The LIBRARY:
Treasured Sources

1971 to 1994

 

The definitive signature; accept no imitations.


Written by John Bennett Shaw in March 1991. First Edition, Published by Robert Hanson at his Opuscula Press, copyright 1991.

The physical library Shaw housed at his home in Santa Fe—1917 Fort Union Drive—began in 1971 and was shipped to the University of Minnesota beginning in 1993. Of course, John had been collecting Sherlock Holmes long before he moved to Santa Fe and took it with him when he moved from Tulsa. That’s why an 18X18-foot room was added to the house on Fort Union Drive.

Many of the questions asked by visitors to the library were answered in a 16-page booklet John wrote in March 1991—COLLECTING SHERLOCKIANA - "An Essay by John Bennett Shaw, BSI.” (This is copy # 44 of 200, autographed by John for Ben Wood, a member of the Pleasant Places of Florida in 1991.)

On page 14 of the booklet, Shaw writes, My library now numbers about 12,000 books and pamphlets. In addition, there are some 3,500 periodicals and 32,000 clippings mounted chronologically, as well as about 1,000 non-book items. In the book section, I have 2,000 volumes of the Holmesian stories in languages other than English. They include books in Braille, in both Pitman and Gregg Shorthand, and in Esperanto.
[Note: Not long after this booklet was published, John was able to add yet another language to the mix—Pig Latin, which he treasured as much as the Esperanto.]

The book belongs to Larry Feldman of Denver, CO. Our thanks to him for sharing this image.


The final section of this booklet is titled Last Words. It is a definitive word from John, “The Sage of Santa Fe,” and one of the world’s greatest book collectors.

I have accomplished much that I had planned, a Sherlock Holmes reference library. It is not a shelf of books, nor is it a collection. It is a library…Smugly, I thought that I was on the right track. It was then I realized two important parts were missing, and would always be missing: money and space.

This 1998 edition, published by Rupert Books of Cambridge, is by Catherine Cooke. She is Chairman of the Sherlock Holmes Society of London and has managed Westminster’s Sherlock Holmes Collection since April 1982.


Ron Lies from Denver visiting the Shaw Library in 1986.


Shaw’s ever-growing collection “of everything Holmesian”, as he often said, was a magnet for Sherlockian scholars around the world; and it all resided at “A Little Adobe House in Santa Fe, New Mexico,” (an article by Jim Hawkins, published in The Friends of Sherlock Holmes Collections, 2002). Shaw worked religiously at spreading the news of Sherlock Holmes.


(The black and white images, from the Special Collections and Rare Books Division of the University of Minnesota, taken in the fall of 1973, show John Shaw in his library looking over his treasures. The color image was taken by Steve Robinson in 1991.)

Shaw advertised his library in newsletters and in personal notes typed on his Smith-Corona electric typewriter, often mailing as many as 30 letters a week. He phoned booksellers and Sherlock Holmes devotees searching for rare books. As his library became well known, Sherlock Holmes collectors from all over the US and beyond made pilgrimages to his and Dorothy’s home in Santa Fe. To keep visitors coming back to Santa Fe John devised a variety of activities built around the evil aura of Moriarty:

The Brothers Three of Moriarty (B3M),
the Un-Happy Birthday Celebration for Professor Moriarty,
and the Colonel Sebastian Moran Trap Shoot.

This 3-minute video is about how the lapel pin of the Brothers Three came to be. Expand to full screen.

1. The Brothers Three of Moriarty

The scion society Shaw founded in 1971 got its name from Moriarty, NM, which was just an hour’s drive south of Santa Fe, and the obvious connection to Professor Moriarty, the arch enemy of Sherlock Holmes. Co-founder Saul Cohen had just moved to Santa Fe from Los Angeles about the time John Shaw moved from Tulsa. The two became friends and served the city of Santa Fe in many ways, giving the world the Brothers Three of Moriarty.

As Saul recalled recently, “John called me and invited me to join his new scion-the Brothers 3. I wasn’t up on Sherlock Holmes, so I started reading through the canon. He was forever dreaming up something new to do with Holmes and to Moriarty.” (interview with Mr. Cohen, May of 2022.)


2. The Annual UN-Happy Birthday,
You Bastard Moriarty, Celebration
-
his annual madhouse of fun

Like all scion society gatherings, the B3M meetings included toasts, drinks, presentations, and one very unique item: the annual deposit of exotic feces deposited on the Moriarty Manure Pile.

It’s possible the idea of an UN-Happy Birthday came from Shaw’s dear friend, Martin Gardner, and his annotated Alice in Wonderland volumes.


TrapShootTarget.jpg

3. Annual Colonel Sebastian Moran Trap Shoot —his only shot not in a glass—

Aside from the usual skeet-shooting competitions, there was also a target featuring the silhouette of Moriarty’s henchman, Colonel Sebastian Moran.


BOOKPLATES

ExLibrisJBS_RBetzner.jpg

The JBS Bookplate

Shared here by Ray Betzner, this bookplate is on thousands of items in Shaw’s library.

GeorgiaShawBookplates.jpg

Shaw family bookplates

Shared by Georgia Shaw on the Friends of John Bennett Shaw Facebook page, “These beautiful bookplates were produced by a student of Eric Gill at Notre Dame University. John Shaw's collection of 2,500 Eric Gill items is in the Memorial Library at the University.”

Librarian Tracy Bergstrom at Notre Dame (Director, Specialized Collection Services Program) has been both diligent in her research and generous with her time. She has identified the student mentioned above as Philip Hagreen, whose original woodcuts for these plates are in a collection at Notre Dame belonging to John Shaw.

PhilipHagreenND.jpg

Part of the John Bennett Shaw Collection at Notre Dame

The deeper one gets into Shaw’s story the more fascinating it becomes.


A rare 8-mm video of John Bennett Shaw’s Library from 1991

Steve Robinson with a unique item in the Shaw Library, (1991).

Steve Robinson with a unique item in the Shaw Library, (1991).

The Robinson/Ewan/Stephenson Video (1991)

As John’s fame grew, Sherlockians from far and near began making the pilgrimage to 1917 Fort Union Drive to meet THE John Bennett Shaw and spend hours looking through the treasures in the library. It was sometimes referred to as the “slumber room” because occasionally a visitor spent the night on the couch there. Visitors enjoyed swapping stories about collecting books and Sherlockian keepsakes. John seemingly had an interesting story about every volume and item in the room. Guests ranged from noted scholars to members of various scions across the country.

Steve Robinson (pictured right, May 25th, 1991) brought Denver Sherlockians Greg Ewan and John Stephenson to visit Shaw at his home in Santa Fe. As I was searching for items to include in these pages in 2018, Robinson searched through his John Shaw treasures and came up with the most incredible 8-mm video of their visit in 1991. He then had the video transferred to digital and posted it at the Friends of John Bennett Shaw. It is an amazing gift from one who came under Shaw’s spell. See this video on YouTube.


The Shaw Twins

One of the most unique items of ephemera in Shaw’s Library, prominently displayed when the library was intact at Fort Union Drive in Santa Fe, was the look-alike doll created for him by Albuquerque, New Mexico, artist Caryn Ostrowe Wagner. John’s doll was the last porcelain doll she made and the one she thought was her best. The look-alike doll was secretly commissioned by John’s wife, Dorothy Rowe Shaw, and presented to him on his birthday. The December 1986 issue of Smithsonian Magazine featured a story about the Shaw Collection, preparing readers for the 100th Anniversary of Sherlock Holmes in print in the January 1987 issue. The image below was taken by Chad Slattery for the article by Fred Strebeigh, “To His Modern Fans, Sherlock is Still Worth a Close Look.” As you read further in this section of this website you will see the famous photograph of “the Shaw Twins” on the cover of other publications. (The complete story as written by Tim Johnson in Friends of the Sherlock Holmes Collections newsletter can be accessed here.)

From Smithsonian Magazine, December 1986. Photo by Chad Slattery.


Shaw faking embarrassment on the number of volumes in the library in 1991.

Shaw faking embarrassment on the number of volumes in the library in 1991.


Organizing the Collection: File Boxes and Ring Binders

Image of Shaw taken from Steve Robinson’s 8-mm video from a 1991 visit to Santa Fe.

Image of Shaw taken from Steve Robinson’s 8-mm video from a 1991 visit to Santa Fe.


Employing his librarian background skills, Shaw spent countless hours labeling and cataloguing his collection, and we repeat, without the convenience of a computer; it was all done by hand. He did, however, have hundreds of file boxes and ring binders, and he took time to carefully label and decorate each one. Like many Sherlockians he enjoyed seeing a graphic representation of what was inside the container; obviously he had thousands of illustrations to choose from. The box I have was manufactured by The Magafile Co. in St. Louis, MO, size 5 D. It came as a flat and had to be folded into a box. Shaw had a countless number of these.


After his collection was safely placed in the John Shaw Library at the University of Minnesota, dedicated as such in 1995, the library made those file boxes available to interested Sherlockians for the asking. Brad Keefauver was kind enough to gift me with one of those. It was one of the sparks igniting my desire to share John Shaw’s story at this website.


Pepper_SternRareBooks.jpg

Although booksellers changed partners, or went out of business, or relocated, John Shaw kept in touch with the major players, never wanting to miss a rare book he had not yet added to his library.

He, of course had the catalogs of the well-known and reputable booksellers across America and abroad. One of those was PEPPER & STERN-RARE BOOKS, INC., registered on 28 Feb 1983 as Domestic Stock company type incorporated at 1980 CLIFF DR., #224, SANTA BARBARA, CA 93109. The agent name of this company is: JAMES PEPPER ,and company's status is Dissolved. Pepper & Stern-rare Books, Inc.'s last statement date was 19 Dec 1996.

(California Companies Directory. https://ca.ltddir.com/companies/pepper-stern-rare-books-inc/)

Many have fallen by the wayside of Amazon and internet sales. More often these “brick and mortar” stores have gone to catalog sales and book fairs. We are reminded of those bookseller days by the file boxes John lovingly adorned.

Pepper and Stern became separate book-selling companies, Pepper remaining in Santa Barbara, [3463 State St. Suite 271 Santa Barbara, CA 93105], and Peter Stern opening in Boston, MA.

Stern opened his first physical shop in Back Bay in 1988. In 2007, he moved downtown. Today, most of Stern’s business is still done via catalogue and book fair; he attends between fifty and eighty regional book fairs a year.

Peter L. Stern & Co., Inc. specializes in English & American Literature, Detective Fiction, Autographs, Manuscripts, 20th Century, and Signed and Inscribed Books. (video information from https://www.abaa.org/bookseller_interview/details/peter-l.-stern)

According to Scott Monty, Peter Stern is a regular at the annual BSI Dinner Vendors Room in New York every January.

You can see the effort John put into making his boxes attractive, an indication of the love this librarian had for the printed word.


Ron Lies with John Shaw.


Ron Lies, a member of Doctor Watson’s Neglected Patients, visited John and Dorothy in 1986. Although Ron and I were visiting Santa Fe at about the same time, we did not meet each other until 2011 when he joined WelcomeHolmes, the online Sherlock Holmes discussion group we began in 1999 as part of the Nashville Scholars scion. Then we discovered our shared memories of being in the fabled Library at about the same time. We both had backgrounds that John enjoyed exploring with us beyond Sherlock Holmes: Ron was a Catholic; I grew up in a funeral home. Shaw was Catholic and a funeral director in his day. Ron Lies and I have since become close friends. We like to think John would have reveled in our story; we both consider him our Sherlockian mentor, and we decided to call ourselves The Brothers-in-Shaw.

It is with a heavy heart, as Watson begins The Empty Room story in The Return of Sherlock Holmes, that I must report that Ron Lies died in Denver on January 16, 2023 (Martin Luther King Day). Rest in peace, my brother.


The Norwegian Explorers of Minnesota
August 2019
Scott Monty interviews Julie McKuras and Gary Thaden

As noted in the From Tulsa to Santa Fe section of this website, The Shaw Collection that once resided in Santa Fe is now safely located in the climate-controlled, underground stacks of the University of Minnesota Libraries. Because it is there and not spread all over Sherlockendom in private collections, it is available to anyone interested in seeing it. Every three years, the Norwegian Explorers of Minnesota scion, founded in 1948 on the campus of UMN, presents a themed Sherlockian event. In the summer of 2019, an event titled Dark Places, Wicked Companions, and Strange Experiences was presented. Many attend these sessions knowing they will be able to tour Shaw’s library in the Sherlock Holmes Collections.

Two members of the Norwegian Explorers, Julie McKuras (BSI - 2001) and Gary Thaden. were interviewed recently by Scott Monty, creator of the I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere podcast. In the interview, they share information about that event. They also help us remember the 1995 dedication of the Shaw Collection and share stories about specific items. (Hear Episode 166: Dark Places, Wicked Companions, and Strange Experiences.)


Trap Shoot

The Sebastian Moran Annual Air Gun Shoot Off (Trap Shoot)

The Annual Colonel Sebastian Moran Memorial Trap Shoot

The Annual Colonel Sebastian Moran Memorial Trap Shoot

Jon Lellenberg (BSI - 1974) was a visitor to the Shaws’ home in 1973 and spent the night sleeping on the sofa in the library, “assuming we could get to sleep with so much Sherlockiana around us on the shelves,” he added. He sent a remembrance of the Trap Shoot he attended in Santa Fe during his visit.

“The first time I met John Bennett Shaw in person was when I had to be in New Mexico on business, and Shaw invited me to come to the Third Annual Colonel Sebastian Moran Memorial Trap Shoot. This was not the very beginning, but close to the beginning of one of the best and most productive friendships in my life, and that weekend cemented what we'd begun at long distance the year before. We both had perfect scores the first go round. ‘No one was injured.’”

He also wrote one of the articles in the Baker Street Journal (1990), titled John Bennett Shaw — His Limits: “At the time I first visited Shaw in Santa Fe, his principal occupation appeared to be innkeeper. I was just the latest, and far from the last, of a vast number of Sherlockian pilgrims to visit Shaw and his awesome collection. Not more than three days ever went by without a house-guest, and one or two stayed for weeks at a time*.”


(*One of the Sherlockian scholars who spent weeks working in the Library was Ronald De Waal (BSI - 1969), author of The Universal Sherlock Holmes. De Waal had been cataloging the Shaw collection in Tulsa and continued his work after John moved to Santa Fe. More on De Waal in FRIENDS.)

Jon Lellenberg

Jon Lellenberg

Mr. Lellenberg, in deciding what to share about his friend John Shaw, had this to say in an email: “I just don't think I could say it better than I did back in 1990, when Shaw was still with us and I knew he'd be reading it himself.”
John Bennett Shaw - His Limits ( © Copyright 1990 by Jon Lellenberg)

(Mr. Lellenberg retired from his work as a defense policy & strategy official at the Pentagon in Washington, DC, in 2006. For many years he was Dame Jean Conan Doyle’s (and later her estate's) U.S. representative in licensing work for the Conan Doyle Estate, Ltd.)

Sadly, Jon Lellenberg died on April 24, 2021. He is remembered in this article on the Conan Doyle Estate, Ltd website.


Ron Lies’ target, with no hits or bullet holes.

Ron Lies’ target, with no hits or bullet holes.

A bit more on the Annual Trap Shoot, always a crowd-pleaser and the very essence of John Shaw’s wacky sense of humor. No doubt he grew up familiar with guns and hunting, as most Oklahoma kids did in the 1920’s and ‘30’s. Shaw came up with a target supposed to be the silhouette of Colonel Sebastian Moran.

Ron Lies, my Brother-in-Shaw from Denver, tells a poignant story about his first Trap Shoot that demonstrates the kindheartedness of Shaw.

I was participating in The Sebastian Moran Annual Air Gun Shoot Off, arranged by The Brothers Three of Moriarty in June of 1987. Each of us wrote our names on our target sheets, which would be replaced for the next contestant as each one of us shot. The trophy for winning was gigantic, and I wanted to win it or at least make a good showing. My hopes were based on realism, however, and to me a good showing would mean hitting the target at least once. Even that was a remote possibility for a four-eyed squinter with one near-sighted eye and the other far-sighted, causing depth perception problems. It came time for the contestants to take their turns shooting.

One at a time, all alone, all eyes on the shooter, we took our turn. When all the contestants completed their shots the target sheets were collected for judging. As fate sadly decreed, my sheet was the only one with no holes or hits on it. I was getting a large share of ribbing from the other shooters. The ribbing from these men was good-natured, but having dealt with poor eyesight all my life, it was tough to take.

Mr. Shaw somehow sensed how I felt. He turned to the other contestants and said, "Boy, you guys do not know a true collector when you see one. Ron did not want to hit anything and ruin his target from the shoot. I taught him well." The ribbing ended immediately. As he turned to walk back up to the house for lunch, John smiled at me and winked.
(Ron Lies, 2018)

Steve Robinson, who lived in Flagstaff at the time, took some great photographs at the Trap Shoot in 1988.


Sage of Santa Fe

Shaw was celebrated in three publications, one during his life—a special issue of the Baker Street Journal (Dec 1990) with various contributors;, and two posthumously—The Sage of Santa Fe (published privately in 2013) written and compiled by Susan Rice (BSI-1991) and Vinnie Brosnan (BSI-2011), and the 1996 issue of Brosnan’s Sherlock in L A catalogue.

The Sage of Santa FeAdventures and Public Life of John Bennett Shaw

SageOfSantaFePamphlet_ps.jpg




In these 26 pages Rice and Brosnan celebrate their friendship with Shaw through recollections of workshops, images from his files, reproductions of his letters and printed materials, famous Shaw quotes, and a quiz on: Thirty of the Cases in the Holmesian Canon Prepared for the Third Annual Colonel Sebastian Moran Trap Shoot Meeting of The Brothers Three of Moriarty, May 23, 1973.

Brosnan attributes the cover of their booklet to the Sesame Street Magazine of February 8, 1976. The image of Shaw was taken from the Smithsonian magazine (December, 1976), showing John holding a ceramic doll of himself created by New Mexico artist Caryn Ostrown-Wagner. Susan Rice’s article in the pamphlet first appeared in Prescott’s Press, No. 57 (September, 2010)


Susan Rice - 2012 (Image by Scott Monty) from IHOSE

Susan Rice - 2012 (Image by Scott Monty) from IHOSE


Here is a line from Susan Rice’s article entitled
“The ‘Hans Sloane’ of Our Age”.

“No writer likes to start a paper with a cliche, much less two, but I find it impossible to resist the inclination to label John Bennett Shaw as larger than life. And having set my foot upon the crumbling slope of cliché, I’d also like to label him with the Reader’s Digest old phrase The Most Unforgettable Character I Ever Met.”


Sadly, both of these dear friends of John Shaw have died. Susan was able to see the beginning of this website for her friend Shaw, and was very complimentary and appreciative. It was a joy to me to know that she spent hours going through it. (See her note in the Friends section of this website.)
Susan Rice “crossed beyond the Reichenbach” on September 28, 2020, and is remembered here by Scott Monty and several other notable Sherlockians. Susan was a fan of Ray Betzner, who has helped shape this John Bennett Shaw website. In Ray’s blog Studies in Starrett, he occasionally departs from writing about Vincent Starrett. This love letter to Susan was one of those times.

Vin Brosnan died in 2013, soon after the publication of Sage of Santa Fe, and is remembered by The John Watson Society here.

Image courtesy of Scott Monty on IHOSE. Clicking on Mr. Brosnan’s photo will take you to the I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere remembrance by Francine Kitts (01/09/2014)

Image courtesy of Scott Monty on IHOSE. Clicking on Mr. Brosnan’s photo will take you to the I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere remembrance by Francine Kitts (01/09/2014)

Vinnie Brosnan of Oceanside, CA (BSI-2011
“That Gap on the Second Shelf”

In The Sage of Santa Fe, Vinnie talked about John’s collecting habits.

John Bennett Shaw, Bibliophile Extraordinaire
”John’s goal was quite simple — to have one of everything and anything that touched Sherlock Holmes. So as a collector he only needed the one item and never hoarded but rather shared his duplicates and extras — not to do so, he felt, was a dereliction.”

According to Vinnie about himself, “In 1988, I became an active member of the Trained Cormorants, one of the oldest scions in the U.S. (founded in 1947) and I became the custodian of their archives. Shorty thereafter, I formed a publishing arm named The Sherlock n L.A. Press and produced three major monographs, all of which are now highly collectible. The first was The Sherlock Holmes Mother Goose by Paula Salo; the second was The Trained Cormorants 60th Anniversary Commemorative which was the scion's history accompanied by many archival photographs; and the third was The Sage of Santa Fe: Adventures and Public Life of John Bennett Shaw written by Susan Rice and myself.” (This quote is from the John Watson Society page referenced above.)

Vin Brosnan remembered Shaw in the 1996 catalog of books for The Sherlock in L.A. Press, using the photograph taken by Chad Slattery and Fred Strebeigh for the Smithsonian Magazine (Dec. 1976) in their article about Sherlock Holmes fandom. The images below include a photograph of Shaw and other BSI members at the 1972 BSI Dinner at the Regency Hotel. See the BSI Trust, Inc. page covening all the details of that evening here. (The images and story from the catalog were sent in by Charles Prepolec of Calgary, CA.)


The December 1990 edition of the Baker Street Journal (vol. 40, no. 4) edited by Philip Shreffler,
was dedicated entirely to John Bennett Shaw. Several friends and scholars contributed brief articles about the importance of Shaw’s contribution to the world of Holmes. The edition was a sellout and quite a surprise to John. Ten of John’s friends contributed articles to the issue:

“Art in the Blood” — Scott Bond (illustration)
”John Bennett Shaw—His Limits” — Jon Lellenberg
”Tales from Dartmoor” —Jeff Decker
”My Grandmother Is Blind” — Martin Gardner
”From the Doctor’s Diary” — Lee Eric Shackleford
”Collector, Punster, Simpson, Shaw” — Thomas L. Stix, Jr.
”He Has the Collection Mania in Its Most Acute Form” — Peter E. Blau
”The Sage of Santa Fe” — Saul Cohen
”The Holmesian Tent Show” — Susan Rice
”Johannes Magnus” — Evelyn A. Herzog

(© Copyright 1990 by the Baker Street Irregulars) The inclusion of John Shaw’s image on the title page is a rarity. Only two other significant Sherlockians have been honored in this fashion: Julian Wolff and Christopher Morley

Philip Shreffler, edited this special BSJ issue honoring John Shaw.

Philip Shreffler, edited this special BSJ issue honoring John Shaw.


Jon Lellenberg set up a meeting with Saul Cohen at his Santa Fe home in September 2019.

Jon Lellenberg set up a meeting with Saul Cohen at his Santa Fe home in September 2019.

Two of the contributors to the “Shaw issue” of the Baker Street Journal were Jon Lellenberg and Saul Cohen. Not only did they know John Shaw very well, these two had been closely associated with the Conan Doyle Estate in England and friends of Dame Jean Conan Doyle, daughter of Sir Arthur. Cohen, an original member of The Brothers Three of Moriarty, had been the attorney for the Conan Doyle Estate in the United States, and Lellenberg for many years was Dame Jean’s U.S. representative in licensing work for the Estate.

In September 2019 I celebrated my 75th birthday by taking a trip to Santa Fe, and spending three hours in Saul Cohen’s home above Santa Fe’s historic Bishop’s Lodge, visiting with him and Lellenberg, reminiscing about John Shaw. Lellenberg set this meeting up, and it was an exceptional birthday gift to me. The spirit of John Bennett Shaw is still alive.

In case you missed it earlier on this page of the website, Jon Lellenberg died on April 24, 2021. He is remembered in this article on the Conan Doyle Estate, Ltd website.


Another important catalog and bookseller John Shaw relied on for his book collecting.

John Shaw’s sources for his collection came from other Sherlockians all over the world, and from book dealers he cultivated in person and with typed letters. One of those sources was Enola Stewart, a book dealer with Gravesend Books in Pocono Pines, PA, with whom John had many a telephone conversation. She became a good friend to Shaw, and spoke at the dedication of his library at the University of Minnesota in 1995. Ms. Stewart was eloquent in her remembrance of her friend John. The moment was not without tears from those of us in attendance.

As the outreach correspondent for the Baker Street Irregulars, the Simpson, Shaw was personally in touch with many of the scion societies in the United States, and several abroad. These groups would send John their newsletters and event programs and photographs, thus adding to his ever-expanding collection.


A Note on the Hench Collection

The Beginning of the Sherlock Holmes Collections

The Sherlock Holmes Collections at the University of Minnesota Libraries is home to several personal collections, including the John Bennett Shaw collection, dedicated in 1995, following his death in 1994. As early as 1974 the University library had purchased the James C. Iraldi collection consisting of 160 books, 150 periodicals, and much ephemera, “especially strong in British and American first editions of the Canon.” Five years later the magnificent Mary Kahler and Philip S. Hench collection was added in 1978, including 1,750 books, 1,400 periodicals, and almost unbelievably, four copies of Beeton’s Christmas Annual for 1887, in which Sherlock Holmes was introduced to the world. John Shaw’s collection, which added an enormous volume of books, scripts, newsletters, sound recordings, and ephemera of all kinds, “running the gamut from books to stuffed animals,” was among those invaluable acquisitions made during the first twenty years of the Sherlock Holmes Collections.

Dr. Hench was associated with UMN in 1931, when he earned his master of science degree in internal medicine there. In addition to his work at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, Dr. Hench found time to maintain an active role in the Norwegian Explorers of Minnesota, a Sherlock Holmes appreciation society formed in 1948. Hench was the one who originated the idea of erecting a plaque at the Reichenbach Falls in Switzerland, commemorating the battle between Holmes and Moriarty.

Andrew Malec, a graduate student in the University of Minnesota Library School at the time, was employed to help catalog the Hench Collection under the supervision of Errett W. McDiarmid (1909-2000), the “Mac” referred to in Shaw’s letter to Malec.

“Mac”, Dean of the College of Science, Literature and the Arts in 1951 at UMN, co-founded the Norwegian Explorers in 1948, and had tremendous influence on the founding and initial organization of the Sherlock Holmes Collections.

This excerpted correspondence to Andrew Malec from Mr. Shaw highlights Shaw’s estimate of the value of the collection, and expresses, in no uncertain terms, his feelings about NOT having a Beeton's Christmas Annual.

(Note) The last phrase of Mr. Shaw’s letter was in no way meant to disparage Dr. Hench. It was a cry of frustration from a man who once before had turned down a Beeton’s Christmas Annual because he felt the price was completely out of line. John reportedly said, “I once let a copy of Beeton’s go for the price of $175! Now, I would have sold all my furniture had I known what would happen—copies now bring $7,500.”
According to Randall Stock, Beeton’s is one of the most expensive magazine collectibles in the world. In the past 30 years copies at auction brought from $18,000 to $156,000. See Randall Stock website.


Pictured here is one of the four copies of Beeton’s Christmas Annual held in the Philip S. and Mary Kahler Hench Collection, part of the Sherlock Holmes Collections at the University of Minnesota Library. All four Beeton’s in the collection are rare, but this copy has the special distinction of having belonged to Vincent Starrett, one of the foremost promoters of Sherlock Holmes. His ground-breaking book, The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, published in 1933, came just one year prior to the founding of the Baker Street Irregulars by Christopher Morley. (1887."Beeton's Christmas Annual -- Starrett copy." University of Minnesota Libraries, Special Collections and Rare Books., Accessed March 15, 2021. https://umedia.lib.umn.edu/item/p16022coll402:1139)

Tim Johnson, the curator for the Sherlock Holmes Collections at the University of Minnesota Libraries, recounted the story of how John Shaw came to share his collection with the University and then promoted it with others. To learn more about how one of the great repositories of Sherlock Holmes materials came to be, join the conversation between Tim and Scott Monty on IHOSE. Begin at 8:05 and end at 16:20, or enjoy the entire podcast.


The Memories of John Shaw Are Lasting …

Illustration by Jeff Decker, resident of Pennsylvania, friend of John Shaw

Jeff Decker, who knew and worked with John from 1979-1984, has been kind enough to contribute this remembrance. His email arrived March 15, 2019.

Jim,
My name is
Jeff Decker. I live in Pennsylvania now, but during 1979 to 1984 I lived in Phoenix, Arizona, and visited Mr. Shaw's home in Santa Fe. We became fast friends, and I did a number of illustrations/cartoons for John, drawings he used mostly as greeting cards. I also did an illustration for him regarding his massive collection's migration to Minnesota (it was an illustration depicting John leading a line of pack elephants bearing his collection, like Hannibal crossing the Alps. He loved it!). After I moved back to the Northeast, I saw John again when I attended his seminar in Williamsburg in '87, where he introduced me to Tom Stix. Both Tom and John were instrumental in expanding my interest in Sherlock Holmes, and they were very enthusiastic and encouraging about my artwork. I'm pretty sure that most of the art I did for John is now filed away with the rest of his collection at the University in Minnesota.

I am in the process of reading your massive blog on John, which was brought to my attention by Charles Prepolec. It's very interesting and well compiled. I was going through some old manila folders this past weekend and discovered I still had the original artwork for the piece I've attached to this email as a jpeg. Of course, I wouldn't part with it now for anything, but I wanted to share it with you.

Congratulations on a great job with your report on John Bennett Shaw. He certainly should not be forgotten. I know I'll always remember him.

Best Canonical Regards,
JD 


On August 28, 2021 this letter from John Shaw to Jeff Decker arrived in a packet of other Shaw-related material. It is Jeff’s take on The Big Move for all of Shaw’s books from Santa Fe to Minneapolis (see the illustration below). Note that the letter was written on John’s 80th birthday (13 October 1993). My sincere thanks to Denny Dobry for sending Jeff Decker’s letter, posted here with his permission. It is the perfect item to include here.


Elephants carrying Shaw’s library from Santa Fe to Minneapolis

This cartoon drawn by Mr. Decker for the Brothers Three of Moriarty meeting in Moriarty, NM, on November 3, 1994, one month after John Shaw died, was included in the Programme for the evening. (See the full account of that meeting in the TULSA to SANTA FE section of this website,)

This image was included in the Holiday greeting card sent out by John and Dorothy in December 1993, rarely seen by the Sherlockian public. Saul Cohen shared it with me from the program. Cohen was a close friend of Shaw and was a charter member of the B3M scion society.
Jeff Decker said Shaw loved the expression on his face in this cartoon.

(Image used with permission from Jeff Decker and the editor of the Baker Street Journal.)

TULSA to SANTA FE LIBRARY WORKSHOPS FRIENDS