Undershaw — Off the Agenda

Disregard my previous two posts on this matter. Waverley Borough Council has now taken Undershaw off the agenda altogether for next Wednesday’s meeting (26 November 2014). Good thing I resisted the urge to book a flight; I never would have got back in time to attend a Mess Dinner in Cambridge, nor attend a Senate meeting in Hamilton on the 26th.

The application has been withdrawn so that the planners can consider the contents of the English Heritage objection letter. Does this mean that the Application has been called in? I think so! Perhaps a letter received from the National Planning Casework Office in Birmingham citing a relevant Article 25 Directive might have also contributed to this decision.

In my opinion, the DFN Foundation has received much expensive but faulty advice and guidance in this matter. It would appear that the steam-roller to destroy the property has been stopped, at least temporarily, and hopefully permanently.

I am advised that the Land Registry Office has received new information on The Undershaw Hotel. New Owners, amount of the purchase etc. I will have this in hand new Tuesday.

The responsibility for this matter now rests squarely on the shoulders of a fellow called Dr. Andrew Brown at English Heritage. He first met Norman Stromsoy, the architects, and D&M at the property on Tuesday afternoon 29 September. He was given a photograph of the stables, which allegedly had been taken the day before. He was not shown the brick-lined well, because there was an issue of Asbestos contamination. Andy will have to bring a N6 mask for his next visit.

In my opinion, English Heritage should have been involved from the getgo, and not as an afterthought when the plans are drawn and posted on the Waverley website.

And what about that expensive excavating equipment that was on the proporty last week? No doubt that the present owner is paying by the day for it to be there. Will whoever? allow the work to continue. I hope not.

Will Undersahw go back on the agenda again, no doubt, but with the schedule for December already booked, it will not be until the new year, and adter the holiday season. So that will make it a full two years since the property was first listed for sale, and a frightfully flawed sales process it was!

 

One man’s trash is another boy’s treasure!

In February 1995, after Austin McLean introduced us, Peter Ruber and I started to lay out Vincent Starrett’s collected Poetry which forms Volume 1 of The Vincent Starrett Memorial Library. We talked regularly on the phone, much to the chagrin of Sandra, my secretary. I used to pick up the mail every morning, and one morning I picked up a parcel that I was not expecting from Peter. It contained four manuscripts which Peter later told me had been sitting on his bookshelf since 1971: “Country Matters” by August Derleth; “Return to Sac Prairie” by August Derleth; “The Game is Afoot!” by Charles Layng; and a 4th which I didn’t publish but subsequently sold to a collector, and sent the proceed to Peter. Peter also included a number of Sherlockian ephemeral items, and when I asked him about them, because I immediately called him as soon as I opened the parcel, Peter noted that he no longer had any interest in them, but he didn’t want to throw them out! The one that immediately caught my interest, because I am a life long philatelist was the pamphlet I attach here as a pdf. It appears to me to be the 1957 Christmas offering from Julian Wolff. I’ve never seen another one like it. and woe is me, I have not checked it in De Waal! A Ramble in Bohemia

 

Do you suffer from Holmesitis?

My friend Cameroon Hollyer prepared a Preface for our collection of Bigelow’s writings back in the 1990s. Good disease to keep in mind, when considering the literary activities of the members of the world-wide Sherlock Holmes community — either fans or scholars.

Preface to Baker Street Briefs: The Collected writings of S. Tupper Bigelow (1993)

Holmesitis: Holmz-i-tis. n. (med.)

A benign disease marked by an obsessive interest in Sherlock Holmes and in the minutiae of his life and career accompanied by an apparent belief in his reality. It is caused by the Holmes virus usually implanted through childhood exposure to the Sherlock Holmes Canon. The disease is frequently latent; emerging fully developed in later life. – The Dictionary of Rare Diseases, by Dr. Hill Barton.

Fortunately Holmesitis is not fatal. No one has ever died from it. Although Holmesians or Sherlockians (either term is usable) have scuffled on the edge of the Reichenbach Falls, none has committed Sherlockocide by plunging into the gorge. Nor does the disease interfere with its victim’s normal functions or appearance. Though the victim must acquire a deerstalker, it is not necessary for him or her to wear it. Only in the seclusion of the study or in genial conference with others similarly afflicted do the symptoms of Holmesitis manifest themselves.

Exactly how or when it struck Judge Tupper Bigelow I do not know. Judge Bigelow is a card player and he has always held the cards of his personal history so close to his vest that it is impossible to get a peep at them. I am forced therefore to supply the want of data with pure speculation and guess-work.

Presumably the young Tupper passed many evenings in his childhood home in Saskatchewan – a province where you can see miles in every direction but there is not that much to see – reading the Sacred Writings (the 60 Sherlock Holmes stories, nominally authored by A. Conan Doyle). In them he found enough picturesque scenes and exciting events to fill a province. He then put these books aside, took up the law, went East and became a lawyer, a Queen’s Counsel, and finally a judge. He lived many years as a respected citizen, calm, steady, judicious, thorough and painstaking in the performance of his duties. No one suspected that he carried the Holmes virus until it emerged full-blown when the century and the Judge were both middle-aged. He continued to work as efficiently as before; but at night he rushed home, barred the windows against airguns, and immersed himself in the Sacred Writings. Stung by the charge of plagiarism (as he tells us himself), he proceeded to acquire all the Writings upon the Writings – the commentaries of the Sherlockian scholars – voluminous even then – not only to read them but to index them so that he would never be caught out again. Finally he articled as a Sherlockian. To article in the Sherlockian rather than the legal sense means to produce learned articles on moot points in the Sacred Writings.

These articles were closely argued as befits a judge and they drew not only upon Judge Bigelow’s extensive knowledge of the Sherlockian literature but also upon his wide reading in other fields especially the law. In several of the articles collected here, he submits the conduct of Mr. Sherlock Holmes to judicial scrutiny. In one article he convicts Mr. Holmes on 17 counts of misprision of felony; in another he has second thoughts and clears him on all 17 counts. Both articles are convincing and you may take your choice as to which is right. In another one, he acquits Sherlock Holmes on several charges of burglary, even though the detective himself has admitted guilt. So cleverly does the Judge argue his client’s innocence, citing obscure laws and legal precedents, that the reader has no doubts that Holmes should walk (as we who are versed in modern crime fiction say). Decrying whimsy in Sherlockian writings, the Judge shows that he can play that game with the best of them, by proving that Sherlock Holmes, far from being Irene Adler’s lover or father of her child (Nero Wolfe), was himself Irene’s father. Here again his knowledge of legal nuances stands him in good stead.

Though Holmesitis shows in general a low recovery rate, some people do shake the disease. When I first met Judge Bigelow in 1969, he was showing signs of recovery. He was willing to part with his collection and it was acquired by the Metropolitan Toronto Reference Library, where it became the nucleus of one of the best public collections of Holmesiana and Doyleana in the world (advt.) With the collection went the Bigelow index to the Writings upon the Writings, which the Judge discusses in the first article in this collection. This index is actively maintained by the library with the help – more than the help – of Donald A. Redmond of Kingston, Ontario (“Good Old Index!”). After Judge Bigelow parted with his collection, I believe that he lost interest in the subject. Of the articles collected below only one bears a date in the 1970’s and that was written for a special volume dedicated to his good friend Julian Wolff, Commissionaire of the Baker Street Irregulars (“An Assessment and Valuation of the Ten Best Canonical Stories, with Some Observations on Those Somewhat Less Deserving of Praise”). All the other articles come from the 1950’s and 1960’s when the Judge was in the grip of Holmesitis.

In the course of my twenty years of curatorship of the library’s Arthur Conan Doyle Collection, it sometimes crossed my mind that Judge Bigelow’s articles – scattered through Sherlockian periodicals – should be collected. But I took no action, and it was only after my retirement that I casually mentioned the idea to Dr. George Vanderburgh. One does not casually mention a Sherlockian project to George as some pie-in-the sky, far-in-the-future possibility. His eyes light up, his computer clicks, and the thing is done. George of course suffers from – no – glories in – a case of acute Holmesitis. On top of this he also has advanced Computeritis, caused no doubt by a computer virus.

For the past two years George has been busy reducing to machine-readable form as many Sherlockian and Doylean texts as he can get his hands on. In his computer are two and a half volumes of Ronald Burt De Waal’s massive The Universal Sherlock Holmes. By touching a few keys, George came up with a complete list of Judge Bigelow’s Sherlockian writings. (Hartley Nathan unearthed two unlisted articles in The Ontario Magistrate’s Quarterly, formerly edited by Judge Bigelow). All of the listed articles were available in the Arthur Conan Doyle Collection and photocopies of them were made. George then scanned them into his computer and produced a camera-ready text which the Metropolitan Toronto Reference Library agreed to publish. Although Judge Bigelow is in poor health and rarely receives visitors, George managed to see him and to obtain his blessings on the project. Wherever possible, permission was also obtained from the magazines involved. In all cases, the original sources are cited.

George and I agreed that The Baker Street Briefs was an appropriate title in view of the legal background of the author and the legal nature of many of the articles. The Judge made no objection to this decision.

All the articles that appear here (with one or two minor exceptions) have been published elsewhere. But this is the first time they have been brought together in a single volume. The completist may not be completely satisfied since we did omit an article too faint to be photocopied. Nevertheless the volume contains all but the most trifling of Judge Bigelow’s Sherlockian articles. We dedicate it to all Sherlockians, who like ourselves carry the Holmes virus and suffer from an incurable desire to know ever more about the Master and his doings. Those who knew Judge Tupper Bigelow will be grateful for this reminder of their great friend and colleague: those who know him only by name will find in the work of this Sherlockian master inspiration for further investigations of the Sacred Writings, and perhaps a warning that on certain topics the Judge has spoken the last word.

— Cameron Hollyer, M.Bt., BSI

 

R.I.P. Peter Ruber (1940-2014)

Peter A. Ruber, BSI, PSI passed away on March 6, 2014. Peter was born September 29, 1940. I have had no contact with him since 2004. He had a major stroke in 2005, and has been in long-term care since 2011. But Peter was absolutely pivotal in my learning and understanding of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Vincent Starrett, August Derleth, Luther Norris, Seabury Quinn, George F. Worts, H. Bedford-Jones and Bertram Fletcher Robinson among others.

Austin McLean introduced Peter to me when I commenced my research on Vincent Starrett in 1994 along with Cameron Hollyer.

I have many fond memories when we travelled together to Minnesota and visited the Sherlock Holmes Collection in Minneapolis. We were royally entertained by Allan Mackler at the time; Allan was full of book stories as well.

Peter and I first visited Arkham House and April Derleth together in 1996. I helped him carry four boxes of books and manuscripts to the airport on his return flight; and Peter was appointed Editor of Arkham House, the following year.

Kay Price extended her hospitality to both of us, and we planned many Derleth publications together for The August Derleth Society in Sauk City. Most, but not all of these can be found on their website www.Derleth.org.

l have pleasant memories of countless long telephone conversations about a multitude of literary matters.

During the course of preparing The Original Text Solar Pons Omnibus 2 volume edition, we had many heated discussions, and resolved many difficult points, but I believe the final published result was worth the effort on both our parts.

Peter talked with me at great length about his publication on The Baker Street Gasogene in 1961-1962. He had plans for a regular journal, but that didn’t work out.

He revised one of the articles to be his introduction to the book The Chronicles of Addington Peace by Fletcher Robinson.

I well remember a meeting on a Friday morning in New York with Richard Lancelyn Green, Peter Ruber, Christopher Roden and myself in New York City. Richard had brought along his personal copies of Baker Street Gasogene for Peter to sign. Richard had also brought along his file of correspondence between Michael Harrison and August Derleth. Peter Ruber also had a file of correspondence he had obtained from Arkham House archives. I was to meld the two and publish the results. Richard also noted there were some missing originals in the files of John Michael Gibson. I did not have the opportunity to complete that correspondence until May 2012. But that’s another story, and the book is ready to go, introduced by David Hammer. I shall dedicate the volume to Peter Ruber and to Richard Lancelyn Green. At the end of breakfast, I adjourned to a second breakfast at The Harvard Club down the street with Dan Posnanysky. I learned later that Peter then presented a number of unpublished manuscripts by H Russell Wakefield which were subsequently published as Reunion at Dawn. But the conclusion to that story is an adventure for another day.

Peter had also done research on the bibliography of George F, Worts. The last item I sent him was the two volume collection of Peter the Brazen. I have also been working a multi-volume collection of Gillian Hazeltine. Rodney Schroeder recently completed the huge editorial job, and the set should be ready for publication soon. I shall dedicate this volume to Peter.

Peter also maintained a rich correspondence with August Derleth, after his first visit to Sauk City in 1962, This is all, now held in the archived of The State Historical Society in Madison Wisconsin. The Derleth archives is well worth a visit. It contains a note scribbled to Derleth by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. If you have trouble finding it, it is filed under “D”.

Peter and I spent three days perusing this archive in some detail in 1996.

Finally, Austin McLean introduced us, and I agreed to publish Ruber’s volume of Vincent Starrett’s poetry. (This is Volume 1 in the Starrett Memorial Library.) Peter sent me four manuscripts, which had been sitting on a shelf in his office since 1971, when his publishing company The Candlelight Press ceased to operate. I examined them in detail. There was also correspondence attached, but in particular Peter had a letterhead logo for his Candlelight Press. You will find it in his version of the Last Bookman. I asked him if I could adopt it as my own since he was no longer using it. The answer was an unqualified yes. The logo had been designed by Henry Lauritzen featuring deerstalker hat, book, candle and pipe. Peter also noted that he did not like the title for my press, in fact he said it was awful! as well as too long! And so The Battered Silicon Dispatch Box press was born amidst controversy. Peter noted that Henry had created it at the same time as he did the illustrations for The Adventure of the Orient Express which was published in 1968.

I well remember when Peter finally consented to let me publish, The Bibliography of H. Bedford Jones, tiled The King of the Pulps. We had talked about it for many years. Peter had two co-authors, Darrell Richardson and Victor Berch. Bedford-Jones was a Canadian, who lived and wrote in the USA. Bedford Jones was prolific to say the least. The rest of this story must be for another day — very complicated and convoluted, but the book was published and is still available. Many additional projects resulted after my perusal of this Bibliography. The Compleat Saga of John Solomon and The Exploits of Riley Dillon are two which immediately come to mind.

In summary, Peter, R.I.P. it was a pleasure to recall our times together, and exciting to remember there are still projects, yet to be published, which will have your imprimatur on them, as well as Henry Lauritzen’s design.

 

Sherlock Holmes six-pack from the Battered Box in 2011

Victorian Holmes 

by Michael Duke TPB 232 pp. ISBN 9781-55246-940-8 @ $24.00

This is a collection of Sherlock Holmes scholarship from Australia. It went to press last week, and I am about to view the proposed cover. The art work for the cover was created by Tom Roberts of Black Dog Books. It might benefit from an Index, but the Table of Contents will have to suffice.

Thinking Outside the Tin Dispatch-Box

 by William R. Cochran, Trade Paperback 160 pp. ISBN 978-1-55246-941-5 @ $20.00

This is book of Sherlockian scholarship. Many of the Biblical references and footnotes are beyond my comprehension, but it is certainly thought provoking. The project is almost ready for press. Some additional illustrations by Tom Artis are on the way. With a little luck and coordination this book will launch at The ACD/Sherlock Holmes Symposium in Dayton Ohio on 13-15 May 2011. Check Ron Fish’s Sherlock Holmes Calendar website for details.

The Compleat Adventures of Picklock Holes

by Rudolf Chambers Lehmann, Trade Paperback 180 pp. ISBN 978-1-55246-913-2 @ 16.00

This is a small collection which collects the pastiches which are interesting and charming. Many of the stories have been collected in anthologies elsewhere. The original book illustrations are included, and a portion of one forms the cover. This will likely appear in 2011.

101 More Crossword Puzzles and Acrostixs

by Franklin Saksena 221pp. TPB ISBN 978-1-55246-879-1 @ $30.00

This is the second volume of  crossowrds and acrostixs by Franklin Saksena. This publication has been delayed for over a year since I was frustrated with the formatting of the double lines necessitated with the acrostixs. I am sure there is an easy way to do it, but I never could find it. This volumes was launched in New York City on the BSI weekend at the beginning of January. Don’t buy this unleass you already have the first one. This volume uses many of the illustrations by Paul Churchill that originally appear in the first colelction as well as the cover in maroon instead of hunter green. 

The Incident of Ak-Sar-Ben

by P. Whitney Hughes a.k.a. Hugh Whitt. Trade Paperback 200 pp. ISBN 978-1-55246-920-0 @ $16.00

This story is the third in a series. The first two are The Adventure of the Two Coptic Patriarchs and The Adventure of the Victroian Vulcan. This is a four collection of short stories on the drawing board entitled The Wheat and the Chaff. I personally have never been a fan of pastiches, but I do recognize the compulsion of every Sherlockian, big and small, young and old to emulate the story telling of the Literary Agent. I even started to write one once, only to discover I can’t write my way out of a wet paper bag! The wrap around cover is a delightful interpretation by Laurie Fraser Manifold of Sherlock and Watson taking an Air Balloon ride. It is a wrap around and a delight to behold.

Under the Darkling Sky

by John E. Weber. Hard Cover and Trade paperback 392pp. with Index ISBN 978-1-55246-851-7 @ $65.00 or $40.00

This volume also rolled out in New York in January 2011. John is a Holmes and Doyle scholar who has travelled extensively in England to compile this comprehensive volume. The cover is a evocative photo of Dartmoor that the author took himself, and provides an appropriate visual image for the title. The text takes my good friend to task for his selections of canical localities. But it is all part of the game — I think!

Realms of Conjecture

By David Hammer. Soft Cover 120 pp. ISBN 978-1-55246-892-0 @$20.00

This is another volume of fact and fiction by David Hammer. He takes dead aim at some of the high profile characters in the cult (better to say hobby) David has the unique ability of expressing his opinions in words in a very engaging fashion. This ability has undoubtedly served him well in the courtrooms of Iowa over the years. I have reworked the art work of Jean Pierre Cagnat for the cover; it features Monsieur Hammer hanging by a rope impaled with various instruments of death. If you don’t like what David has to say, you will certainly enjoy the cover. The book is about to go to press, after a final proof reading by David. This project was also instrumental in another book project coming my way. In brief, David had written an essay on the demise of Richard Lancelyn Green. David had previously offered the manuscript to the Wessex Press and it was rejected based on the manuscript containing the RLG essay. When Jon Lellenberg heard that I was now considering publishing the manuscript — with the RLG essay, we (Jon and I) had a series of telephone conversations in which a law suite was alluded to more than once. I’ll spare you the details, but the results; David agreed to withdraw the essay altogether; and Mycroft and Moran published Baker Street Irregular. David also did a major rewrite of his essay on Wiggins and The Baker Street Irregulars. In my opinion, David remains highly critical of the irregular organization and I predict it will be increasing difficult for those Irregulars who are “low-bridging” it; and also increasingly easy for those irregulars who are attempting to “low-bridge” it as well.

 

Contemplating Deerstalkers

I have observed over the years that most Sherlockians own a deerstalker hat. They don’t often wear them, because perhaps they are afraid of being identified as part of a fringe group of readers who might firmly believe in something their heart believes is true. But I purchased my own Fore-and-Aft Cap from a mailorder firm in Florida many years ago now, and which, undoubtedly, has gone out of business by now. It is well used and is beginning to fray at the edges, but it will do me for my remaining breathing time. But I have also inherited some deerstalkers from other Sherlockians.

My friend Bob Gray died some years ago now. He gave me two first editions of the Hound shortly before his death, along with countless other Sherlockian Treasures, including signed material from Richard Lancelyn Green whom he met at the Metro Toronto library in 1980 when Richard was doing research for his ACD Bibliography with John Michael Gibson. When Bob passed away, his family invited me to select some stuff and I ended up with Bob’s deerstalker, his reading lamp and his Betamax tape collection. The hat is a little small for me, but I will always treasure it.

When my friend Bill McCoy died last year, I was in the unenviable position of emptying his apartment. Most of the cupboards and drawers went to Good Will or The Salvation Army, but not his WWII Air Force Uniform, and not his Deerstalker. It too is a little small for me, but I will treasure it always.

When I travelled to Don Izban’s CCC (Canonical Convocation and Caper — I think) in 2005 Don Izban presented me with a handsome black and white checkered deerstalker which did fit, and I wear it proudly, and each time I wear it I remember the events of that late summer weekend in Door County, Wisconsin very fondly. It is a wonderful place to visit on the south shore of Lalke Superior. We took the ferry across Lake Michigan on the way home.

In early 2010, I purchased some of the books from the library of August Derleth from his daughter April Rose Derleth. His deerstalker came as part of that package. It was still hanging on a coat & hat-rack in his studio library upstairs at The Place of Hawks. I tried it on with trepidation. Alas, it too was small. But it had a label inside which intrigued me “Hawkshaw” this was undoubtedly the manufacturer. BUt it also reminded me of a comic Strip that Derleth collected over many years, and I plan to extract and republish from the State Historial Society in Madison. Hawkshaw the Detective. It had some name changes over the years because of conflict with those two reprobates Denis and Adrian Conan Doyle, but I think a collection of the Hawkshaw strips by whatever name would be a useful adjunct to the Sherlock literature — always remembering, never has so much been published by so many for so few!

And finally I contemplated Derleth’s Deerstalker itself. It had a shades of green and dark green checkered design that was familiar to me. The Mycroft & Moran logo than Coyne (not Utpatel) designed for Derleth in 1945. This hat was the model Derleth used for his logo for his Solar Pons stories!

 

“Under the Darkling Sky”

Only the serious Holmes aficianodo will recognize this as a short quote from The Hound of the Baskervilles. In Florida, I made the final editorial changes to the manuscript, and finished the compilation of the index, and sent the print out to the author John Weber of Syracuse for his final perusal. This book is fully titled: Under the Darkling Sky: A Chrono-Geographic Odyssey through the Holmesian Canon. It should be ready for a conference in August in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
The two pictures attached are Sunset on Dartmoor and the author at the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland. In passing, a trip to the Reichenbach Falls is the Sherlockian equivalent of a trip to Mecca — strange but true!

 

How did you meet August Derleth?

I’ll met everyone who reads this entry will have their own answer to this question. I first encountered his writing in the lobby of the Algonquin Hotel back in January 1991 at around 6:00 p.m. on a Thursday during the BSI weekend. I was standing in a group listening in on the conversation, trying desperately to learn Dr. Watson’s middle name? How many wives he actually had? Whether a goose really does have a crop? and What Sherlock Hoolmes actually did when he visited Tibet during the Great Hiatus.

David Galerstein, engaged me in conversation, and invited me to go for dinner later that evening. He asked me if I had ever read a Solar Pons story? I replied no; and he then recommended them to me. They were written by a fellow in Wisconsin, by the name of August Derleth. I visited Otto Penzler’s bookshop the next day for the first time, and purchased the two volume slip-cased, shrink-wrapped edition of “The Solar Pons Omnibus” along with some other Sherlockian items including a reading copy of the three volume Heritage Club edition of the Canon. Now that’s my story and I am sticking to it!

But I suspect I am not in the majority, far from it. I suspect the majority of Derleth’s readers today are either fans of H.P. Lovecraft; readers of his “Sac Prairie Saga” including fiction, poetry and journals; readers of the anthologies he compiled in Science Fictionand the Macabre; or encountered one of his columns in the newspaper; read one of his many book reviews; or read his many short stories in Weird Tales; or his fiction in Redbook Magazine; or one of his biographies about Zona Gale, or Emerson or Thoreau; or one of juvenile volumes as a child.

Like a diamond, August Derleth had many facets as a writer, that I have only discovered after I followed up on the advise of David Galerstein. When David was going through his collection many years later to divest himself of stuff preparing to meet Sherlock under the Reichenbach, he sent me the original PSI pin that he had received from Luther Norris, as a token of his esteem. I shall always treasure it, and wear it with pride.

 

Travelling to Florida

During a recent car excursion to Florida, we had some some experiences worthy of note. I won’t bore you with the repetitive details necessarily involved — like lousy or good meals, or lousy and hard beds, not enough towels etc. nobody wants to take their time to read that trivia.

The first night we stopped at Dunkirk, New York. We have stayed there before and I know there is a computer in the lobby with the usual gambling and tourist shortcuts, but there was also a short cut to “Google Earth.” I was struck with an idea and I punched in “Maiwand Afghanistan.” And indeed I did get an aerial view of Maiwand, not in great resolution but certainly recognizable. I printed it out, and have now rescanned it. I wasn’t able to save the original digital image, but I post it here, and hope that I haven’t committed some egregious act of piracy. When I get home I should be able to find the landmarks and the military (British and Jezail) graveyard. I don’t suppose I will see the rock cairns, nor the signed entrance, nor the obelisk in the treed grove that marks the Afghan cemetery. Maiwand of course was where Dr. John H. Watson received his wound(s) serving as a Medical Officer with The Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers.

The first destination the next day was my appointment at The Maple-Vail Book Manufacturing Group in York, PA to discuss the possibility of two large bulk book purchases. One batch of books was held in inventory at the warehouse in York, and the other batch of books was held at the warehouse, sixty miles up the road at their warehouse in Fredericksburg with a Lebanon, PA mailing address. I met with Joan, Shonna and Bradley in shipping and was very pleased when they accpeted Arkham House lapel pins.

That same afternoon we drove to “Fallingwater” a house built over running water of a stream somewhat southwest of Pittsburgh. We took a wrong turn, and got some excellent directions from Emily and her associates working in Campaign office of a Democrate running for office. Emily was in fact a guide at Fallingwater — serendipity in Pittsburgh. Fallingwater is a remarkable world class attraction where Frank Lloyd Wright built a home for Mr. Kaufman the department store magnate back in the 1930’s. The project went over budget, and rather than describe it here, I’ll let the reader google the word — Fallingwater. They have a remarkable webcam on site which is viewable on their website. The water was running very high under the house with the spring thaw. David Niles and his film crew were conducting a high definition film shoot of the house, and David noted that he had waited for 43 years for this two-day opportunity of a lifetime. The security guard noted that the site had 150,000 visitors per annum. I took a photograph of David doing the shoot, and we agreed that we would meet again at his studio in New York City — likely in January 2011. I invited him to do a shooot of the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) and he was interested. He knew of the recent Thomson renovation to the tune of 300 million, but he did not know of the 110 million dollar Reubens! I was going to post that picture of David but when I read the disclaimed that the gatekeeper had given me — no pictures of the site are to be posted on the internet, I decided not to. In closing well worth the visit — and now a cherished memory.

A point of interest: Frank Lloyd Wright (Spring Green, Wisconsin) lived just down the road from August Derleth (Sauk City, Wisconsin). They were neighbors and they kknew each other. Augie hired an architect from Chicago to build his house which Augie called “The Place of Hawks” the house that Redbook built. The money from the downpayment came from a series of Sac Prairie novels that Augie sold to Redbook. Some of these have never been collected in book foorm, and a couple are still in manuscript and have never been published at all. They were presumably turned down by Redbook, but on this point the written record is unclear. When FLW asked AD why he had not hired him to do Place of Hawks, Augie is alleged to have said “because if you had designed the house, it would be your house, and because the fellow from Chiago designed it — it is my house. Neat point! who remebers that fellow Kaufman now? The Fallingwater property designed by FLW belongs to the Pennsylvania Conservatory.

The second night we stopped at Breezewood, Pennsylvania. Then after a hectic drive around Washington, DC.
we stopped at Richmond, Virginia. We walked through the mall next door for a relaxed Italian Dinner. I consulted the tourist guides in the lobby, and thought a visit to The Confederacy White House and the The Holocaust Museum in Richmond were top of the list for a visit, but got on the road first thing instead.

On the road again in North Carolina  we stopped at J&R Outlet Mall and my major purchase was a $3.00 children’s baseball bat. Not that I’m a baseball player, but I am publishing a 3rd edition of The Annotated Casey at the Bat by Martin Gardner. I mailed the bat to Martin in a mailing tube, and suggested that his son Jim take a picture of Martin swinging the bat like Casey did in Thayer’s poem. This will form the back cover illustration for the book with a suitable caption.

The fourth night we overnighted in Florence, South Carolina. The Fatz Cafe was located within walking distance from the motel. The next day we did a whirlwind sight seeing tour of Myrtle Beach, and Charleston South Carolina. I placed a telephone call to Dan Boulden and we discussed the two editions of The Shunned House a 2008 facsimile edition issued in an edition of 100 copies. There are minor differences which will be elaborated in a blog in the near future. 

The fifth night we stopped at Ridgeland, South Carolina after a long day. Mexican meal nearby, and on the road early to visit the St. Augustine Outlet Mall. I sat patiently and quietly for a couple of hours while a shopping spree occurred.

We arrived at our destination in New Smyrna Beach, Florida. Upon registration I was presented with a package from Pasquale Accardo containing the final correction of the Chester-Belloc Project. I collection of G.K. Chesterton’s illustrations, published and unpublished for some 13 books.

We went out to dinner at a Sports Bar, and I was impressed that not a single one of the 100 TV’s in the place featured the Health Care Debate which was in progress, and that I had been following every morning and every evening of the trip. On the way home I purchased a Magic Jack, a rather magical device for placing and receiving telephone calls at no charge in The USA and Canada.

That’s enough! and here’s Maiwand! I uploaded it twice, and I can’t figure out how to delete the second image.

 

High Water Marks in Canonical Illustrations

If you are not an afficiando of Sherlock Holmes stop reading this blog entry right now! If you are and you have a shelf of books allegedly penned by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle you will already know of Sidney Paget. But did you know that his brother Walter illustrated one of the stories. You will know of the work of Frederic Dorr Steele who created his Sherlock as a William Gillette look-alive and all these originals — if they survived the sands of time — are highly prized by their owners, and sell for very high prices at auction. There is no point in illustrating them again here, the majority are well known to us all. A definitive study of the engraver’s signatures is yet to be done, and this is a project that Richard Lancelyn Green and I discussed back in 2001; perhaps his notes still reside in a file in the Portsmouth Library archives?

Another complete set of 64  illustrations (2 for each of the 4 novels) was created by George and Betty Wells. The originals were numbered and given out as quiz prizes at meetings. I used the set to illustrate the pages of The Universal Sherlock Holmes back in 1994, and have seen a couple, not many in collections in the interim. I have seen a couple of sale by dealers, and the originals are very collectiable as well. In fact, if the truth be told, Sherlockians collect everything as the 24, 807 entries in USH will tell you. ZHere’s a couple to wet your appetite.