Professional Documents
Culture Documents
The group began its existence as the Amateur Mendicant Society of Madison, and kept that
name for several years until it found out that another group elsewhere already had
established informal “rights” to the use of that title.
The Amateur Mendicant Society was an organization investigated by Holmes in 1887, and
which “held a luxurious club in the lower vault of a furniture warehouse,” according to the
story, “The Five Orange Pips.”
According to the first issue of the AMS newsletter, A Case of Identity, issued in 1971:
“The Holmes addicts of Madison…wished to form a group of devotees, led by Mr. Ira Fistell,
host of Radio Station WKOW’s “Nightline” program, who became our first president and has
since moved on to Milwaukee.”
Fistell also was the first recipient of the group’s main award, the Mycroft trophy (a form of
recognition no longer presented). Fistell later left Milwaukee for Los Angeles, where he
continued to work in radio hosting talk programs as late as 1995, and perhaps even longer.
The newsletter no longer is published, and the call letters WKOW no longer are used by what
is now WOLX.
According to Thomas Boykoff, longtime leader of our monthly case studies, the
organization’s founding was prompted by Fistell’s asking questions on “Nightline” about
various elements of the Sherlock Holmes stories. Because of the response those questions
generated from callers, there appeared to be enough interest in the Canon to justify an
organizational meeting.
According to the first newsletter, “There were approximately fifteen charter members, of
whom five are still with us, including the present president (Miss Joanna Overn) and vice
president (Mrs. Donna Kopecky).”
The group eventually decided to submit a request to the the leading American Sherlock
Holmes organization, the Baker Street Irregulars, for formal recognition by that group. But
as they were to learn, the Amateur Mendicant Society was a name already in use by another
group. Since BSI discourages duplicate names for organizations it recognizes, BSI in 1975
proposed the name the group uses today.
The name Notorious Canary Trainers is based on a brief reference in the Sherlock Holmes
story called “Black Peter” and now found in the collection, “The Return of Sherlock Holmes.”
Dr. Watson remarks at the beginning of this chronicle:
“In this memorable year (18)95 a curious and incongruous succession of cases had engaged
his (Holmes’) attention, ranging from his famous investigation of the sudden death of
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Cardinal Tosca – an inquiry which was carried out by him at the express desire of his
Holiness the Pope – down to his arrest of Wilson, the
notorious canary-trainer, which removed a plague spot from the East End of London…”
Although Arthur Conan Doyle never found any notes in the files of Dr.
John Watson which reported any additional details about Wilson and his
crime(s), Doyle’s son, Adrian, later addressed the matter in “The
Adventure of the Deptford Horror” in his “The Exploits of Sherlock
Holmes.” (It is in that story that we are told that Wilson’s first name was
Theobold.) Nicholas Meyer also published his account, called “The
Canary Trainer,” in 1993, citing a “missing manuscript” located by a
computer in the bowels of a major university “where it had collected dust
for over half a century.”
The group first held its meetings in downtown Madison at the Community Center. Later,
meetings moved to the Wisconsin Union (Room 221), to members’ homes for parties and
picnics, an antique shop, and eventually the Canterbury Booksellers and Coffeehouse at 315
W. Gorham. In July 1996, the group began meeting at Barnes & Noble West Towne because
a larger meeting area was needed. We moved to the Booked for Murder bookstore on
University Ave. starting with our September 2008 meeting.
For years the group had a Web site – its first and to This group of Notorious Canary-
date only -- at Trainers members and guests marked
http://communities.madison.com/canary, but it Sherlock
disappeared in April 2010 when the Web site host Holmes birthday anniversary in 2006.
switched “platforms” to one which did not meet
our needs.
In April 2006 we began the tradition of allowing members to choose a “canonical name” for
use within the group. Names usually are those of characters, events, or locations found in
the Sherlock Holmes’ accounts.
We also meet between meetings via message postings on our Yahoo Group, established July
2, 2001 at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/nct1969 Anyone can join the group by following
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the instructions at the link. (If you choose not to join, you still can receive message postings
by subscribing; send an email to nct1969-subscribe@yahoogroups.com)
NCT membership is free. For those interested in being recorded as a member, leave your
name, mailing address, and phone number with the meeting leader at any of the monthly
meetings or send it to nct1969-owner@yahoogroups.com or to Mike McCoy, One Hiawatha
Circle, Madison, WI 53711.