The Baker Street Irregulars enjoyed the distinct pleasure of celebrating the Master’s birthday on the “traditionally accepted” date of January 6. Karen A. Johnson was celebrated as The Woman. Seven Irregulars were invested. The proceedings included a greeting to the Irregulars by Dr. Tsukasa Kobayashi, founder of The Japan Sherlock Holmes Club with his wife Akane Higashiyama; the Japan Sherlock Holmes Club, founded in 1977 with only two members (Dr. and Mrs. Kobayashi), now boasts 1,200 members and “is the largest Sherlockian society in the world.” The evening also featured Joe Fink's fervent defense of Tonga, Philip Shreffler's illustrated series of "Lessons in Canonical Villainy", and Jon Lellenberg's report on the current (and possibly future) Canonical content of the Oxford English Dictionary. Also on the program was a “special presentation of The Murray Award for conspicuous heroism” to Robert Thomalen.
The cocktail party on the following day, January 7, witnessed a truly illustrious gathering of sixteen of the then-24 living The Women of the BSI: Lisa McGaw (1964), Peggy [Mrs. James] Nelson (1967), Ceil [Mrs. William S.] Baring-Gould (1969), Dorothy [Mrs. Thomas L., Jr.] Stix (1971), Dorothy [Mrs. Herbert] Brean (1972), Ines [Mrs. William S.] Hall (1973), Julia [Mrs. Albert M. Rosenblatt (1979), Ad [Mrs. Will] Oursler (1981), Barbara [Mrs. John B.] Koelle (1982), Francine Morris [Mrs. Wayne B.] Swift (1983), Eleanor [Mrs. William P.] Schweickert (1984), Jane [Mrs. William I.] Jenkins (1985), Nancy Pond (1986), Edith Meiser (1987), Maureen Green (1988), and Karen L. Johnson [Mrs. Philip A. Shreffler] (1989).
At this party, Edith Meiser received the Queen Victoria Medal (see the 1969 Dinner for background), and Enola Stewart received the first Commissionaire’s Award (see the 1988 Dinner for background) “for meritorious contributions to Sherlockiana.”
Dinner Details: January 6, 1989
24 5th 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 1989 BSI Dinner photo (not available at this time)
BSI Honours List
Investitures:Richard M. Caplan as Dr. Jackson
Andrew Joffe as Sir Charles Hallé
Brad A. Keefauver as Winwood Reade
Jack D. Key as Pritchard
Tsukasa Kobayashi as Baritsu
M. Kenneth McQuage as The Plumstead Marshes
Alvin E. Rodin as Palmer
* received Investiture at another event during the year
What is an Investiture?
Two-Shilling Award:
None listed
What is a Two-Shilling Award?
The Woman:
Karen L. Johnson (Mrs. Philip A. Shreffler)
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 1989 BSJ report.
What is the origin of “standing on the terrace?”
Morley-Montgomery Award:
No awards were given from 1981-1995.
What is the Morley-Montgomery Award?
Reports on the Dinner
The Baker Street Journal v39 n1 (March 1989) pp. 43, 55 (available in the eBSJ).Blau, Peter, Scuttlebutt from the Spermaceti Press, (January 1989), p. 1.
List of 1989 BSI Dinner Attendees (not available at this time)
Recordings
None available online at this time.Related Material
1989 BSI Dinner Menu (digitized images at Harvard)Two pages. Cover and interior. Sequence 124-125.
The Sign of the Four; Or, the Problem with the Sholtos (digitized image at Harvard)
Four pages from Conan Doyle's pocket diaries, referring to The Sign of Four, by Richard Lancelyn Green, distributed at the 1989 BSI Dinner.
Two pages. Cover and interior. Sequence 126-127
Ticket to the Annual Sherlockian Cocktail Party on January 7, 1989 (digitized image at Harvard)
One page. Sequence 123
Katz, Robert S., “To The Second Mrs. Watson,” The Baker Street Journal v40 n2 (June 1990) pp. 108-110 (available in the eBSJ).
Toast given at the 1989 and 1990 BSI Dinners.
Previous dinner: the 1988 BSI Dinner
Next dinner: the 1990 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 3/28/2016 by Tamar Zeffren
This page last updated 4/15/2016 by Andrew Solberg.
