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From
The Surrey Shore . .
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The Newsletter of the Hated Rivals on the Surrey Shore Vol. 2, No. 4, August 2003
****A Scion
Society for All Who Enjoy Sherlock Holmes in All His Manifestations!****
No, actually it’s by the Hated
Rivals on the Surrey Shore—and you’re invited! So gather up your picnic
utensils, grab a handful of hot dogs, and plan on converging on Stately Sutton
Manor, down in South Indianapolis, on Saturday, September 13, from 1:30 till .
. . well, whenever you’re fully sated with outdoors cooking and great
Sherlockian fellowship. We’ll be meeting at the home of Hated Rival Jim Sutton,
near the Southport area of the city, at 5550 S. Harlan St., just west of South
Keystone Ave. and Dudley, where the Suttons maintain a backyard cooking pit
just for such occasions and have graciously opened their home to us for this
event. We’re asking that each person attending bring a covered dish of some
sort, along with your own plate, utensils, and (if you’re picky) something to
drink (although water will be available at Casa Sutton). Your humble Hated
Rivals officers will be bringing hot dogs and buns (plus some fruit punch, for
those who may forget their own drinks, and a few paper plates, etc., just in
case). In addition to our fire-grilled feast, the program will include a
musical presentation by the duo Holmes & Watson (last heard at our November
2002 meeting), who’ll present a short program of Sherlockian tunes, plus engage
in an impromptu jam session for your further entertainment. (Anyone who wants
to join in the latter may bring along your own musical instruments as well, if
you’re so inclined.) A short business meeting and Canonical toasts will round
out the program, but the main emphasis this time is on feasting and
fellowshipping on a fine pre-Fall afternoon. We hope to see you there! (For
directions and other details, see the “Coming Meetings” section of this
newsletter.)
***
We’re rapidly approaching Labor
Day and another autumn in Indiana. And our first annual Hated Rivals cookout
(see above) should get the Fall season started off on the right (a)foot! So as
you start to anticipate a great fire-cooked meal and fantastic Sherlockian
fellowship, take a few minutes to soak in this issue’s Sherlockian food for
thought.
On Sherlock Holmes’
Birthplace—a Serendipitous Discovery
Those who’ve skipped ahead to
the following section (or who’ve visited my gaming Web site from the link on
our Hated Rivals site), know that, along with Sherlockiana/Victoriana, your
humble correspondent also counts role-playing gaming among his cherished
hobbies. But what has this to do with Sherlock Holmes’ birthplace? Well, it was
as I was preparing a Victorian-era role-playing adventure some years ago for my
gaming group (a Victorian scenario for Call of Cthulhu, the H.P.
Lovecraft RPG of horror and adventure) that I found supporting proof for the
contention of eminent Sherlockian William H. Baring-Gould that Sherlock Holmes
was actually born and raised in the northern county of Yorkshire—and, more
specifically, in that county’s North Riding division.
Now, of course, the Canon itself
is silent on where Holmes was born, although some believe that it harbors clues
to the possible location. Sherlockians other than Baring-Gould have weighed in
on their own beliefs as to Holmes’ birthplace. (Sherlockian Trevor Hall, for
example, suggested Sussex as the county that gave the world its future greatest
detective in his book Sherlock Holmes: Ten Literary Studies.) But having
read Baring-Gould’s biography of Holmes soon after becoming a Sherlockian, I’d
always held a fond place in my heart for his theories and often-ingenious (if
sometimes fanciful) attempts to fill in the gaps that Canon left in describing
the life of the Master Sleuth of Baker Street. Baring-Gould not only settled on
the North Riding of Yorkshire as the place of Holmes’ birth, but even named the
ancestral manor of the Holmes family that he placed there . . . Mycroft Manor.
He further determined that Holmes’ older brother, Sherringford (a name that
Doyle first considered giving to the detective in his notes for A Study in
Scarlet), still lived in Yorkshire as a country squire, having inherited,
as the family’s firstborn, the manor after the death of Holmes Senior (whose
name was, of course, Siger Holmes, deduced from Holmes’ use of the alias
Sigerson during the Great Hiatus). In his creative timeline of Holmes’ life,
Baring-Gould also suggested that, during 1896, Holmes spent much of the year
clearing Sherringford of a murder charge—a case involving “black magic in the
19th century.”
It was all too perfect!
Baring-Gould’s clever suppositions became the basis for my Call of Cthulhu
scenario, “The Yorkshire Horror,” which eventually was published in my Cthulhu
By Gaslight supplement for the main game. (Both are, sadly, out of print,
although a new edition of Gaslight is supposed to be in the works from
the original publisher, Chaosium, updated and expanded to cover much of the
Victorian world in the 1890s.) But in preparing the scenario, I still needed to
pinpoint an exact location for Mycroft Manor. Fortunately, I owned some period
guidebooks that I could check. At the time, however, the only one that I had
that covered all of England was an 1869 Black’s Picturesque Tourist of
England. Of course, Holmes would have been in his teens in 1869, so
although my scenario took place almost 30 years later, the earlier guide should
suffice. I settled on an area near Northallerton, which was on one of the major
railway routes north from London. The guidebook had a map of the area east of
Northallerton—and, there, I made my discovery! Just to the east of
Northallerton was a small hamlet by the name of Sigton! SIGton? As in Siger
Holmes? Again, it was just too perfect. (Of course, the tiny town undoubtedly
pre-existed Holmes’ father, so it obviously wasn’t named after him. But
couldn’t the father have been named after the town . . .?)
For my money, this happy find
confirmed Baring-Gould’s belief that Holmes had been born and raised in
Yorkshire’s bleak, moors-ridden North Riding. Now, whether Baring-Gould had
actually made his determination based on the existence of Sigton or had arrived
at his conclusions through an entirely other line of thought, I can’t say, as
Sigton wasn’t mentioned in his biography of Holmes. But, hey!—it was good
enough for me. Sigton, Yorkshire, became, in my mind at least, Holmes’
birthplace and the site of Mycroft Manor, as well as the setting for “The
Yorkshire Horrors.” Of course, I’ve since discovered on some other period maps
of Yorkshire that Sigton is also known as “Kirby Sigton.” The possible
significance of this additional name in the life of Sherlock Holmes, however,
I’ve yet to discern . . .
(Look to our Web site in the
future for a slightly expanded version of this mini-article, along with some
graphics of period maps showing Sigton, Yorkshire, as soon as I have time to
scan and post them.)
This past July, I attended the
GenCon gaming convention for the first time in 12 years, primarily because it
was held this year (and for the foreseeable future) right here in Indianapolis.
Now what is a description of a gaming convention doing in a Sherlockian
newsletter, you may wonder? Well, as those who’ve read our past newsletters
know, although Sherlockiana is a major focus of our scion’s activities, so is
Victoriana in general. And I can happily report that the Victorian Age is still
well-represented among today’s board and role-playing games. (Although, of
course, compared to the fantasy and science fiction elements of the hobby, it
is a minor division.) Among the Victorian-era games that I found offered at
this year’s GenCon was a recent role-playing game called, simply, Victoriana.
Although it incorporates fantasy and “steampunk” elements in its background and
presents an alternate-history version of 1867 Victorian England (in which the
Crimean War still rages and the American Civil War is yet to happen), it also
offers a great deal of historical background on Victorian England and those
living there. In the works is a London sourcebook for the game. (I’ll cover it
in more detail in a future newsletter.)
Other Victorian-era RPGs spotted
at the con include White Wolf’s Victorian Vampire and its two
supplements and Steve Jackson Games’ GURPS Steampunk, GURPS Castle
Falkenstein (and its Ottoman Empire supplement), and GURPS
Steamtech. Matrix Games, located in Bloomington, Indiana, offered several
books of scenarios, including a number of detective scenarios based in 1880s
London. Numerous board games covered the area, most notably, War: Age of
Imperialism, which starts in the previous century and takes players through
a game of empire building through Victoria’s reign. And both the Civil War and
the Wild West were available for play in such games as Pinnacle’s Deadlands
(aptly subtitled “The Weird West”). Although I couldn’t afford a booth, I even
managed to sell a few copies of my own game, So Ya Wanna Be A Rock ’N’ Roll
Star! A Rock ’N’ Role-Playing Game, featuring the band Sherlock & The
CDs in the adventure, “The Sounds of the Vaster Hills” (still available from me
at $15 p.p.—a bargain!).
As for events at the convention,
only two had a Victorian theme that I could discover. One was a Call of
Cthulhu 1890s scenario about Jack the Ripper. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able
to sit in on it. The other was my own “Cool Zulus By Gaslight” (the name a play
on my Cthulhu By Gaslight supplement), in which a rock band playing at
the Zulu Aid festival in London got zapped back to the 1890s—and had encounters
with such period characters as the Master Sleuth of Baker Street, William
Escott, and his biographer, Dr. James Hamish. (Huh? If you don’t get the names,
they’re based on past Sherlockian speculations.) Other scenarios that I ran
also managed to zap players briefly into Victorian London (one of which
featured Sherlock Holmes as Jack the Ripper, a la The Last Sherlock
Holmes Story), and in one, players faced the dreaded Hound of the Vaster
Hills. Silly stuff? Sure—it was all played for laughs and a good time. (And if
one can’t have a good time at his hobbies, why bother, after all?)
So if you enjoy an evening of role-playing or war
gaming, you can be assured in the knowledge that the Victorian era is
well-represented in gaming in general, just as it was at this year’s GenCon.
And then there’s always next year . . .
If you’ve recently sent an e-mail to us through the
main e-mail address listed in this newsletter, we may not have received it. A
random lightening strike (random, of course, assuming that Professor Moriarty
or his minions haven’t been experimenting with the use of Tesla coils as
advanced weaponry) unfortunately zapped the modem on our WebTV unit, making
inaccessible the e-mail account to which messages sent through the Web site
e-mail address were forwarded. Which means that, until the situation is
corrected (one that could take a while, as WebTV was purchased by MSN, making
the old units obsolete), any e-mail sent to us in the past two months (or
shortly before—as I hadn’t had the opportunity to read all that were there)
also is inaccessible. In the meantime, I’ve set up an alternative account with
one of the Web providers, so as of this newsletter, your e-mails can once again
reach us. In the meantime, as we have no idea how long it may take to access
the old account again, please do resend any e-mail sent to our Web site e-mail
address since at least early May. (If you sent us an e-mail and have not
received any response, that means that we did not get it or read it before the
electrifying disaster, so please do resend.) Thanks—and we apologize for any
delay in responding to your messages.
That wraps up this issue’s Letter from Barker. Look
for more scintillating, serendipitous prose in our next newsletter. Till then,
I remain, as always, ever yours . . .
—C.
Barker, Esq.
***
July 12 found the Hated Rivals
on the Surrey Shore safely ensconced in the party room at Lord Ashley’s Pub
& Eatery, at Pendleton Pike and Oaklandon Road, celebrating the birthday of
Barker, the original Hated Rival on the Surrey Shore. Between 1 and 1:30 p.m.,
Rivals arrived at the restaurant and enjoyed drinks and lively discussions of
things Sherlockian and otherwise. Conversation continued till and after our
meals arrived — an eclectic repast ranging from burgers and pizza to rum steak
(served flambé). After appetites were sated, the meeting was called to
order. Following a discussion of possible locations for our next meeting, our
own Barker, Bill Barton, presented a rousing, albeit abbreviated, a capella
version of his “Barker Birthday” song (to the tune of the Beatles’ “Birthday”),
with most other Rivals filling in on the choruses and providing unique vocal
“instrumental” parts. (The full version of the song will be performed at the
next meeting that Bill’s musical partner can attend.) Next, Suzanne Snyder
presented an excellent survey of Elizabeth Peter’s Amelia Peabody stories. (The
intrepid Ms. Peabody, although primarily an Egyptologist, sufficiently extends
her well-honed investigative skills in her 15 novels to date to qualify her as
yet another “rival” of Sherlock Holmes.) Mimi DeMore followed this survey of a
fictional archeologist’s exploits with the first installment of what is to
become an ongoing series on actual Victorian archeologists, providing an
overview of the field during the Victorian era and then focusing on one of many
famous 19th century archeologists, [name]. Bill closed the formal
part of the meeting with part 2 of his “Victorian Railway” paper and a toast to
the two greatest detectives of the Victorian era — Sherlock Holmes and, of
course, Mr. Barker! Following the meeting itself, most Rivals in attendance
converged at the Lowe’s Cherry Tree on East Washington Street to view the last
matinee showing for the day of the Victorian-era cinema action-adventure film, The
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, starring Sean Connery as Allan
Quatermain. (See the “I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere” section of this newsletter
for a review of the movie.) In short, an excellent time was had by all.
***
Dogs play a special role in the
Sherlockian Canon—there’s Toby, the bloodhound, in Sign of the Four, the
Hound of the Baskervilles (of course), and the dog that did nothing in the
night-time in “Silver Blaze” (see the “I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere” entry on
this). Victorians were especially fond of their pets, especially their dogs and
cats. (At least the middle and upper classes were fond of them as pets. The
lower classes were sometimes fond of them in yet another way, although that’s
not where we get the term “hot dog.”) One popular vehicle in the country was
known as a dog-cart. (Its name derived from the fact that it was once
used to carry dogs in a compartment on the back.) The dog-cart featured two
seats, back to back, and was usually drawn by a single horse. It was quite
ubiquitous in the Victorian countryside, and most Victorian references
(including Jack Tracy’s excellent Encyclopedia Sherlockiana) provide
curious readers of the Canon sufficient information about this and other
Victorian vehicles featured in the Holmes tales. (And yet, curiously, I recall
even not too long ago reading a Sherlockian piece on the Web in which the
author seemed totally mystified as to what a dog-cart really was. All the more
reason for those of us interested in the Great Detective to extend our reading
beyond the Canon into areas that shed light on the era in which he lived.) I
even own a period book, written in the 1890s, call Across England By
Dog-Cart, chronicling the author’s trip across Southern England (including
through Dartmoor!) in such a vehicle. For those looking for a readily available
source, I can recommend Daily Life in Victorian England, by Sally Mitchell.
At $45, it’s rather pricey, but it’s one of the best overall surveys of daily
life in Sherlock Holmes’ England (and indeed all of England from 1837-1901)
that’s currently available. You can order it from such online booksellers as
Amazon.com and can probably order it from most brick and mortar bookstores as
well. If you’re at all interested in the background of the Holmes stories I
heartily recommend it.
***
I Hear of Sherlock
Everywhere!
Mooch the Cat—feisty feline or Master Sleuth? Well,
in recent Sunday episodes of the Mutts comic strip, our favorite cartoon
kitty was both. In one, he carried out an investigation in the style of the old
Dick Tracy comic strips, with a rowdy roster of kooky canine culprits and a
questionable solution. In yet another, Mooch was actually addressed as
“Sherlock” by another character (the annoying Crabby—who is, of course, a
crab). Could Mooch now be shooting for Holmes’ position as the Greatest
Detective of All Time? Will Mooch deduce (or “dedushe,” as the speech-impaired
fluffball would say), while the culprit fleas . . . er, flees? Stay tuned . . .
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, by Mark Haddon (Doubleday
& Co, Inc., 2003; $22.95) isn’t a Sherlockian pastiche, despite the line
from “Silver Blaze.” It’s a modern-day tale of a 15-year-old autistic boy,
Christopher John Francis Boone, and his investigation of the curious death of a
dog in his neighborhood. Devoid of normal emotions himself, Christopher’s hero
is, of course, the very cerebral Sherlock Holmes. Using his knowledge of the
Holmes stories and the detective’s methods, he sets out on a quest to learn the
truth behind the dog’s demise. The book has received good reviews and is also
available from the Book-of-the-Month Club at a reduced rate of $15.99 for
members.
Lost in a Good Book, by Jasper Fforde (Viking
Books, 2003; $24.95), continues the adventures of Thursday Next and her
renegade uncle, Mycroft, begun in the author’s The Eyre Affair (reviewed
in the December 2002 issue of our newsletter). I’ve not actually seen this one
yet (waiting for it to turn up at a reduced price in one of the book clubs I
belong to, frugal soul that I am), but from reviews, it appears to involve more
reality hopping from one literary world to another. (No clue yet as to whether
the world of Sherlock Holmes is visited this time.)
The Fallacy Detective, by Bluedorn, Nathaniel,
and Hans ($22), is a book designed to teach logic and critical thinking to
children. Appropriately, it features on its cover an illustration of a dog
wearing caped cloak and deerstalker and carrying a magnifying glass (and
definitely doing more than nothing).
Sadly, as of the end of August, Issue 6 of Volume II
of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen graphic series still has not
arrived in specialty comic book stores, despite earlier promised release dates
first in June and then in August. As the hard cover collection of the series
has already been announced with a release date in November, we can only hope
that the final issue becomes available before then. But in the meantime, you
can enjoy Jess Nevin’s trade paperback Heroes & Monsters: The Unofficial
Companion to the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, containing notes and
essays about the first series, or check out his Web site for notes on the second
series so far (see last issue’s newsletter for details). Or you can catch the
movie version (or novelization), described as follows . . .
The League of Extraordinary
Gentlemen – a Movie Review
Well, let me start by saying that I thoroughly enjoyed this movie. And I think that most people who enjoy action-adventure movies with a Victorian setting would as well—this despite the fact that, in general, most critics panned it in the reviews that I read. (Most likely because they just didn’t “get” it, as those of us who are aficionados of Victorian sensational/fantastical literature would.) If what you seek in a movie is a lot of angst and emotional entanglement on the part of the characters instead of a rousing good tale featuring the likes of Allan Quatermain, Captain Nemo, Dr. Jekyll (and Mr. Hyde), the Invisible Man, and Mina Harker (billed inaccurately in trailers as “Dracula’s Bride”), and with Dorian Grey and an adult Tom Sawyer (working for the U.S. Secret Service) thrown in for extra flavor, you may not care much for this film. If you seek the latter, however, I urge you to head straight away to whatever theater in your area is still running it (unlikely, although it may be in second run theaters by the time you get this) or rent or buy the video (or DVD, if you’re into that) as soon as it’s available. (Or catch it on cable—if you can really wait that long.) That said, let me warn you that the following paragraphs contain a lot of spoiler material, so if you like to be surprised, wait until after you’ve seen the movie to read on.
First, I should apologize for reporting some
inaccurate info that was listed on the movie Web site I mentioned in an earlier
newsletter. The character M, the supposed head of the British Secret Service,
was not Mycroft Holmes, as reported by that Web site. (Perhaps the
producers leaked inaccurate info to throw people off the scent.) Rather, as was
the case in the first series of the comic book version of League, M was
actually (Spoiler Alert!) Professor Moriarty! Ironically, the actor
portraying M resembled neither Mycroft nor Moriarty, as described in the Canon.
But at least the Sherlockian connection was maintained, even if neither of the
brothers Holmes made an appearance on-screen.
As for the actors portraying the Victorian legends
around which the action centered, Sean Connery did an excellent job as Allan
Quatermain. (By the way, despite the persistent injection of a second “r” in
the name, Quatermain is, I believe, correctly spelled as here. At least
that’s what the character claimed in one scene that was either cut out of the
movie or added to the novelization.) In fact, most of the actors fell into
their roles quite admirably, even if their screen time was often so limited by
the need to fit so many diverse characters into the action that not a lot of
character development took place on-screen. (Of course, most of those who’d
enjoy and want to see the movie would already be familiar with the characters,
either from the Victorian novels in which they appeared or from the comic
series published by DC/Wildfire’s America’s Best imprint.) And some
characterizations were changed from the comic series so as to better fit the
idea into cinematic form. Although in the graphic series, Mina was not a
vampire, for example, her cinematic conversion to the “dark side” fit the plot
of the movie quite well and provided one of the most exciting scenes, in which
she—either accompanied by a horde of bats or having turned into them, it wasn’t
quite clear—took down a row of snipers trying to prevent the League from saving
Venice from collapsing into its watery foundations. Shane West, as Secret
Service agent Tom Sawyer, was a surprise. I didn’t expect much from his
character, considering him added just to attract younger viewers, but he did a
credible job of the rash young American counterpart to the older, jaded British
adventurer that Connery portrayed Quatermain as. The character most underused,
I thought, was Captain Nemo, whose role was mainly to provide the League
transportation in the Nautilus—although he did get a chance to shine
using martial arts on the brutal soldiers in the enemy’s citadel near the end.
Speaking of the Nautilus, the special effects
crew did a good job of portraying the massive ship in several scenes, although
it differed quite a bit from the vessel portrayed in the movie versions of Twenty
Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, as well as the one depicted in the League
comic series. Its lines were much smoother and its design based more on a
submersible version of period ironclad surface ships, with their long ram prows
at the water line. Its decorative motif was Hindu, corresponding with the
portrayal of Nemo as a Sikh in Verne’s Mysterious Island, which the
creators of the graphic series choose to follow. Mr. Hyde was likewise done
decently, appearing more like his counterpart in the graphic series than in
past movies—a sort of Victorian Incredible Hulk, although Hyde looked far more
realistic than that character did in his own summer movie. (Thankfully, Hyde
was a far less brutal beast in the movie than was his comic
counterpart—especially in the second series now running.) And Mina’s conversion
into (?) the bat horde was also well done. The effects used to portray the
Invisible Man (not the original character of the Wells novel or the graphic
series, but a thief named Skinner who stole the original formula) were nothing
spectacular, but they worked, too. And Skinner provided much of the movie’s
comic relief as well.
The plot of the movie revolved around a mysterious
masked criminal know as the Fantom. (“Quite operatic,” Quatermain quipped in
the novelization.) The Fantom’s efforts to spark a war in Europe through his
advanced weaponry (including a WWI-era tank some 20 years before it was
actually invented, plus fully automatic rifles) supposedly led M—who (Spoiler
Alert!) was, of course, himself the Fantom—to assemble the League in an
attempt to stop the Fantom before he could destroy a meeting of the world’s
leaders in Venice. M’s (or Moriarty’s) real plot was to use Quatermain, the
great hunter, to capture Mr. Hyde (stalking the Rue Morgue in Paris and, in a
nod to Poe’s “Murders in the Rue Morgue,” rumored to be a great ape). He then
used his plant in the League (Spoiler Alert!—it was Dorian Grey,
although many red herrings pointed to Skinner as the culprit) to obtain skin
cells from the Invisible Man, blood from the vampiric Mina, Dr. Jekyll’s
formula for becoming Hyde, and the plans for the Nautilus. His goal was
to create a super-army of invisible men, Hyde-like brutes, and vampires,
transported in submersibles to (dare I say it?) rule the world! (Ambition even
for Moriarty, and the scheme was a bit overly involved, but again it fit the
atmosphere of the movie as long as you didn’t think too much about it.) Sawyer
was involved only because he’d been tracking the Fantom himself and followed
the League to Dorian Grey’s, where he helped repel a staged assault on the
League by the Fantom’s army. (Although cut from the movie, the novelization
explained that Sawyer’s motive, aside from duty, was to avenge the death of a
fellow Secret Service agent who’d died at the hands of the Fantom—Huckleberry
Finn!)
Of course, after Dorian Grey’s betrayal of the group
(and his near sinking of the Nautilus through a series of planted bombs,
detonated by a tone in a gramophone recording left by Grey in which M did the
standard villainous gloating over outsmarting them), the League quickly got
back on his trail—thanks to Skinner, who stowed away about the minisub that
Grey stole—and tracked the villains to a citadel deep in Mongolia. (Skinner, it
turned out, was secretly working for the real British Secret Service all
along.) The showdown in the citadel offered some of the movie’s best moments,
ending in the final death of Professor Moriarty—although not, as expected, at
the hands of Quatermain. In a surprise move, it was Tom Sawyer who ended the
Professor’s career with a shot from Quatermain’s elephant gun. And Quatermain,
sadly, died from the wounds he’d suffered in his own final battle with M.
(Although an ending sequence, where a witch doctor spoke an incantation over
Quatermain’s grave, seemed to indicate that the adventurer could rise again,
should a sequel ever be made.)
Final answer: If you enjoy action-adventure and
Victorian sensational literature, you’ll love The League of Extraordinary
Gentlemen, as I did. And if you missed the movie and don’t want to wait to
see it on video, look for the paperback novelization by K.J. Anderson (Pocket
Star; $6.99). (The same author, incidentally, wrote his own fictionalized
biography of Captain Nemo, out in hardcover last year and paperback now.) Even
if you saw the movie, get the novelization, as it fills in a lot of the blanks
that either were cut from the movie or never quite made it into the script. (It
even includes an alternative ending, without the funeral and possible
resurrection of Quatermain, but introducing Campion Bond, the British Secret
Service agent of the comic series—and setting up the League to face Wells’
Martians in a possible sequel, as occurred in the second graphic series.)
***
Coming Meetings!
Following are the details of our
upcoming meeting, plus the dates and tentative information about our remaining
meetings for 2003. (Check our Web site or our Indianapolis Star Web page
for updates.) So set these dates aside to join the Hated Rivals at the
following soirées:
A Canonical Cookout!
Saturday, September 13,
2003, starting at 1:30 p.m.
In the backyard of Jim and
Linda Sutton’s home
5550 S. Harlan
Indianapolis, Indiana
Directions
and Details: To
get to the Suttons’ home, take I-465 to the south side of Indianapolis, and
take the I-65N. exit to Keystone Avenue (the first exit after you get onto
I-65N.). Turn south (left) on Keystone and drive several miles (past Hanna,
Thompson, and other crossroads until Keystone becomes a two-lane road) and
continue till you reach Dudley, on the right. Turn right, and the next right is
Harlan. The last house on the left is Casa Sutton. Park in the driveway or
along the street, and either knock on the front door or just go on around to
the backyard. We’ll be cooking hot dogs over the backyard pit and sharing
pitch-in dishes (see the meeting description at the front of the newsletter),
plus enjoying the Sherlockian (and other) music of Holmes and Watson. (If it
rains that day, come anyway. We’ll still gather at the Suttons for some
Sherlockian music and fellowship and then decide from there how to further
celebrate the event.)
And don’t forget to mark
your calendar for these great upcoming meetings . . .
Sunday, November 9: Mayhem, Menace, and
Moriarty!
Sunday, January 4, 2004
(tentative):
A Victorian Tea, Reprised!
For
more information, contact us at P.O. Box 26290, Indianapolis, IN 46226-0290; or
send us e-mail at postmaster@surrey-shore.freeservers.com or at
rivalrussell@hotmail.com. (And don’t forget to check out our Hated Rivals Web
site at http://surrey-shore.freeservers.com or our Indy Star Web page at
http://community.indystar.com/928/ for recent updates.) See you again in two
months, back on the ol’ Surrey Shore, where the game’s always afoot! (But you
knew that anyway—right?)