Jan 15 #1 Scuttlebutt from the Spermaceti Press Sherlockians (and Holmesians) gathered in New York to celebrate the Great Detective's 161st birthday during the long weekend from Jan. 7 to Jan. 11. The festivities began with the traditional ASH Wednesday dinner sponsored by The Adventuresses of Sherlock Holmes at Annie Moore's, and continued with the Christopher Morley Walk led by Jim Cox and Dore Nash on Thursday morn- ing, followed by the usual lunch at McSorley's. The Baker Street Irregulars' Distinguished Speaker at the Midtown Executive Club on Thursday evening was Alan Bradley, co-author of MS. HOLMES OF BAKER STREET (2004), and author of the award-winning "Flavia de Luce" series; the title of his talk was "Ha! The Stars Are Out and the Wind Has Fallen" (his paper will be published in the next issue of The Baker Street Journal). The William Gillette Luncheon at Moran's Restaurant was well attended, as always, and the Friends of Bogie's at Baker Street (Paul Singleton and An- drew Joffe) entertained the audience with an updated version of "The Sher- lock Holmes Cable Network" (2000). The luncheon also was the occasion for Al Gregory's presentation of the annual Jan Whimsey Award (named in memory of his wife Jan Stauber), which honors the most whimsical piece in The Ser- pentine Muse last year: the winner (Jenn Eaker) received a certificate and a check for the Canonical sum of $221.17. And Otto Penzler's traditional open house at the Mysterious Bookshop provided the usual opportunities to browse and buy. The Irregulars and their guests gathered for the BSI annual dinner at the Yale Club, where Paul Martin proposed the preprandial first toast to Inez Bergquist as The Woman. The dinner's agenda featured the traditional BSI toasts and rituals, Michael Dirda's report on Langdale Pike's participation in the Civil War and other important events, Terry Hunt's tribute to Chris- topher Morley, and David Stuart Davies' one-man multi-voice performance of an unrecorded but almost Canonical episode at Baker Street and elsewhere. Mike Whelan (the BSI's "Wiggins") presented the BSI's Tip of the Deerstalk- er Awards to Marsha Pollak, Ralph Hall, George McCormack, and Jim Saunders, and a Two-Shilling Award to Mary Ann Bradley. This year's Birthday Honours (Irregular Shillings and Investitures) were awarded to Bill Mason ("White Mason"), James O'Brien ("Knowledge of Chemistry.--Profound"), Chrys Kegley ("Rachel Howells"), Kiyoshi Arai ("The Shoso-in Near Nara"), Emily Mirank- er ("Lady Hatty St. Simon"), Kristina Manente ("Grace Dunbar"), Marino C. Alvarez ("Hilton Soames"), and Jeffory Hart ("Henry Baker"). An enthusiastic crowd attended this year's Gaslight Gala at the Manhattan Club, where the agenda featured toasts, music, a show-and-tell by Bob Zatz ("On Dr. Watson's Guns"), and theatrics that included performances of Wil- liam Gillette's "The Painful Predicament of Sherlock Holmes" and some ori- ginal skits, and much more. Some of the more fervent (or perhaps hard core) Sherlockians gathered after the dinners at O'Lunney's Irish Pub to honor long-standing traditions such as staying until at least 2:21; another tradition calls for newly-Investi- tured Irregulars to buy a round of tequila shots. Jan 15 #2 On Saturday morning Covent Garden West (the dealers room at the Roosevelt Hotel) welcomed sellers and buyers, and authors and editors delighted to inscribe or sign their books. The Beacon Society held its annual meeting, and the Junior Bloodstain of The Clients of Adrian Mul- liner featured Gayle Lange Puhl's new play "The Riddle of the Refurbished Room" (performed by Ken Vogel's hand puppets). The BSI's Saturday-afternoon reception at the Yale Club offered entertain- ment, conversation, wining, and dining; Timothy S. Greer was honored as the winner of the Morley-Montgomery Award (a check accompanied by an attractive certificate) for the best contribution to The Baker Street Journal in 2014. The John H. Watson Fund benefited from energetic sales of tickets for the raffle prize (the set of five medals handcrafted by Maggie Schpak for The Curious Collectors of Baker Street), and an auction of attractive donations to the Fund. The main Saturday-evening event was the annual "Very Irregular Lost in New York with a Bunch of Sherlockians" dinner arranged by Chrys Kegley and The Curious Collectors of Baker Street at O'Lunney's Times Square Pub, with 54 on hand for the festivities, and on Sunday morning a goodly crowd gathered at the Adventuresses of Sherlock Holmes' brunch at the Churchill Tavern. A final note for those who want to plan ahead: The Baker Street Irregulars' next annual dinner will be held on Jan. 15, 2016. The Sherlock Holmes So- ciety of London's annual dinner likely will be on Jan. 9, 2016. I've not reported on everything, I hasten to add; there will be much more detailed reports in the spring issue of The Baker Street Journal. The BSJ appears quarterly, and subscriptions (four issues plus the Christmas Annu- al) cost $39.95 (to the U.S.) or $52.00 (elsewhere); payment by credit card or PayPal is welcome, or you can pay by check sent to the BSJ (Box 583, Zi- onsville, IN 46077). You can also subscribe at the BSJ web-site at <www.bakerstreetjournal.com>, which has interesting features such as articles from recent issues of the BSJ, some of the papers written by winners of the Morley-Montgomery Awards, and information on the BSI's other publications and activities. The title of The Baker Street Journal's 2014 Christmas Annual is "The Only Actor Who Ever Got It Right" (it's now in the hands of BSJ subscribers, and not otherwise available unless you can find it at eBay or wherever), and it is a warm tribute to Douglas Wilmer, now 95 years old, and it includes his speech to the Sherlock Holmes Society of London's annual dinner in 1994. The BSJ's 2015 Christmas Annual will be a 40th-anniversary tribute to Nich- olas Meyer's THE SEVEN-PER-CENT SOLUTION, both the book and the film; the Annual, edited by Steven Doyle, will commemorate the spark that ignited the great Sherlockian "boom" of the 1970s. Al Gregory <[email protected]> offers (via e-mail) his 2015 edi- tion of "The ABC of the BSI" (an alphabetical listing of Investitures, with recipients, from "Abbey Grange" to "Young Stamford") and "The Florin Socie- ty" (couples in which both spouses have received Irregular Shillings). Jan 15 #3 OUT OF THE ABYSS is the latest volume in the Baker Street Ir- regulars Manuscript Series (2014; 229 pp., $39.95); edited by Andrew Solberg, Steven Rothman, and Robert Katz, it offers a facsimile of the original manuscript of "The Empty House", an annotated transcript, in- teresting commentary on both the manuscript and the story, artwork by Fred- eric Dorr Steele on the dust jacket, and a nice surprise if you (carefully) remove the dust jacket to inspect the cloth binding. Details, on the book, including the table of contents and one of the articles, are available at <www.bakerstreetjournal.com>. Sonia Fetherston's PRINCE OF THE REALM: THE MOST IRREGULAR JAMES BLISS AUS- TIN (2014; 174 pp., $21.95) is the second volume in the BSI's biographical series, and it's a fine tribute to a fascinating man who was a collector, scholar, and mentor, and a good friend to many Sherlockians. Also from the BSI is SHERLOCKIAN SATURDAYS AT THE PRATT, edited by William Hyder (2014; 192 pp., $21.95), offering a grand survey of three decades of Canonical scholarship from the annual gatherings at Baltimore's Enoch Pratt Free Library. All of the BSI's books can be ordered using the BSI web-site or by mail (checks payable to The Baker Street Irregulars) from Michael H. Kean, 3040 Stoat Road, Pebble Beach, CA 93593; shipping for one book costs $5.95 to U.S./$22.95 elsewhere. Add $1.50/$5.00 for each additional book in the same shipment. THE DRURY LANE THEATRE MYSTERY is Dennis Hoey's only screenplay, unproduced and only now published, found by Michael A. Hoey after his father died, and now available accompanied by Michael's account of his father's life and ca- reer, and a description and history of the Drury Lane (Indianapolis: Gaso- gene Books, 2014; 85 pp., $12.95) <www.gasogenebooks.com>. Dennis Hoey had a long career on stage, screen, radio, and television, almost always as a supporting character in roles that included Inspector Lestrade in Univer- sal's "Sherlock Holmes" series, and of course Holmes, Watson, and Lestrade are all involved in Hoey's mystery at the Drury Lane. One of the nicest things about modern technology is that it offers access to so much information, as can be seen easily in Gasogene's SHERLOCK HOLMES AND CONAN DOYLE IN THE NEWSPAPERS, VOLUME 1, 1881-1892, edited (and anno- tated) by Mattias Boström and Matt Laffey (2014; 306 pp., $32.95). They've scoured digitized archives and extracted and reprinted a treasure trove of articles that offer a fascinating look at what was to be found in print in those years, including (for example) the first commentary on the many mis- takes in "Silver Blaze" (and the critics were not at all kind). There will be more volumes to come in the series, and that's nice news indeed for any- one who want to see just how valuable an institution the Press can be. Also from Gasogene: 221 BBC, by Bert Coules (2014; 297 pp., $22.95) is an expanded and revised second edition of the 76-page booklet published by the Northern Musgraves in 1998, and it will be welcomed by all those who have enjoyed Bert's work on the BBC's radio series, which not only was the first (and the only) series to have dramatized all of the Canon but also was ex- tended by Bert to include 15 apocryphal stories.