British actor Edward Hardwicke has died. He is best known as Dr. John Watson in the 1980s and 1990s BBC Sherlock Holmes series co-starring Jeremy Brett as Holmes.The Guardian has an obituary and here is a video of Hardwicke and Brett interviewed about playing Watson and Holmes.
“A murder is somehow more quintessentially English when committed on the cobbles of a foggy East End alley. If there’s a silhouetted top hat, a rustle of crinoline and a scream cut short with straight razor, all the better.” The Guardian has more on “the Great English Slaying.”
Neil Gaiman’s tale of Lovecraftian horror is available as a PDF download of the “daily newspaper for all classes,” The Star of Albion–including ads for such things as “Jekyll Powders.”
Slouching Towards Bethlehem has found tantalizing evidence of a detective agency operating in Meiji Era Japan, The Iwai Detective Agency.
Yellowback novels were pulpy Victorian reading. Emory University has a bunch of them for you to download. (via @houseinrlyeh)
Kirkbride Buildings are the castles of the American Midwest. They’re also 19th century State Hospitals.
Find t-shirts, mugs, totes and more at our new Guttermart location at Teepublic!
The Cultural Gutter 