Bill Hagen (billha@ionet.net)
Tue, 26 Oct 1999 13:08:33 -0500 (CDT)
James Doherty writes (snipped), "While Daly was undoubtedly
first with a PI character
named "Three-Gun"
Terry Mack, the Op beat Race Williams into print by
several months.
Further, although "Three-Gun Terry," the
first-ever story
about a hard-boiled sleuth who defines his
profession as a
private detective, beat "Arson Plus," the first
Op story, into
print by a few scant weeks,.."
Have we got that right? (Noting pabergin's qualification that
Daly had a hard-boiled non-PI adventurer as early as 1922.)
Terry Mack in May 1923, Race Williams in June 1923 Black
Mask, but Op was "several months" earlier than June?? That
would make Op the first hard-boiled PI, wouldn't it? My
source (Goulart, The Dime Detectives) says the first Op story
was not published until Oct. 1923.
If Goulart is wrong, I'd like to know, and the actual date of
the first Op, so I can make a marginal correction in his
book! (If Goulart is right, the
"race to the mailbox" is a fiction created by some rare
birds.)
Bill Hagen
<billha@ionet.net>
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