Sherlock Holmes

Arthur Conan Doyle never specified in any of his sixty Sherlock Holmes stories that his fictional creation wore a deerstalker cap, smoked a curved pipe or relaxed off-duty in luxurious dressing gowns. In fact, much of our popular visualization of the master detective (as well as the phrase "Elementary, my dear Watson") originated from the work of actor/director/playwright William Gillette, who in 1899 wrote the stage play Sherlock Holmes and performed the title role in extended international tours and multiple revivals. (He chose the curved pipe because it allowed him to speak his lines without blocking his mouth.) The virile and magnetic Gillette was one of the most popular performers of his era, but he is mostly forgotten today because his sole motion picture performance – a 1916 silent adaptation of the play that made him famous - was thought lost to time.

Sherlock Holmes, the amateur detective, chemist, violin player, boxer, and swordsman (among other talents), first appeared in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's A Study in Scarlet in the Beeton's Christmas Annual in 1887.