Detectives

"Sherlock Holmes Umpires Baseball," a spoof of the popular character, ran in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer in 1906, illustrated either by Dok Hager (1858-1932) or his son, George Hager (1885-1945), both of whom were Hoosiers and both cartoonists.

Perhaps in answer to Sherlock Holmes, E.W. Hornung created Raffles, a "gentleman cracksman" who lived on the opposite side of the law. Frederick Coffay Yohn (1875-1933) was the illustrator for Raffles' American editions. Hornung by the way was the brother-in-law of Arthur Conan Doyle, Holmes' creator.

Turn-of-the-century humorist John Kendrick Bangs wrote comic versions of popular books and characters. A frequent collaborator was illustrator and cartoonist Albert Levering (1869-1929), who drew this picture for Mrs. Raffles (1905), Bangs' account of the adventures of Raffles' widow. Yohn drew the straight version, Levering the takeoff. Both were Hoosiers.

John McCutcheon (1870-1949) and George Ade (1866-1944) were friends and schoolmates at Purdue University. They spent much of their lives in Chicago, though, and collaborated often. Their book, Bang! Bang! (1928), recounted the investigations of boy detective J.P. Davenant, pictured here. From The Murder Book: An Illustrated History of the Detective Story (1971) by Tage la Cour and Harald Mogensen.

Astrogen Kerby, "Astro," was a different kind of detective, a palmist and fortuneteller who investigated crimes. He appeared in The Master of Mysteries by Gelett Burgess (1912), with pictures by Indiana illustrator George Brehm (1878-1966). From The Murder Book.

Finally, The Strange Case of Mason Brant by Neville Monroe Hopkins (1916) with illustrations by Gayle Porter Hoskins (1887-1962).

Captions copyright 2010 Terence E. Hanley