By Bill and Teresa Peschel: Inside an unassuming house in Reading, PA is a treasure. It’s a complete down-to-the-last-detail, life-size recreation of Sherlock Holmes’ sitting room at 221B Baker Street.
And, if you’re a member of a Sherlock Holmes fan group (there are many across the world including the U.S. and we welcome new members) you can visit it on open house days.
Bill and I are members of the White Rose Irregulars, a group based in central PA. Thus, when word comes from on high that the sitting room is open for visitors, we make the trek to Reading. The owner, a member of the Baker Street Irregulars, opens up once or twice a year. He gets visitors from across the United States who come to revel in sitting in Sherlock’s own easy chair, gawk at Sebastion Moran’s air rifle, study the chemistry lab, listen to the sound of horses clip-clopping outside on the street, try to identify the hundreds of items on display and connect them to the canon, and buy loads of Sherlock merchandise to supplement their own hoards.
In addition, the owner sells memorabilia to benefit the Baker Street Irregulars Trust. It uses the money raised to raise Sherlock’s profile in the public school system. He acquires it from everywhere: donations, people downsizing their collections, others who have gotten duplicates, or the heirs who don’t know what to do with any of that stuff.
The current plan for the sitting room is it will eventually go, down to the last cocaine syringe and spent bullet casing, to the University of Minnesota’s Sherlock Holmes collection. It will join some 60,000 other items including the Peschel Press contribution to Sherlock studies: The 223B Casebooks. These comprise nine volumes of vintage Sherlock Holmes parodies covering 1888 – 1930. And yes, the owner of Sherlock’s sitting room has a set of our books. We’re very proud.
This is an amazing place to visit. You enter the house, descend the staircase lined with Sherlock movie memorabilia, and enter the sitting room. Once inside, you can walk around and marvel, even touch things. Two passageways lined with more posters and such lead to the memorabilia room. It’s crammed with wonderful treasures you can buy with a clear conscience because you’re supporting the BSI Trust. While you’re there, you can meet and chat with Sherlock fans from across the country, some of them very big names indeed.
But until Sherlock’s sitting room reopens and you can go to Reading, enjoy the pictures.
Bill and Teresa Peschel are indie writers and publishers from Hershey, PA. They publish a wide variety of books, including the 223B Baker Street series which collects vintage Sherlock Holmes fanfiction and annotations of Agatha Christie and Dorothy Sayers golden age mysteries. Visit them at Peschel Press to learn more or follow them on Instagram for daily quotes and posts.
