradition (using heated beeswax and multiple dye baths) and featured dancing men and S'ian mottos. Ramute died last year, and her brother has showcased her art on a new web-site at , where you can see her Sherlock Holmes Eggs and her other creations. Reported by Phil Attwell: the Royal Mail's presentation pack for the set of stamps honoring James Bond, issued on Jan. 8, includes a time-line for Bond and his creator Ian Fleming; the entry for Bond in 1964 states "Bond--like Sherlock Holmes--declines a knighthood." There are links to more informa- tion about the stamps at . Ales Kolodrubec reports that a Czech publisher (Garamond) has issued a ser- ies of bilingual editions (English on one page and Czech on the other) of Sherlock Holmes stories (three short stories or one novel per volume) and some of Conan Doyle's non-Sherlockian stories. The books cost from $9.00 to $14.00 each plus shipping, and if you're interested you should send an e-mail to Ales at and ask for more information. Another company is publishing Czech translations of some of Conan Doyle's non-Sherlockian work, and Ales has information about them as well. The Spermaceti Press: Peter E. Blau, 7103 Endicott Court, Bethesda, MD 20817-4401 (301-229-5669) Feb 08 #1 Scuttlebutt from the Spermaceti Press The "Sherlock Holmes Weekend" in Cape May, N.J., on Mar. 7-9 will include a new mystery ("Sherlock Holmes and the Music Box Murders") presented by Mid- summer Night Productions, and a performance of Craig Wichman's dramatiza- tion of "The Speckled Band" by the East Lynne Theater Company. The festi- val web-site at has more information (the Sherlock Holmes weekends have been held in the spring and fall for many years. I began last month's issue quoting from Michael Dirda's weekly on-line con- versation "Dirda on Books" at , and I might as well do it again: he was asked to recommend a collection of the Sherlock Holmes stories that can be read without the assistance of a magnifying glass, and he had three suggestions: the Heritage Press edition, the OXFORD ANNOTATED SHERLOCK HOLMES, and THE NEW ANNOTATED SHERLOCK HOLMES, noting that for the last of the three that you "would have to enjoy or put up with the bizarre kind of playful scholarship associated with the Baker Street Irregulars." , maintained by Ron Fish and Ben and Sue Vizoskie, is an excellent list of upcoming Sherlockian events, for any- one who would like to know what's happening when, and where; if you want to have something listed, Ron is at . "Despot Bigwigs Ban Sherlock Holmes Carriage" was the headline on a story in the Hampstead & Highgate Express (Jan. 18), at hand from Ken Lanza. The historic hansom cab (which is billed as London's only Victorian horse-drawn taxi) has been banned from the Royal Parks because it advertises the Sher- lock Holmes Museum. A spokesman for Royal Parks (which include Hyde Park, Green Park, and Regent's Park) said that "managing the parks is about bal- ance and we seek to limit commercialization and advertising where we can." John Aidiniantz, director of the museum, said that "it is not reasonable or practical for us to cover up our advertising," and that the museum has been trying to get a commercial license to travel through the Royal Parks for 15 years. Aidiniantz said the latest refusal is "the last straw," and the cab has now been taken off the streets, because "you cannot take the cab around London without going through the parks because you have to go around them which is no good for the horses." An addition to the familiar names on the Queen New Year's honours list (Jan 08 #5): June Lancelyn Green (Richard Lancelyn Green's mother) was appointed MBE (Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) for services to the community in Merseyside. Thanks to Steve Rothman for the report. Michael Cox, the executive producer of the Granada "Sherlock Holmes" tele- vision series, was the keynote speaker at the first Sherlock Holmes Review symposium at Indiana University in Bloomington in 1987, offering his audi- ence the inside story of the creation of the series. His talk was record- ed, and it's a delight to hear his account of the imagination and hard work involved in launching and continuing the series. "A Study in Celluloid" is a 58-minute CD available from the Wessex Press (Box 68308, Indianapolis, IN 46268) . $18.45 postpaid (to the U.S.); see the web- site for shipping costs outside the U.S. Feb 07 #2 OLD DEVIL MOON, by Christopher Fowler (London: Serpent's Tail, 2007; 296 pp., 7.99/$14.95); his tenth collection of "dark and sometimes uneasily humorous" short stories, including "The Lady Downstairs" (an amusing Sherlock Holmes story told by his landlady, who has an entirely different perspective on the Great Detective); the story was read by Hannah Gordon in the BBC 7 radio series "Cult Holmes" in 2005. Nancy Springer's "Enola Holmes" mysteries continue with THE CASE OF THE BI- ZARRE BOUQUETS (New York: Philomel, 2008; 170 pp., $14.99); the series is for young readers, and the stories and characterizations are excellent (THE CASE OF THE MISSING MARQUESS and THE CASE OF THE LEFT-HANDED LADY are the previous books). Enola is the younger sister of Mycroft and Sherlock, and is hiding from them in London and solving mysteries on her own. Al Gregory offers (by e-mail only) his 2008 edition of "The ABC of the BSI" (an alphabetical listing of Investitures, with recipients, from "Abbey Grange" to "Young Stamford") and "The Florin Society" (couples in which both spouses have received Irregular Shillings). The Pleasant Places of Florida are sponsoring a Sherlock Holmes Film Festi- val at St. Petersburg College on Mar. 29; it's open to the public without charge, and the films are "The Case of the Whitechapel Vampire" (2002, with Matt Frewer), "The Musgrave Ritual" (1986, with Jeremy Brett), and "Sher- lock Holmes and the Baker Street Irregulars" (2007, with Jonathan Pryce). This is the sort of event that brings new members to a society, of course, in addition to helping "keep the memory green." Rupert Holmes (who is perhaps best known as the author of the musical "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" and whose pen name reflects his enjoyment of Rupert Knickerbocker beer and the Canon) has joined the executive committee of the International Mystery Writers' Festival, and he has adapted two episodes of his delightful television series "Remember WENN" (1996) for performance (as "Armchair Detective: A Remember WENN Musical Mystery") in Owensboro, Ky., June 12-22. "Remember WENN" was a 30-minute series about a fictional radio station in Pittsburgh during the golden age of radio, and "Armchair Detect- ive" had the station doing a Sherlock Holmes broadcast. The festival web- site will have more information about the schedule, which also will feature Stuart Kaminsky's dramatization of his short-story pastiche "The Final Toast" (1987). "In lighter moments she turns to Conan Doyle," Wilson Harris wrote, in an article on "The Education of a Queen" in the Atlantic Monthly (Dec. 1943), also reported by Jon Lellenberg. The article was about Princess Elizabeth, then 17 years old, and Harris hoped that she read THE WHITE COMPANY as well as SHERLOCK HOLMES. You can read the entire article at the Atlantic's web- site at . Plan ahead (but decide quickly): the announcement for the Baker Street Ir- regulars' "A Study in Scarlet" excursion to Salt Lake City on Aug. 29-Sept. 1 is being mailed to those who asked Mike Whelan to put them on the mailing list; space will be limited, so if you haven't asked to be on the mailing list already, write to Michael F. Whelan (7938 Mill Stream Circle, Indiana- polis, IN 46278). Feb 08 #3 "There have been millions of detective stories over the years. Many of them are forgettable. Somehow Sherlock Holmes has en- dured, mainly because no one could write a detective story as brilliantly as Conan Doyle and nobody could come up with a character as interesting and flawed as Sherlock Holmes." Stan Lee (who has created some enduring char- acters himself), interviewed at on Feb. 7. Thanks to Ken Lanza for spotting this. Laurie R. King discusses THE ART OF DETECTION on a new 38-minute DVD "Mys- terious California: Four Authors" created by Pamela Beere Brings and Will- iam McDonald for the California Center for the Book, which offers a "book club in a box" without charge to libraries in California . The other authors are Kirk Russell (SHELL GAMES), Nina Revoyr (SOUTHLAND), and Nadia Gordon (SHARPSHOOTER), and all four of them have written myster- ies set in California and have interesting things to say about their books. The DVD is available for purchase by out-of-state libraries ($85.00 to pub- lic libraries, and $150.00 to college and university libraries) at the web- site or by phone (800-343-5540). The filmmakers also have kindly made it available to individuals for home use only at a "writer's discount" price of $35.00 until June 1 (same phone number: 800-343-5540). Laurie already has written more than 100 pages of her next book, THE LANG- UAGE OF BEES. It's the new Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes novel, of course, and you'll find more information about Laurie and her work and her blog at her web-site . And Laurie will be on tour, making appearances in the Detroit area on Apr. 16-18, discussing THE BEEKEEPER'S APPRENTICE and signing books. Details at their web-site Barry Morse died on Feb. 2. Best known as Lt. Philip Gerard, who pursued Richard Kimble in the 1960s television series "The Fugitive", he began his acting career when he received a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Drama- tic Arts in the 1930s, and went on to act on stage and screen and televis- ion for more than 60 years. He played Carter Morstan in CBS-TV's "The Re- turn of Sherlock Holmes" (1987). Reported: L'AFFAIRE DU CHIEN DES BASKERVILLE, by Pierre Bayard (Paris: Les ditions de Minuit, 2008; 166 pp., E14.50; Bayard is a psycholanalyst and a professor of French literature, and the author of HOW TO TALK ABOUT BOOKS YOU HAVEN'T READ, and in his latest book he concludes that Sherlock Holmes got it wrong, and that Sir Charles Baskervilles wasn't killed by Jack Stap- leton with the help of a gigantic dog. In other books Bayard has suggested that Hamlet got it wrong (Claudius didn't kill his father) and that Poirot also got it wrong (in THE MURDER OF ROGER ACKROYD). The new book is avail- able only in French (so far). Sherlockian societies in southern cities (Atlanta, Nashville, Birmingham, and Greenville) will hold their Fourth Annual Gathering of Southern Sher- lockians at the Sheraton Read House in Chattanooga, Tenn., on Apr. 12-13; the festivities will include a performance of Brad Keefauver and Bill Ma- son's "Hee-Haw Holmes". Details are available from Kent Ross (721 Hartford Road, Springfield, OH 45503) (678-464-8321) . Feb 08 #4 There may be Sherlockians still alive who saw Basil Rathbone on stage as Sherlock Holmes in 1953, and there certainly are some who could have but didn't, because they didn't attend the try-outs in Bos- ton or the (only) three performances in New York. Susan Dahlinger and Glen Miranker have researched the history of the play for The Baker Street Jour- nal's Christmas Annual for 2007 ("Rathbone Returns! A Misadventure Called Sherlock Holmes), and it is a delight to read their story of how the play came to be written and produced, and about why it failed. $11.00 postpaid (or $12.00 outside the U.S.) from the BSJ at 2 Dettling Road, Maynard, MA 01754; you can also order on-line at . SIR HUGO'S LITERARY COMPANION: A COMPENDIUM OF THE WRITINGS OF HUGO'S COM- PANIONS, CHICAGO, ON THE SUBJECT OF MR. SHERLOCK HOLMES, edited by David C. Humphrey (Lincoln: iUniverse, 2007; 167 pp., $22.95 cloth or $12.95 paper or $6.00 eBook), is very much what the subtitle announces: the authors in- clude Vincent Starrett, Jay Finley Christ, and Robert J. Mangler, and their works range from scholarship to parody. Signed copies are available from the editor (1843 Winnetka Avenue, Northfield, IL 60093); $28.95 postpaid. Steven Dietz's "Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure" will be performed at the Western Stage (156 Homestead Avenue, Salinas, CA 93901), from Aug. 15 to Sept. 14. Box office at (831-375-2111) . If you're still seeking an attractive Sherlockian calendar for 2008, Bill Dorn's colorful calendar is illustrated with scenes from 24 films and tele- vision shows, notes more than 250 events from the Canon television, and in- cludes a dozen original limericks; it's discounted to $10.00 postpaid (to the U.S.) or $12.00 to Canada or $15.00 elsewhere), from William S. Dorn at 2045 South Monroe Street, Denver, CO 80210. You can see sample pages (and other Sherlockian offers) at his web-site at . Further to the report (Jan 08 #8) on the new Czech bilingual editions (Eng- lish on one page and Czech on the other), Don Hobbs reports there are simi- lar Arabic/English, Danish/English, French/English, German/English, Japan- ese/English, Korean/English, Russian English, Spanish/English, and Swedish/ English editions. If you can add to the list, please let me know. Shirley Dickensheet ("Ivy Douglas") died on Feb. 8. She was an energetic member of The Trained Cormorants and then The Scowrers and Molly Maguires, and she one of the speakers at John Bennett Shaw's Sherlockian seminar at Stanford University in 1987. She was working for the Fireman's Fund when they insured in Loch Ness Monster in 1969, and paid off when it sank dur- ing the filming of "The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes" (the submersible is now at the bottom of the Loch, waiting to be found by one of the many people who still pursue "Nessie"). Shirley and her husband Dean were the sparking plugs for Vamberry's Ltd. (Wine Merchants) and The Beaune Press, and she received her Investiture from The Baker Street Irregulars in 1993. The Sound & Fury Fakespearean Players performed their "Sherlock Holmes and the Saline Solution" in Los Angeles in 2006 (May 06 #4), and they're plann- ing to repeat the show during the Fringe Festival in Winnipeg in July. You can see their poster at , and you can purchase the DVD ($20.00) ; click on [Product] at the left. Feb 08 #5 Emory Lee has spotted an advertisement for SHERLOCK IN SHANG- HAI: STORIES OF CRIME AND DETECTION, by Cheng Ziaoqing (Hono- lulu: University of Hawai'i, 2006; 214 pp., $24.00); Cheng Ziaoqing (1893- 1976), described as the most popular author of Chinese detective fiction in the first half of the 20th century, wrote many stories about Huo Sang and Bao Lang (his fictional counterparts to Holmes and Watson) set in Shanghai in the 1920s and 1930s (and a 1940s edition of the Huo Sang stories ran to 40 volumes). The December issue of the quarterly newsletter of The Friends of the Sher- lock Holmes Collections at the University of Minnesota has Julie McKuras' discussion of Edith Meiser, Philip Bergem's "100 Years Ago" report on the scrapbook from the wedding of Sir Arthur and Lady Jean Conan Doyle, Jon L. Lellenberg's amusing story about a damaged portrait of Conan Doyle that Jon has donated to the Collections, and other news from Minneapolis. Copies of the newsletter are available from Richard J. Sveum, (111 Elmer L. Andersen Library, Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455) . is the URL for the latest issue of Carolyn and Joel Senter's The Sherlockian E-Times from Classic Specialties; their new offers include T-shirts and sweatshirts display- ing a "Cogitavit ergo sum" design, based on a design by Tom Rieschick. The Latin paraphrases Descartes' famous dictum "Cogito ergo sum" and translates as "He [Conan Doyle] thought, therefore I am." A poll of 3,000 teenagers in Britain revealed that 27% think that Florence Nightingale was a mythical character, and 20% believe that Winston Church- ill was fictional. And that 58% believe that Sherlock Holmes really lived at 221B Baker Street, and 51% think that Robin Hood actually lived in Sher- wood Forest. 77% admitted they didn't read history books, and 61% changed channels rather than watch historical programs on television. The poll was commissioned by the cable channel UKTV Gold, which has launched a new "Rob- in Hood" series; UKTV Gold's Paul Moreton said that "the elevation of myth- ical figures to real life showed the impact good films could have in shap- ing the public consciousness." "Stories like Robin Hood are so inspiring," he added, "that it's not surprising people like to believe these characters really existed." The story was picked up by many newspapers, demonstrating that UKTV Gold knew how to get attention for its "Robin Hood" series. The next annual STUD-Watsonian Weekend will be held in and near Chicago on Apr. 11-13; the schedule includes a dinner (with Julie McKuras as the fea- tured speaker), a running of The Silver Blaze at Hawthorne Race Course, and a Fortescue Honours brunch. Registration forms are available from Susan Z. Diamond (16W603 3rd Avenue, Bensenville, IL 60106) . Michael A. Hoey's ELVIS, SHERLOCK & ME: HOW I SURVIVED GROWING UP IN HOLLY- WOOD (Albany: Bear Manor Media, 2007; 335 pp., $24.95) is written with hum- or and style, about the author's interesting career in Hollywood, but (more important for Sherlockians) it offers an excellent account of the stage and screen career of his father, Dennis Hoey, who played Lestrade in six of the Basil Rathbone films made by Universal in the 1940s. Feb 08 #6 "Battered by talk of national decline and chronic instability, Italy has rediscovered a forgotten hero," Richard Owen wrote in a dispatch to The Times (Feb. 18). The forgotten hero is Dorando Pietri, who was the first to cross the finish line in the marathon in the Olympics in 1908, only to have the prize withdrawn because he had been assisted to- ward the finish line by officials on the track. It has been alleged that Pietri was helped by Conan Doyle, but he actually was in the stands, cover- ing the race as a correspondent for the Daily Mail. Billy E. Ross ("The Abergavenny Murders") died on Jan. 28. He entered the Sherlockian world as a member of The Maiwand Jezails, and after moving east to be a professor of educational administration at the University of Dela- ware was a member of The Sons of the Copper Beeches and The Six Napoleons. Billy received his Investiture from The Baker Street Irregulars in 1977. The winter issue of The Magic Door (the newsletter published by The Friends of the Arthur Conan Doyle Collection at the Toronto Reference Library) has Barbara Rusch's report on Andrew Lycett's talk at the Library in October, Peggy Perdue's discussion of new acquisitions from the family archives, and greetings from Mary Rae Shantz, the new manager of special collections at the Library. Doug Wrigglesworth (16 Sunset Street, Holland Landing, ON L9N 1H4, Canada) will be happy to send you a copy of the latest issue. Karen Ellery has found an interesting web-site for people who want to read translations into Russian: offers (according to their count) 17,273 books, including some of the Sherlock Holmes stories, SIR NI- GEL, and Frank Thomas' SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE GOLDEN BIRD. is the URL for this year's Sherlock Holmes Essay Contest for seventh-grade students in Howard County, Md. The contest is sponsored by Watson's Tin Box, and students will write a five-paragraph analytical essay on "The Speckled Band"; the web-site has a link to a booklet that teachers and students can use for the content. THE CRIMES OF DR. WATSON, by Duane Swierczynski (Philadelphia: Quirk Books, 2007; 60 pp., $24.95), is an "interactive mystery" with pull-out clues that allow readers to pretend they're Sherlock Holmes and solve a formerly lost case; the format's reminiscent of the murder dossiers edited by Simon Good- enough in the 1980s, but the adventure is a new one, with some interesting twists and turn. An interesting letter written by Conan Doyle about "The Hound of the Bask- ervilles" will be at auction at Bonhams in London on Mar. 18 (sale 16199, lot 276) . Conan Doyle wrote to Cecil P. Turner that "My story was really based on nothing save a remark of my friend Fletcher Robinson's that there was a legend about a dog on the Moor connected with some old family. I had no place in my eye." Turner seems to have written to Conan Doyle asking if the story had been based on the Black Dog of Her- gest Croft, which haunted the Vaughan family in Herefordshire. The Spermaceti Press: Peter E. Blau, 7103 Endicott Court, Bethesda, MD 20817-4401 (301-229-5669) Mar 08 #1 Scuttlebutt from the Spermaceti Press The winter 2007 issue of the Socit Sherlock Holmes de France's QuinCahier has arrived; 24 pages all in color (and all in French), with news, scholar- ship, a quiz, and grand artwork by Jean-Pierre Cagnat; 8 euros postpaid to France or 10 euros to Europe or 12 euros elsewhere (36 avenue Jean-Jaurs, 63500 Issoire, France). You can see what it looks like at their web-site at , and order there with PayPal. The web-site also offers a fine look at the imaginative things the French are up to. For completists: CELEBRATING BOARD GAMES, by Nine Chertoff and Susan Kahn (New York: Sterling Publishing Co., 2006; 144 pp., $10.00), is a colorful review of board games, from 1861 to the present, with two pages devoted to "Alfred Hitchcock Presents Why" (a 1958 game with a character piece named Shylock Bones). There haven't been any Sherlockian comic books in quite a while, but Greg Darak reports a S'ian panel in DONALD DUCK: THE CASE OF THE MISSING MUMMY (published by Gem- stone in 2007, $8.99); Gemstone seems to be the success- or to Gladstone, and the comic's available at their web- site at . Mimi Langley died on Feb. 24 She was for many years a member of The Sher- lock Holmes Society of London, and one of the volunteers who answered the letters written to Sherlock Holmes at 221b Baker Street, when they were de- livered to the Abbey National Bank. And now for something non-Sherlockian and non-Doylean: a computerized geo- grapy quiz at that allows you to test your knowledge of the world. You get points for being close, and fast, and no one else need know how you scored. Compliments to Peter Ashman for finding and reporting the quiz. Roger Llewellyn's tour in David Stuart Davies' new play "The Death and Life of Sherlock Holmes" (Sep 07 #2) started on Mar. 6 in Guildford, and it con- tinues in Britain through Sept. 6; The Sherlock Holmes Society of London's web-site has a detailed schedule. ANTHONY BOUCHER: A BIOBIBLIOGRAPHY, by Jeffrey Marks (Jefferson: McFarland & Co., 2008; 213 pp., $35.00), is a delightful tribute to a multi-talented man: Boucher wrote novels, short stories, radio scripts, and book reviews, and edited magazines and mystery libraries, and Bouchercon, the world mys- tery convention, was named in his honor. When Boucher's novel THE CASE OF THE BAKER STREET IRREGULARS was published in 1940, Edgar W. Smith was for a time suspicious that the book had been written by a member of our BSI under a pseudonym. Boucher soon became a member of the BSI as well as The Scow- rers and Molly Maguires of San Francisco, and wrote scripts for the "Sher- lock Holmes" radio series, and Marks offers an excellent account of Bouch- er's life and career, and a detailed bibliography of his published and un- published work (and there are many unpublished titles in his papers at the Lilly Library at the University of Indiana). Mar 08 #2 It's always nice to be reminded of Rex Stout, and his biograph- er John McAleer: MYSTERY WRITING IN A NUTSHELL, by John and An- drew McAleer (Rockville: James A. Rock, 2007; 100 pp., $9.95), is subtitled "The World's Most Concise Guide to Mystery and Suspense Writing" and it in- cludes brief but interesting excerpts from John's ROYAL DECREE: CONVERSA- TIONS WITH REX STOUT (1983). Sam Fry spotted an Acme Metropolitan Whistle ("still standard issue to Lon- don bobbies") offered by The J. Peterman Company ($19.00); they're at 888- 647-2555 and . The whistle was invented in 1883, and I don't recall that anyone has proposed a connection between its inventor and someone of note in the Canon: Mrs. Hudson. Police whistles are mentioned in half a dozen of the Sherlock Holmes stories, and its inventor was Joseph Hudson; biographical information and a photograph are available at the com- pany's web-site at . William F. Buckley, Jr., died on Feb. 27. He was a committed conservative, and he wrote more than 50 books and more than 5,600 biweekly columns "On the Right". The National Review, which he founded in 1955, was launched with the claim that it "stands athwart history yelling Stop!" and his book CANCEL YOUR OWN GODDAM SUBSCRIPTION (2007) featured corr- espondence he received at the magazine, including this exchange with someone who wrote in 1967: "You are the mouthpiece of that evil rabble that depends on fraud, perjury, dirty tricks, anything at all that suits their purposes. I would trust a snake before I would trust you or anybody you support." To which Buckley replied, "What would you do if I supported the snake?" Brad Linaweaver's "A Scandal in Transylvania" in May 1977 in New Guard: The Mag- azine of Young Americans for Freedom had Buckley and D. Keith Mano in pur- suit of Professor Goreviarty. CLASSICS FOR PLEASURE, by Michael Dirda (New York: Harcourt, 2007; 341 pp., $25.00), is a collection of 89 excellent essays that range from Lao-tse to Edward Gorey; Conan Doyle be found in the section on "Realms of Adventure". Julian Rathbone died on Feb. 28. He was a prolific author, twice nominated for Britain's Booker Prize, and the great-nephew of Basil Rathbone, and his pastiche "Baz" (about a thoroughly modern Holmes and Watson) was published in Maxim Jakubowski's anthology NEW CRIMES 3 (1991). Greg Darak has reported a new British two-CD set "Did You Know These Stars Also Sang?" (Jasmine Music, 2007) with 108 tracks, one of them Basil Rath- bone singing "I Do Like to Be Beside the Seaside" from "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" (1939). "A Scandal in Bohemia" is a new two-act chamber opera written by Nathalie Anderson (libretto) and Thomas Whitman (music), and "A Window on the Work" (an unstaged concert version of Act I) was performed at Swarthmore College on Mar. 2. Orchestra 2001 is planning a concert version of the entire op- era next year, tentatively at the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia on Feb. 6 and at Swarthmore College on Feb. 8. Mar 08 #3 "I had played Watson to his Holmes," Dr. Sheppard said, about Hercule Poirot, in Agatha Christie's "The Murder of Roger Ack- royd". Not in the book, but rather in the 90-minute dramatization (by Mi- chael Bakewell) that was broadcast by BBC Radio 4 in December 1987 (and re- peated this month on BBC 7). John Woodvine played Sheppard, and John Moff- att was Poirot. Thanks to Phil Attwell for spotting this. The 27th annual Sherlock Holmes/Arthur Conan Doyle Symposium was held this month despite a blizzard, and the organizers have surrendered to the weath- er and scheduled next year's Symposium ("The Merry Wives of Watson") on May 15-17 in Dayton, Ohio; Cathy Gill manages their mailing list (4661 Hamilton Avenue, Cincinnati, OH 45223) (513-681-5507) . Further to the item (Feb 08 #6) on the new Italian stamp honoring Dorando Pietri, the design is based on the now (in)famous finish-line photograph that shows all of the people who might have been, but weren't, Sir Arthur Con- an Doyle. And I have some extra copies, which I will be happy to share with readers who request them (they'll be mailed with your next issue). E. Gary Gygax died on Mar. 4. In 1974 he collaborated with Dave Arneson to create the fantasy game Dungeons & Dragons, and in his ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS MONSTER MANUAL (1979) Gygax listed a "Rat, Giant (Sumatran)". And in an article the Nov. 1979 issue of the computer-gaming magazine Dragon he suggested that his readers "imagine a game based on the exploits of Sir Ar- thur Conan Doyle's magnificent sleuth Sherlock Holmes. Which of the parti- cipants wouldn't like to play the role of the great detective? Or, at the very least, Dr. Watson? The subject matter for any such game would be par- ticularly difficult to handle, and what would the participants do if Holmes were slain? Or merely made a fool of, for that matter?" Retno Nindya Prastiwi has launched a "Sherlock Holmes Indonesia" web-site at , adding one more country to the list of those that have Sherlockians. Faithful readers may recall my enthusiasm for Terry Jones and Brian Froud's LADY COTTINGTON'S PRESSED FAIRY LETTERS (Dec 97 #6), and it is welcome news that a book of letters written to Lady Cottington has been returned to the Cottington Archive, and published in facsimile (verified and presented by Brian Froud and Ari Berk) as LADY COTTINGTON'S PRESSED FAIRY LETTERS (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2005; 48 pp., $19.95); the newly discovered letters came from dignitaries such as Wendy Darling, J. M. Barrie, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The Sherlock Holmes Society of London has three interesting events on its forward schedule: "Capital Watson: London Festival" (May 23-25), a cricket match against the P. G. Wodehouse Society (June 22), and their "Portsmouth Weekend" (Sept. 5-7), and their web-site ought to have details by the time you read this. Events are open to people who are not members if there's room; contact Catherine Cooke (15 Copperfield Court, 146 Worple Road, Wimbledon, London SW20 8QA, England) and mention that you're not a member. Mar 08 #4 There's an interesting "The Whole Story" edition of THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES with attractive artwork by Nicollet and an- notations and additional illustrations appropriate to the story (New York: Viking, 2004; 190 pp., $25.99). An earlier edition was published by Galli- mard in Paris (2002), and the American edition also was available in paper covers ($17.99). Philip Sherman ("The Six Napoleons") died on Mar. 10. He retired from the Maryland National Guard in 1987, after more than four decades service, with the rank of Brigadier General, and was a lawyer, historian, and a biblio- phile, and an enthusiastic member of The Six Napoleons of Baltimore (Phil was Napoleon XL, and in 1966 became Gasogene XI). He launched the annual Sherlockian weekend at the Enoch Pratt Free Library and he presided over it for many years. Phil received his Investiture in the Baker Street Irregu- lars in 1969, and their Two-Shilling Award in 1984. Further to the review of Jerry 'B-P' Riggs' collection THE UNUSUAL SHERLOCK HOLMES (Aug 07 #2), Jerry has created a Sherlockian Scout Badge to honor Baden-Powell's admiration of Holmes. It's enameled in seven colors and costs $6.95 postpaid (303 South Norton Street, Corunna, MI 48817. Miles Kington died on Jan. 30. He reviewed jazz for The Times, and joined the staff of Punch in 1965, eventually becoming its literary editor, and in 1976 he became a highly respected columnist for The Independent. He enjoyed Sherlock Holmes, and his S'ian parodies began in Punch in 1968 and continued in The Independent; Kington also wrote "The Death of Tchaikovsky: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery" (which he described as a "comic musical enigma") performed in Bath in 1996. Malice Domestic will announce the winners of its Agatha awards at it's con- vention next month, and the nominees (chosen by fans rather than committee) include (best non-fiction) ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: A LIFE IN LETTERS, edited by Jon L. Lellenberg, Daniel Stashower, and Charles Foley. Dan will be toast- master at the convention. Admirers of the Russian television series that starred Vasiliy Livanov as Sherlock Holmes and Vitaliy Solomin as Dr. Watson may be interested in Igor Maslennikov's autobiography BEIKER-STRIT NA PETROGRADSKOI [BAKER STREET TO PETROGRAD] (St. Petersburg: Seans/Amphora, 2007; 255 pp., $31.00); avail- able from MIPP International at . Maslennikov was the director of the series, and of course has much to say about it (in Russian, but there are lots of nice photographs for those who don't read Russian). Randall Stock has reported Neil McCaw's booklet "A Study in Sherlock: Un- covering the Arthur Conan Doyle Collection" (with details on the bequest by Richard Lancelyn Green, and a foreword by Stephen Fry), available for 3.50 from the Portsmouth City Museum Gift Shop (Museum Road, Portsmouth, Hants. PO1 2LJ, England); has more information about the booklet, and you can order the booklet on-line at . And the web-site at offers an interesting look at the collection itself. Mar 08 #5 Paul Scofield died on Mar. 20. Best known for his performance as Sir Thomas More in "A Man for All Seasons" on stage in Lon- don and New York (where he won a Tony) and in the film (for which he won an Oscar), he also starred as Thomas Becket in Caedmon's recording of T. S. Eliot's "Murder in the Cathedral" (1968), which contains the exchange with the Second Tempter that Eliot borrowed from "The Musgrave Ritual". "The Bank Job" (Jan 08 #6) has opened in the United States. I've not seen any mentions of Sherlock Holmes or "The Red-Headed League" in reviews; the film's official web-sites in both Britain and the U.S. THE TRAINED CORMORANTS 60TH ANNIVERSARY COMMEMORATIVE is an interesting tribute edited by Vinnie Brosnan and Jim Coffin; the contents include comments by members on the history of the society, photographs, recollections of its founders Bob Pattrick and Don Hardenbrook, a new Cockroach Bones parody by Kevin Reed, and amusing cover art by Colin Bailey. The cover artwork also is avail- able on a T-shirt. $20.00 postpaid for the book, and $12.00 postpaid for the T-shirt (S-M-L-XL); both can be ordered from Vincent Brosnan, 1741 Via Allena, Ocean- side, CA 92056. "Sherlock Holmes: Nemesis" is the new title for the computer game "Sherlock Holmes versus Arsne Lupin" (Oct 07 #1), due for release from Frogwares in April, there's more information about the game (under the old name) at the web-site . Reported: Michael Farquhar's A TREASURY OF FOOLISHLY FORGOTTEN AMERICANS: PIRATES, SKINFLINTS, PATRIOTS, AND OTHER COLORFUL CHARACTERS STUCK IN THE FOOTNOTES OF HISTORY (New York: Penquin, 2008; 272 pp., $15.00) includes a chapter on "America's Sherlock Holmes". And who's that? Luke May? Ellis Parker? Encyclopedia Brown? Reported: Jeffery Deaver's "The Westphalian Ring" (first published in Ell- ery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Sept.-Oct. 2004) in his MORE TWISTED: COLLEC- TED STORIES, VOL. II, by Jeffery Deaver (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006; 448 pp., $24.95) (New York: Pocket Books, 2007; 544 pp., $7.99). Gyles Brandreth's OSCAR WILDE AND THE CANDLELIGHT MURDERS (May 07 #2) fea- tured Wilde and his friends Arthur Conan Doyle and Robert Sherard in pur- suit of a murderer, and it was reprinted in the U.S. as OSCAR WILDE AND A DEATH OF NO IMPORTANCE; the second book in the series will be OSCAR WILDE AND THE RING OF DEATH, due from John Murray in London in May (14.99). Who's "America's Sherlock Holmes" in Michael Farquhar's book? William J. Burns, the Pinkerton detective who opened his own agency (and who knew Co- nan Doyle, although that's not mentioned in the book). The title also has been used to describe Luke May, a pioneering scientific detective in Seat- tle; Ellis Parker, the chief of detectives in Burlington County, N.J., when the Lindburgh baby was kidnapped; and Encyclopedia Brown, a fictional boy detective in a series of book by Donald J. Sobol. Mar 08 #6 Reported: a new recording of THE LOST WORLD, read unabridged by Glen McReady on seven CDs, from Naxos Audiobooks ($34.98); it's also available as an MP3 download at for $24.49, and you can listen to a sample at the web-site). They also offer most of the Canon (read unabridged by David Timson), four non-Sherlockian stories (read abridged by Carl Rigg), and Hesketh Pearson SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: A LIFE (read abridged by Tim Pigott-Smith). Timson also has a free 13-minute podcast at . The Admirable Beach Society was founded to promote reading of the Sherlock Holmes stories at an "admirable beach" (there's a mention of one in "The Lion's Mane"); the society's web-site is at , and members are encouraged to post appropriate photographs. The society's four-color enamel lapel pin costs $10.00 postpaid (to the U.S.) or $12.00 (elsewhere) from Beverly Ellis (48132 Colony Farm Circle, Plymouth, MI 48170). Collectors of foreign translations of the Sherlock Holmes stories will wel- come Don Hobbs' "The Galactic Sherlock Holmes". Don happily bills himself as "The Maniac Collector" and he has a splendid collection of translations, and offers a CD electronic bibliography of non-English and foreign-language editions in PDF format on a CD. A one-year subscription (with two to three updated CDs) costs $15.00 (to the U.S.); $20.00 elsewhere. Joseph and Elaine Coppola have edited VOICES FROM THE STRANGERS' ROOM (San Diego: Aventine Press, 2008; 108 pp., $14.00) for The Mycroft Holmes Soci- ety; it's an anthology of interesting contributions from its members, among them Judith Freeman (who offers considerable sympathy for the goose in her alternative view of "The Blue Carbuncle") and Nancy Beiman (who provided an artistic cover). Dr. William R. Hanson has designed a special cancel for the Clif-Pex Stamp Show in Clifton Park, N.Y., on Apr. 5; you can send your own (stamped) covers and postcards to the Postmaster, Clif-Pex Station, Clifton Park, NY 12065, with your request for the Sherlock Holmes cancel (requests must be postmarked by May 4). Gary Lovisi's SHERLOCK HOLMES: THE GREAT DETECTIVE IN PAPERBACK (Jun 90 #8) has been revised and expanded with a new title: SHERLOCK HOLMES: THE GREAT DETECTIVE IN PAPERBACK AND PASTICHE: A SURVEY, INDEX & VALUE GUIDE, avail- able from Gryphon Books (Box 209, Brooklyn, NY 11228) for $55.00 postpaid (180 pp., spiral bound). It's a delightful and extensive survey, with in- troductions by John Bennett Shaw (from 1990) and Michael Kurland, many il- lustrations in full color, wide coverage (from 1888 to 2007), and interest- ing commentary and annotations by Gary, who defines paperback broadly (in- cluding publisher's proofs, advance reading copies, print-on-demand books in paper covers, pamphlets published by Sherlockians and Sherlockian soci- eties, and some British and other foreign editions. The Spermaceti Press: Peter E. Blau, 7103 Endicott Court, Bethesda, MD 20817-4401 (301-229-5669) Apr 08 #1 Scuttlebutt from the Spermaceti Press Cheng Ziaoqing's SHERLOCK IN SHANGHAI: STORIES OF CRIME AND DETECTION (Hon- olulu: University of Hawai'i, 2007; 214 pp., $24.00) offers a selection of fascinating stories by a Chinese author who was inspired by the Canon, but created his own detective, just as August Derleth did with his Solar Pons stories. Cheng's detective is Huo Sang, who is assisted by Bao Lang, and the stories are set in Shanghai in the 1920s and 1930s. Translator Timothy C. Wong discusses Chinese detective fiction in his preface, and also pro- vides a short biography of Cheng. It has been quite a while since I mentioned Steve Trussel's "Detectives on Stamp" web-site at ; it's delightful, as is his "Philatelic Sherlock" web-site at . He includes stamps, covers, postmarks, and Cinderella issues, with almost everything illustrated in full color. One hardly ever hears of The Great Mouse Detective any more, since Disney gives far more emphasis to characters more important (to them) than Basil of Baker Street, but Evy Herzog spotted DISNEY'S WONDERFUL WORLD OF WORD- FINDS: THE ANIMATED MOVIES (Blue Bell: Kappa Books, 2006; 98 pp., $3.95), with a one-page word-puzzle based on the film. Stephen Baker's HOW TO LIVE WITH A NEUROTIC CAT, first published in 1985, is still in print (New York: Gramercy Books, 1999; 128 pp., $7.99), with illustrations by Sherlockian artist Jackie Geyer, who (of course) included a Sherlockian illustration. The Wessex Press continues to use YouTube to make things interesting; their advertisement for their 75th anniversary edition of Vincent Starrett's THE PRIVATE LIFE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (Jan 08 #7) includes audio of Starrett re- citing his famous poem "221B". will let you hear how Starrett pronounced "view-halloo". Tom Pitner has reported Arthur Wontner's "The Sleeping Cardinal" (1931) on DVD from Amazon ($14.95); that's the British title of the film (which was released in the U.S. as "Sherlock Holmes's Fatal Hour"), and the DVD actu- ally has the American release, presumably recorded from a copy (or perhaps a copy of a copy) of the 16mm print once owned by William K. Everson. Rog- er Johnson has reported that the print was screened for the Sherlock Holmes Society of London in 1951, at their first film evening, with Wontner in the audience, and the print also was screened for The Priory Scholars of Ford- ham in 1956. Moonlight Cinema offered the film on VHS cassette some years ago (Sep 99 #6). It's likely that the DVD is a bootleg, since the box has no address or con- tact information for the company (Reel Classic Films) other than a URL that leads nowhere. The film's also available on DVD at eBay, where one seller kindly notes that he has downloaded the film onto DVD-R from an NTSC MPEG copy stored on his hard disk, and it is likely that the DVD offered at Ama- zon was made the same way. The quality of the DVD is average at best (the VHS cassette was somewhat better), but it's nice that more people will have a chance to see an interesting film with Wontner as Sherlock Holmes. Apr 08 #2 Randall Stock has expanded his interesting "The Best of Sher- lock Holmes" web-site to include a new "Sidney Paget Original Drawings and Artwork: A Preliminary Census and Checklist". He has lots of new information, and illustrations, and he extends his coverage to include Paget's non-Sherlockian work. And of course he'd like to hear from anyone who can add to the census by reporting unrecorded originals or identifying where some of the non-Sherlockian work has been published; the new web-site is . If you would like to read one of the textbooks Conan Doyle studied before he took his medical degree in 1881, Peter Wood has discovered Joseph Bell's A MANUAL OF THE OPERATIONS OF SURGERY FOR THE USE OF SENIOR STUDENTS, HOUSE SURGEONS, AND JUNIOR PRACTITIONERS on the Internet at web-sites the include . Bell wrote the book in 1866, and Project Gutenberg has the fifth edition (revised and enlarged) published in 1883. McMurdo's Camp is the newest Sherlockian society; it meets in Charlevoix, Mich., and has a web-site at . There are many society web-sites now, and you'll find links to many of them at Chris Redmond's . If your society has a web-site that's not linked from Chris' site, you should let him know. Ken Lanza spotted a report in the Harrogate Advertiser that a copy of Bee- ton's Christmas Annual for 1887 was discovered by two Oxfam volunteers in a pile of donated books. It will be sold at auction at Bonhams in Oxford on May 20, and the charity hopes that it "will produce a four-figure addition to Oxfam's funds." According to Bonhams, the Beeton's lacks the original wrappers and advertisements and is bound with four other works (all appar- ently Christmas annuals from other publishers); it's estimated at 7,000- 9,000. There's more to the story, of course, and you can read all about it at Randall Stock's Philip K. Jones has compiled (and continues to compile) an excellent data base for Sherlockian pastiches. There are 6,875 entries (and more to come, of course), and it's available on the Internet at the Illustrious Clients' web-site at . Robert H. Steele ("The Scowrers") died on Feb. 28. He was a banker and a leader of the Republican party in San Francisco, and an enthusiastic mem- ber of the Scowrers and Mollie Maguires of San Francisco, serving as its Bodymaster for forty years until he retired in 1999. He received his In- vestiture from the Baker Street Irregulars in 1959. Dave Smith discovered a Krone limited edition "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Sher- lock Holmes" fountain pen, and it's an impressive pen indeed: solid ster- ling silver, intricately detailed with three-dimensional elements to help you solve a mystery that has 14 clues, and with a piece of notebook paper from Conan Doyle's personal writing pad embedded atop the cap. The edition was limited to 50 pens (with a suggested retail price of $12,500), and it sold out in a few days. The web-site displays images of the pen, and you can see other equally imaginative (and still available) Krone pens at . Apr 08 #3 The Town & County Public Library in Elburn, Ill., sponsors an annual Dewey Dash, named in honor the Dewey Decimal System, as a fund-raiser for the library. The event started in 2005 and has a differ- ent literary theme each year. This year's Dewey Dash was held on Apr. 13 and called "The Game Is Afoot". It was led by its mascot Dr. Watson, with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle as a "ghost runner". Joe Eckrich has begun selling Sherlockian books and ephemera on eBay. Go to , click on "Advanced Search, clink on "Items by Seller", and search for "eckrich221". Watson's Tin Box will host "A Scintillation of Scions" at Amherst House in Columbia, Md., with the intent of bringing together members of mid-Atlantic (and east-coast) Sherlockian societies for "an afternoon of fun, scholar- ship, and social time." The afternoon event will run from 1:30 to 6:30 and will include afternoon tea, papers, a limerick contest, and a dramatic pre- sentation. More information is available at . Content is important when material comes to auction: the letter written by Conan Doyle about "The Hound of the Baskervilles" at auction at Bonhams in London last month (Feb 08 #6) sold for 3,700 (plus premium and tax). The late Peter Cushing was a painter as well as an actor, and some of his artwork was sold at auction last month, with a total estimate of 12,000. The sale total was more than 20,000, and one of the watercolors sold for 2,000. Holger Hasse displays some of the paintings in full color at his blog . Further to the item (Jul 07 #3) about Edinburgh's new tram line, the Edin- burgh Evening News has reported (Apr. 3) that "fans of Sherlock Holmes are angry that the statue of the sleuth in Picardy Place is to be stored up for two years during the city's tram works." The story quoted Roy Upton-Holder as saying "Many feel that the Edinburgh Council will have succeeded where Moriarty and Conan Doyle failed: in getting rid of Sherlock Holmes." Up- ton-Holder is the founder of the Deerstalkers of Welshpool (a city on Eng- land's border with Wales); there is no Sherlockian society in Edinburgh. A few days later the paper published a letter from C. S. Lincoln of Edin- burgh (Apr. 8), who noted that the statue had been erected in Picardy Place to mark the site of Conan Doyle's birthplace, but the building had been de- molished in 1969. Lincoln suggested that the statue should be moved to In- firmary Street, where Conan Doyle, in the old infirmary, clerked for Joseph Bell and observed the "amazing, deductive methods of this great doctor." THE SHADOW OF REICHENBACH FALLS, by John R. King (New York: Forge/Tom Do- herty, 2008; 350 pp., $25.95); Thomas Carnacki, at the Reichenbach on May 4, 1891, "rescues an amnesiac gentleman from the base of the falls only to find himself and his companion pursued by an evil mastermind whose shadowy powers may reach from the bloody crime scenes of Whitechapel to beyond the grave." Sherlockians will have no trouble identifying the amnesiac gentle- man and the evil mastermind, and Thomas is William Hope Hodgson's Carnacki, before he became Carnacki the Ghost-Finder, so there's a strong supernatur- al content in the story. Apr 08 #4 ON THE TRAIL OF ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: AN ILLUSTRATED DEVON TOUR, by Brian W. Pugh and Paul R. Spiring (Sussex: Book Guild, 2008; 125 pp., 12.99), offers narrative chronologies of Conan Doyle, George Tur- navine Budd, and Bertram Fletcher Robinson, and discusses their connections with Devon (Budd lived in Plymouth, where Conan Doyle doctored with him for a short period, and Fletcher Robinson assisted Conan Doyle with "The Hound of the Baskervilles"); the book also includes an "Arthur Conan Doyle Devon Tour" for those who want to drive to places associated with the three men. Pugh is the curator of the Conan Doyle (Crowborough) Establishment, and has a web-site at , and they pre- sent an interesting look at the three men and what they did in Devon. The book also is available in German: AUF DER SPUR VON ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: EINE RUNDREISE DURCH DEVON (Mannheim: Dryas Verlag, 2008; 146 pp., E12.95). The Hallmark Channel uses late-night slots to broadcast programs for teach- ers to record for use in the classroom; "The Royal Scandal" (2001) will air May 29, and "The Case of the Whitechapel Vampire" (2002) on June 26 (both at 3:00 am). The programs starred Matt Frewer Kenneth Welsh as Holmes and Watson, and there is a 27-page "Educator Guide" available for download at . Samantha Wolov has reported some Sherlockian artwork at the opening page of AOL Stalker at ; it's a data-base of 36,389,569 search- es made by AOL users in March, April, and May 2006. AOL removed the data, but the information still is available elsewhere (as is so often the case on the Internet); it is difficult but not impossible to identify searchers. It may be possible to find out who actually had the telephone number XX.31 (announced by Colonel Damery in "The Illustrious Client"): John Baesch has spotted a story in The Times (Nov. 28) about a new archive of 280 million telephone numbers in the first 104 years of British telephone directories, now available to subscribers at . Conan Doyle fought hard to protect mediums from prosecution by the authori- ties, and eventually the Witchcraft Act (1735) was replaced by the Fraudu- lent Mediums Act (1951), under which prosecutors must prove fraud and dis- honest intent to secure a criminal conviction. Now, according to a story in the Observer (Apr. 6), Britain plans to replace the Fraudulent Mediums Act (under which there have been fewer than ten convictions in the past 20 years) with Consumer Protection Regulations that apply to anyone charging or accepting gifts in exchange for a service, and allow disgruntled custo- mers to sue. Spiritualists, according to the story, are worried that they will be forced to issue disclaimers such as "this is a scientific experi- ment, the results of which cannot be guaranteed," and to prove they did not "mislead, coerce, or take advantage of" vulnerable customers. Yuichi Hirayama has resumed his English-language blog about "Sherlockiana in Japan" at . One of the recent entries displays the stamps issued for the recent convention of The Japan Sherlock Holmes Club (as in some other countries, the Japanese postal service allows you to put your own photographs on stamps). His web-site for the Shoso-In Bulletin is at . Apr 08 #5 Charlton Heston died on Apr. 5. His acting career spanned more than 60 years, and his starring rles included Moses, Ben-Hur, Gen. Charles "Chinese" Gordon, El Cid, Cardinal Richelieu and Michelangelo. Heston also played Sherlock Holmes in Paul Giovanni's play "The Crucifer of Blood" in Los Angeles in 1980 (with Jeremy Brett as Watson), and in a tele- vision version of the play in 1991. ELIMINATE THE IMPOSSIBLE by Alistair Duncan (Stanstead Abbotts: MX Publish- ing, 2008; 260 pp., 9.99), is subtitled as "An Examination of the World of Sherlock Holmes on Page and Screen". Duncan discusses the Canon, focusing on the major characters and providing a synopsis for and comments on each of the stories, and then turns to the major screen and television actors, from Arthur Wontner to Jonathan Pryce. Duncan's commentary is interesting, both when he writes about the stories and the actors, and when he discusses previous Sherlockian scholarship. Variety has reported (Mar. 31) that Paramount has bought the film rights to David Grann's "The Story of Z" and that Brad Pitt plans to produce and star in a film about Col. P. H. Fawcett, the explorer who vanished in the Matto Grosso in Brazil in 1925. Grann's article was published in The New Yorker (Sept. 19, 2005), and Doubleday plans to publish a book based on the arti- cle. Grann mentions Conan Doyle, who met Fawcett in 1910, and there's much more about their meeting in my newsletter (Oct 05 #1). Marina Stajic forwards a report from the Kings of Scandinavia that there is a Sherlock Holmes Pub in Denmark. The pub is in Aarhus, which is where the late Henry Lauritzen lived, and I'm sure that Henry would have enjoyed vis- its to the establishment. The pub's web-site is , where you'll find a photograph of Holmes and Watson sitting in front of the pub, flanked by two of its waiters. Plan far ahead: the Marple Newton Players will present William Gillette's "Sherlock Holmes" in Newton Square, Pa., Sept. 19-Oct. 4; the box office is at 610-353-9181 . The Irving Community Theatre will present Charles Marowitz's "Sherlock's Last Case" in Irving, Tex., Jan. 19- 31, 2009 (972-594-6104) . Vertigo Theatre will pre- sent Steven Dietz's "Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure" in Calgary, Apr. 25 to May 17, 2009 (403-221-3708) . Reported: THE RIVALS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES, edited and with an introduction by Nick Rennison (Manchester: No Exit Press, 2008; 320 pp., 9.99); an anthol- ogy of stories about other fictional detectives in Victorian and Edwardian London. Presumably similar to Hugh Greene's THE RIVALS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES: EARLY DETECTIVE STORIES (1970). Ralph E. Edwards ("Dr. Barnicot") died on Apr. 2. He was an actuary and vice president of the Baltimore Life Insurance Co., and for many years one of the sparking plugs of The Six Napoleons of Baltimore, as Napoleon #41, Gasogene IX, and Commissionaire #7. Ralph also happily participated in the Carlton Club of Baltimore, and in the electronic mailing list The Hounds of the Internet, contributing each week a set of scholarly and often-amusing "Canon Queeries" for the Canonical tales. He received his Investiture from The Baker Street Irregulars in 1963, and their Two-Shilling Award in 1983. Apr 08 #6 Laphroaig scotch, Lapsang souchong tea, and lemon balm are the ingredients in the rich, smoky Sherlock Holmes, according to a story in the Washington Post (Apr. 4) about new cocktails. The cocktail is available at PX, a 1920s-style speak-easy in Alexandria, Va. Proportions aren't given in the article, but you can ask PX founder Todd Thrasher; the phone number for PX is 703-299-8384. Sir Christopher Frayling's splendid paper on "The Writing of The Hound of the Baskervilles" (presented during the January birthday festivities) has been published in the spring issue of The Baker Street Journal, with pho- tographs of entries in Conan Doyle's diary for 1901, and considerable de- tail on just what Conan Doyle was doing when and where while to story was being written. The BSJ, published quarterly, costs $26.50 a year ($29.00 foreign), and checks (credit-card payments accepted from foreign subscrib- ers) should be sent to the BSJ (Box 465, Hanover, PA 17331); the BSJ web- site also accepts subscriptions. Lawrence Goldman's THE ANATOMY OF DECEPTION (New York: Delacorte, 2008; 352 pp., $24.00) is a medical thriller that's set in Philadelphia in mid-March 1889; in the first chapter the narrator states that "as Holmes' popularity soared, it thus became sport among physicians to match wits with the fic- tional detective, eager to demonstrate that if they applied themselves to murder, theft, mayhem, they would achieve similarly sterling results." The first three chapters of the book are available on-line at Bookreporter.com . is another example of interesting things to be found on the Internet: a joint venture between NBC Universal and News Corp., and adver- tiser supported (so you don't pay anything), it offers a chance to watch a long list of films and television series, old and new. Sherlockians may be interested in Vincent Price's "Dr. Goldfoot and the Bikini Machine" (1965), and the "Remington Steele" episodes "Steele's Gold" (1983) and "Elementary Steele" (1984). And I'm sure there's other material of interest, but those are the titles that turned up in a quick scan of the web-site's contents. "Are you more in the mood for Farrah Fawcett, or Mr. T?" was the teaser ti- tle on a review in New York magazine (Apr. 7). For racing fans: Karen Murdock spotted a horse named Sherlock Holmes runn- ing the 11th race (the Cotejo De Potrillos Stakes) in Santiago, Chile, on Apr. 9 and (according to Kate Karlson) finished third. Phil Attwell reports that the "Doctor Who" episode "The Talons of Weng-Chi- ang" (1977) is available on a DVD from the BBC Shop dis- counted to 15.99. The Doctor appears in Sherlockian costume, battling gi- ant rats, and there also is a passing mention of a Mrs. Hudson. According to the BBC this is the first release of an unedited version of the episode, and the DVD's added features include interviews with some of the stars, 25 minutes of behind-the-scenes footage, and an Easter egg. But: the DVD was released in 2003, and it's available for 7.98 at (note: the DVD is in PAL format). The Spermaceti Press: Peter E. Blau, 7103 Endicott Court, Bethesda, MD 20817-4401 (301-229-5669) May 08 #1 Scuttlebutt from the Spermaceti Press An update on the item about International Mystery Writers' Festival at the RiverPark Center in Owensboro, Ky. (Feb 07 #2): there will be seven perfor- mances (June 13-21) of Stuart Kaminsky's dramatization of his short-story pastiche "The Final Toast" (1987) and five performances (June 14-22) of Ru- pert Holmes' adaptation of two episodes (one of them is Sherlockian) of his television series "Remember WENN" (1996); the festival's address is 101 Da- viess Street, Owensboro, KY 42303 (877-639-6978) . Sorry about that: the web-site for the Shoso-In Bulletin (Jan 08 #8) now is at (English) and (Japanese). Christopher Paul Carey notes that the Subterranean Press (Box 190106, Bur- ton, MI 48519) offers two books that will be of interest to admirers of Philip Jose Farmer's Sherlockian (and other) work. PEARLS FROM PEORIA (2006, 769 pp., $45.00) offers reprints of "The Two Lord Ruftons" and "A Scarletin Study" and "The Doge Whose Barque Was Worse Than His Bight". And Carey has edited VENUS ON THE HALF-SHELL AND OTHERS (2008, 328 pp., $38.00), which includes "The Adventure of the Peerless Peer" and "The Problem of the Sore Bridge--And Others". Both titles also are avail- able at Amazon and elsewhere. Carey also reports that issue #12 of the magazine Farmerphile is Sherlock- ian; you can see Keith Howell's cover art showing Farmer in S'ian costume at ; the contents include Farmer's "Sher- lock Holmes and Sufism" (a paper delivered to The Mexborough Lodgers in El Paso in the 1975 and now published for the first time). $11.00 postpaid to North America ($15.00 postpaid elsewhere); checks to Michael Croteau, 393 James Street SW, Lilburn, GA 30047 (ask for issue #12). Or you can order on-line at the web-site. "Street Name Shake-Up Offers Public Chance to Have a Say" was the headline on a story in the Edinburgh Evening News (Mar. 24); Edinburgh will create "banks" of street names for different areas of the city, for use when new developments are built. Local residents will be able to suggest names with connections to the area (in the past the Edinburgh Council made such deci- sions), and the possibilities noted by the paper include political figures, great thinkers, sporting heroes, and the world of literature, including Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. There are many interesting aspects of book collecting, and it can be argued that the most interesting of those aspects is the collectors. You can read about many of them in Nicholas A. Basbanes' splendid AMONG THE GENTLY MAD: STRATEGIES AND PERSPECTIVES FOR THE BOOK HUNTER IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY (Henry Holt and Co., 2002, and Owl Books, 2003); Basbanes tells wonderful stories about collectors, with five pages about Daniel Posnansky (who has collected Conan Doyle for decades, and calls himself as an elitist rather than a completist, and explains the distinction), and two pages about Fred Kittle (who collects the entire Doyles and Conan Doyle family). Basabanes has an excellent web-site at , with discussion of all of his books, a link to the syndicated weekly radio program "The Book Guys" (with an archive of past programs), and much more. May 08 #2 Derham Groves, the first Australian to become a member of The Baker Street Irregulars (in 1985, as "Black Jack of Ballarat"), has had a long career as architect, artist, and writer, and his new THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE HOLMES: EXPLORING SENSE OF PLACE THROUGH CRIME FICTION (Black Jack Press, 178 pp.) is a delightful collection of essays that discuss his own work (including his detailed design for a Sherlock Holmes Centre) and the work of his students (who designed rooms and houses inspired by Canoni- ical tales, and a Sherlock Holmes Hotel in New York); there are many illu- strations, often in full color. Derham also reprints an article by R. Thurston Hopkins (from the Melbourne Herald, Aug. 31, 1933) in which he explains that he once asked Conan Doyle where Holmes actually lived, and was told that "that is one of the secrets Mr. Holmes refuses to divulge." But Conan Doyle acknowledged that he had a certain house in his mind's eye, adding that "there are clues in the Sher- lock Holmes stories which may help you to locate the house quite definitely in Baker Street." And Hopkins, after considerable research identified the house (93 Baker Street). And Derham publishes, for the first time, an in- troduction by John Bennett Shaw, written in 1987 for the catalog for Der- ham's exhibition "Holmes Away from Home" (a different introduction by John appeared in the catalog, and "The Sherlock Holmes Phenomenon" is a nice re- minder of John's enthusiasm and expertise). You can order the book from Michael Jorgensen (392 Station Street, Carlton North, VIC 3054, Australia) ; US$41.00 postpaid by airmail, US$36.00 postpaid by seamail. Checks payable to Peter E. Blau can be sent to me at 7103 Endicott Court, Bethesda, MD 20817. David H. Galerstein ("Bert Stevens") died on Apr. 29. He was a teacher and a principal, and a member of the New York City Board of Education. He also was a member of many Sherlockian societies in and around New York, and with Marlene Aig edited the anthology A SINGULAR SET OF PEOPLE (1990), and with Carolyn Bryan A SINGULAR SENSE OF HUMOR: A COMPLICATION OF STUFF AND NON- SENSE BY AND FOR SHERLOCKIANS (1993). He received his Investiture from The Baker Street Irregulars in 1972. There's a new (well, recent) edition of MURDER IN BAKER STREET: NEW TALES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES, the 2001 anthology edited by Martin H. Greenberg, Jon L. Lellenberg, and Daniel Stashower (New York: MJF Books, 2006; 277 pp., $7.98 at Barnes & Noble); hardcover, with an atmospheric dust jacket. The Practical, But Limited, Geologists honored the world's first forensic geologist at dinner in San Antonio on Apr. 23, during the annual meeting of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, and the visitors received a friendly Texas welcome from Ben Fairbank and Richard Lackritz on behalf of The Strange Old Book Collectors. Our next dinners will be in Houston on Oct. 8, and in Denver on June 10. Paul Spiring has reported the launch of "The Baskerville Weekend" (excur- sions arranged by Baskervilles Carriages); the inaugural weekend was held this month; the featured guest was Edward Hardwicke, who was Dr. Watson in the Granada television series. More information is available at Spriring's B. Fletcher Robinson web-site at . May 08 #3 Sherlockian societies in southern cities (Atlanta, Nashville, Birmingham, and Greenville) will hold their Fifth Annual Gath- ering of Southern at the Sheraton Read House in Chattanooga, Tenn., on Apr. 18-19, 2009; "The Hound of the Baskervilles" will be the conference theme, and the mailing list is maintained by Kent Ross (721 Hartford Road, Spring- field, OH 45503) (678-464-8321) . Alan C. Olding ("Cooee") died on May 6. He was serving in the British Roy- al Corps of Signals when he participated in the Normandy invasion, and in 1951 he emigrated to Australia, where he founded The Sherlock Holmes Soci- ety of South Australia (which became The Sherlock Holmes Society of Austra- lia, and eventually merged with The Sydney Passengers). He edited the ap- propriately-named newsletter News from the Diggings, and received his In- vestiture from The Baker Street Irregulars in 1988. Bochym Manor in Cornwall is for sale for L3 million, accoridng to a story in The Sunday Times (May 25). The house is located on the Lizard peninsi- la and was once owned by Robert, Count of Mortain (half-brother of William the Conquerer); it is built in stone and laid out in four wings, with ten bedrooms, seven reception rooms, three bathrooms, and 18 acres of grounds with holiday cottages. "Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was there just before the first world war," according to the story, and "even set a Sherlock Holmes story on the estate." There's more information about the house at the web- site . It's always a pleasure to discover Conan Doyle's fiction included in antho- logies: A SKELETON AT THE HELM, edited by John Richard Stephens (New York: Metro Books, 2008; 343 pp., $9.98 at Barnes & Noble), contains "The Striped Chest" (one of Conan Doyle's fine "stories of pirates and blue water"). is the URL for a blog entry by Jared Bland about the new eight-volume set of pap- erbacks of the Canon that Penguin has issued in Britain in their Red Class- ics series at L6.99 each (they've combined HIS LAST BOW and THE CASE-BOOK in one volume). Penguin's senior copywriter Colin Brush has blogged about the set at , call- ing them "dramatic, Hammer-horror-film-poster-style" editions. Series de- signer Coralie Bickford-Smith wrote: "Many people will have a fixed set of idea about Holmes and I wanted to confound these expectations and show that there's more to the character. The vibrant, two-toned covers use typefaces that evoke the Victorian era and an early cinema poster aesthetic emphasiz- es the adventure and excitement of the stories." The series also includes THE EXPLOITS AND ADVENTURES OF BRIGADIER GERARD (L7.99). Michael Chabon won a Pulitzer Price for his novel THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF CAVALIER & CLAY (Apr 01 #3), and his THE FINAL SOLUTION: A STORY OF DETEC- TION was an intriguing Sherlockian pastiche (Oct 04 #3). His MAPS AND LEG- ENDS: READING AND WRITING ALONG THE BORDERLANDS (San Francisco: McSweeney's Books, 2008; 222 pp., $24.00), his first non-fiction book, is a collection of interesting essays that include "Fan Fictions: On Sherlock Holmes" (re- vised from its first appearance in the N.Y. Review of Books in Feb. 2005). Chabon's enthusiasms extend to Colman McCarthy, M. R. James, and Will Eis- ner, and it's an excellent book. May 08 #4 The Sub-Librarians Scion of the Baker Street Irregulars in the American Library Association will gather at 4:00 pm on Sunday, June 29, in room 207-D at the Anaheim Convention Center (that's Anaheim in California); Les Klinger will be their featured speaker, discussing "Drac- ula, Sherlock Holmes, and Other Victorian Friends". More information about event is available from Marsha Pollak (Sunnyvale Public Library, 665 West Olive Avenue, Sunnyvale, CA 94086) Jon Lellenberg has reported that "The Lost Cases of Sherlock Holmes" is the first computer game officially licensed by the Conan Doyle Estate. Legacy Interactive describes it as "a whodunit casual computer game of theft, es- pionage, and murder" in which players must tap their own powers of observa- tion to solve puzzles and identify the culprits. The game has 16 different cases and more than 100 visual puzzles and mini-games; there is a demo on- line at , and Legacy off- ers a trial download (without charge) and the game itself ($19.95) on-line . The March issue of the quarterly newsletter of The Friends of the Sherlock lock Holmes Collections at the University of Minnesota offers Dick Sveum's "100 Years Ago" discussion of "The Flag" (Conan Doyle's 1908 addition to "A Duet"), Julie McKuras' "50 Years Ago" tribute to Page Heldenbrand, and Tim Johnson and Gary Thaden's report on Victor Cahn's performance in his play "Sherlock: Solo" in New York, as well as other news from and about the col- lections. Copies of the newsletter are available from Richard J. Sveum, (111 Elmer L. Andersen Library, Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455) . "Elementary, My Dear Indy!" is the motto for Bouchercon 40, to be held in Indianapolis on Oct. 15-18, 2009 (Bouchercon is the long-established world mystery convention, run by fans for fans, named in honor of Anthony Bouch- er, and with a web-site at . There will be a pre- conference event on Oct. 14 at the Lilly Library in Bloomington; click on "Breaking News" to read all about "Doyle, Boucher, Fleming--This Will Blow You Away" (The Lilly has excellent collections of all three authors). The postal address is Bouchercon 2009, c/o The Mystery Company, 233 Second Ave- nue SW, Carmel, IN 46032. The spring issue of For the Sake of the Trust (the newsletter of The Baker Street Irregulars Trust) offers Julie McKuras's tribute to David A. Weiss, and news of some recent additions to The Baker Street Irregulars Archives (including a letter written by Christopher Morley in which he noted that "The only clubs I have founded are the Three Hours for Lunch, the Grillpar- zer Club, and the Baker Street Irregulars--which are all phases of the same great idea: to avoid publicity!" Copies of the newsletter are available on request from Julie McKuras (13512 Granada Avenue, Apple Valley, MN 55124) . Andy Peck has reported that the Mystery Guild is now offering a "exclusive softcover" edition of ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: A LIFE IN LETTERS (May 07 #5/Sep 07 #6) for $21.99 (order no. 05-6751); their address is Box 6325, Indiana- polis, IN 46206 . Their "exclusive " edition may or may not be the same as the Quality Paperback Book Club edition. May 08 #5 E. J. Wagner reports that her THE SCIENCE OF SHERLOCK HOLMES: FROM BASKERVILLE HALL TO THE VALLEY OF FEAR: THE REAL FORENSICS BEHIND THE GREAT DETECTIVE'S GREATEST CASES (Jun 06 #2) has been translated into German: WISSENSCHAFT BEI SHERLOCK HOLMES UND DIE ANFANGE DER GERICHTS- MEDIZIN (Weinheim: Wiley-VCH, 2008; 234 pp., E14.95). E. J. has an inter- esting web-site at . Gyles Brandreth's OSCAR WILDE AND THE RING OF DEATH (London: John Murray. 2008; 395 pp., L14.99) is the second in his series of mysteries featuring Wilde as the detective, assisted by Robert Sherard as his Watson, and by his friend Arthur Conan Doyle; the mystery is ingenious and the story well told, with excellent period flavor. The U.S. title will be OSCAR WILDE AND A GAME CALLED MURDER (from Touchstone later this year, $24.00). The first novel in the series, OSCAR WILDE AND THE CANDLELIGHT MURDERS (May 07 #2), was published here as OSCAR WILDE AND A DEATH OF NO IMPORTANCE, and there is a fine web-site at . "Faeries" is a new musical about the Cottingley fairies, written by Stephen Langston and Wendy McPike, scheduled for the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August; there's a web-site at . The newly-discovered copy of Beeton's Christmas Annual (Apr 08 #2) sold at auction at Bonhams in London this month for L15,500 (well above the esti- mate of L7,000-9000); add 20% for the buyer's premium. The Northern Echo reported (May 21) that it was bought "by a collector from the north west of England who describes himself as a Sherlock fanatic." According to a story in the Oxford Mail (May 21), the 45-year-old Holmes fanatic from the north of England, who asked not to be named, said, "I'm elated and now I need to sort out the money--I'm lucky I have an understanding wife," and that "I'm very happy because I've been collecting Conan Doyle for about 30 years now. Randall Stock has more information about the Oxfam Beeton's at his web-site at . Bruce Holmes is continuing to expand his explorations of Sherlockian phila- tely (and philatelic Sherlockiana) (Aug 03 #1/Nov 04 #5/Jan 05 #4), and a colorful catalog of his philatelic offerings is available as a .pdf file by e-mail from Bruce at . Robert H. Schutz ("The Arnsworth Castle Business") died on Apr. 26. He was a chemist, director of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health's Testing and Certification Laboratory, and an enthusiastic amateur printer, presiding over the Plane Tree Press, from which he published many issues of The Arnsworth Castle Business Index. He received his Investiture from The Baker Street Irregulars in 1961. Martin Heath reports that Bigwood Auctioneers in Stratford upon Avon will have a 42-piece set of silver cutlery at auction on June 27. The cutlery, discovered in Baskerville Hall, is engraved with the Baskerville crest, and there's a press release at with photographs of the silver. This Baskerville Hall is Clyro Court in Hay-on-Wye, where the owners have said for many years that Conan Doyle visited the family often, and found inspiration there for his story (the family asked Conan Doyle to change the setting so that they wouldn't be overrun by tourists). May 08 #6 Dick Martin died on May 24. He was a fine actor and comedian, most famous for the long-running television series "Laugh-In" that he launched with Dan Rowan in 1968. They impersonated Holmes and Wat- son in Victor Herbert's "The Red Mill" in St. Louis in 1960, and there is a photograph of them in Canonical costume on p. 250 in Chris Steinbrunner and Norman Michael's THE FILMS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (1978). Steven Dietz's play "Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure" continues to be popular with regional theaters: it's on at the Park Square Theatre in St. Paul, Minn., through June 22; 20 West 7th Place, St. Paul, MN 55102 (651- 291-7005) . It's also scheduled at the Hedge- row Theatre in Media, Pa., Oct. 16 through Nov. 16. 64 Rose Valley Road, Media, PA 19063 (610-565-4211) . "The Death and Life of Sherlock Holmes" is a two-act puppet play adapted by Bob Brock from "The Final Problem" and "The Empty House", first performed at the Hole in the Wall Puppet Theatre in Lancaster, Pa., in 2000; they'll perform it again on June 6-7 and 13-14. 126 North Water Street, Lancaster, PA 17603 (717-394-8398) ; click on Over 21 Club. ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: A LIFE IN LETTERS, edited by Jon L. Lellenberg, Daniel Stashower, and Charles Foley, won an Agatha from Malice Domestic (best non- fiction), and an Edgar from the Mystery Writers of America (best critical/ biographical). Plan ahead: The Baker Street Irregulars' next annual dinner will be held on Jan. 9, 2009, honoring the 150th anniversary of the birth of Arthur Conan Doyle and the 75th anniversary of the founding of the BSI. And The Sher- lock Holmes Society of London's next annual dinner will be held on Jan. 17, 2009. It was in January 1968, during the William Gillette Luncheon in an upstairs room at Keen's Chop House in New York, that a Baker Street Irregulars sug- gested that The Adventuresses of Sherlock Holmes might consider picketing the BSI's annual dinner. And so they did. And much earlier, in 1946, the William Gillette Memorial Luncheon was held at Keen's. But Keen's is fam- ous for much more than that: Keen's Pipe Club has a long and distinguished history, and Bruce Harris has an interesting article about the restaurant and the club in the summer issue of Pipes and Tobaccos. $7.95; 5808 Farr- ingdon Place #200, Raleigh, NC 27609 . Postage rates increased this month, and my newsletter will cost $10.70 (to the U.S.), $13.90 (to Canada), and $16.50 (elsewhere); my circulation de- partment will remind you when it's time to renew. And my apologies to anyone who sent in something that didn't make it into this month's issue: I've recovered from a computer crash, but lost a few very recent notes that weren't backed up. "Have two copies of anything you ever want to see again" is excellent advice. The Spermaceti Press: Peter E. Blau, 7103 Endicott Court, Bethesda, MD 20817-4401 (301-229-5669)