In a perfect world, Dr. Tracy Revels’ office number would be 221B.
An office that shares the number of Sherlock Holmes’ London flat would be a fitting place to find someone who has spent much of her life reading about, talking about and writing about the fictional detective.
Revels, a professor of history, might not have the office number, but she has something better: Membership in the Baker Street Irregulars, an exclusive literary society based in New York City that is dedicated to all things Sherlock Holmes. She learned in January via Zoom – thanks to COVID-19 – that she had been selected for admission.
“They started to announce the new members, and they go alphabetically, so I was the last name,” Revels says. “When they said professor of history at a small college in South Carolina, I thought how many of us can there be? Then my name comes up, and they announce my investiture name, and I still haven’t recovered.”
Revels’ investiture name, as selected by the leader of the BSI, is “A black sequin-covered dinner dress.” The names are taken from Sherlock Holmes stories and can be characters or other items. They also are tailored to the recipient’s interests, and Revels earned hers because of her study of and teaching about fashion.
“Not many people can wear their investiture name,” Revels says. “So, when I go (hopefully to the next annual dinner held in New York on the Friday closest to Holmes’ Jan. 6 birthday), you better believe I’ll have a black sequin-covered dinner dress for that event.”
Revels read her first Holmes story, “The Adventure of the Speckled Band,” when she was 11, and she was hooked.
“I got almost to the end, and I said, ‘I wonder if it could be a snake that killed the woman,’ and it was,” Revels says. “I thought I was so smart, but I never solved another one.”
While other kids her age were getting into Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys, Revels stayed faithful to Holmes.
“Part of the attraction was that Holmes was a grown up,” she says. “Even as a kid, I didn’t believe kids could go out and solve crimes. Also, Holmes stories were about grown up things like murder and blackmail. They weren’t about who stole somebody’s sneakers.”
Revels was about 15 when her mother bought her the complete collection of Holmes adventures written by Arthur Conan Doyle. It was a treasure she spent many hours poring over, and one that has made every move with her since.
“The cover is off, the pages are filthy, there’s underlining throughout,” Revels says. “I abused that book because I loved it so much. I’ve dragged it with me every place I’ve lived.”
While at Wofford, Revels developed a Sherlock Holmes class that she’s taught both as a semester-long first-year humanities course and as a month-long Interim. She’s planning to teach “A Journey to Baker Street: Reading the Sherlock Homes Canon” this year during Interim, which because of the pandemic will be held from mid-April through mid-May.
“We will read the stories, watch the movies and just have fun,” says Revels. “When you’re teaching something that you love, it’s almost beyond words.”
Revels has written three Sherlock Holmes novels – with a twist. In her books, Holmes is a wizard. She also has written 14 short stories published in volumes of “The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories.”
Revels is a member of four other Holmes societies, or scions, as they’re called. One of those, The Survivors of the “Gloria Scott,” is based in Greenville, South Carolina.
David Marcum, the editor of “The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories,” first met Revels in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in 2012 at – where else? – “A Gathering of Southern Sherlockians.” He says her investiture in the BSI is a reward she earned through her dedication to Holmes.
“She is an amazingly knowledgeable Sherlockian, bringing her historian’s sensibility and curiosity to all her very interesting stories — many of which have the royalties donated to charity — and she’s also a fine and intelligent person as well,” Marcum says. “I’m very glad to know her. It’s wonderful that all of her hard work, including her involvement with her local Sherlockian scion group, has been recognized by a membership in the Baker Street Irregulars.”
For Revels, her investiture is the culmination of a lifelong journey, the arrival at a destination she never thought she would reach.
“The Baker Street Irregulars is by invitation only,” Revels says. “You can’t apply, you can’t con your way into it in any sort of way. All of my life I felt like, well, I’m just from a farm in Florida … nobody is ever going to let me join the BSI. Even if I wrote a million books, there’s no way I’d get in. But I did, and I’m grateful.”
By Robert W. Dalton