The 1980 Dinner marked Sherlock Holmes’s 126th birthday. After the first Canonical toast to The Woman, Peggy (Mrs. H. W.) Starr was given the honour. The dinner included all rites and ceremonies faithfully observed. The entire programme was carried out as usual, except for one delightful interruption: “an Irregular committee took over the proceedings and delivered tributes to the surprised, flattered, and blushing Commissionaire on the occasion of his seventy-fifth birthday.”
Dinner Details: January 11, 1980
The Regency Hotel, 540 Park Avenue, New York
Dinner Photo Information
Click on the above photo to see a larger version of it, and maximize your browser window to see the most detail.Key to People in the 1980 BSI Dinner photo (not available at this time)
BSI Honours List
Investitures: Bruce R. Beaman as The Yellow Face**
John Stevens Berry as The Hammerford Will Case**
Stafford G. Davis as Horace Harker
J. Devereux deGozzaldi as The Speckled Band**
Robert Watson Douty as The Priory School
Samuel M. Gerber as The Final Problem
Alvin F. Germeshausen as Baron Dowson**
Charles E. Henry as The Lion's Mane
Jeffrey L. Michelman as Sutro, the Lawyer
Robert A. Moss as The Case of Fairdale Hobbs**
Hartley R. Nathan as The Penang Lawyer
Frank F. Reilly as The Boscombe Valley Mystery
* received Investiture at another event during the year
** in absentia
What is an Investiture?
Two-Shilling Award:
Peter E. Blau
John Bennett Shaw
What is a Two-Shilling Award?
The Woman:
Peggy (Mrs. Herbert W.) Starr
What is The Woman honour?
"Stand with me here upon the terrace..."
(as named at this Dinner, not their year of passing)
Not listed in the 1980 BSJ report.
What is the origin of “standing on the terrace?”
Morley-Montgomery Award:
Howard Brody, "The Location of Baskerville Hall"
The Baker Street Journal v29 n4 (December 1979) pp. 229-234 (available in the eBSJ).
What is the Morley-Montgomery Award?
Reports on the Dinner
The Baker Street Journal v30 n1 (March 1980) p. 49 (available in the eBSJ).The Baker Street Journal v30 n2 (June 1980) p. 116 (available in the eBSJ).
List of 1980 BSI Dinner Attendees (not available at this time)
Recordings
None available online at this time.Related Material
1980 BSI Dinner Menu (digitized images at Harvard)Two pages. Cover and interior, two copies. Sequence 79-80 and 81-82
The Musgrave Ritual (digitized image at Harvard)
Read at the 1980 BSI Dinner.
BSI Constitution and Buy Laws (digitized image at Harvard)
Read at the 1980 BSI Dinner.
Previous dinner: the 1979 BSI Dinner
Next dinner: the 1981 BSI Dinner
For an index to all BSI Dinners and photos, see our BSI Dinner Summary list.
The BSI Archive is located at the Houghton Library at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Archival material may be used by any qualified scholar, subject to the normal rules and regulations of the Library. For links to a detailed finding aid and related information, see our BSI Archive at Harvard page.
Page composed on 1/5/2016 by Tamar Zeffren
This page last updated 2/9/2016 by Andrew Solberg.
