Who's the big enigmatic private dick who's a puzzle machine to all the chicks?

May 6, 2010 2:35 PM

According to this PDF (previously on the Blue), in 1934, Martin Gardner said in an interview that (prior to himself) the only puzzle collector he'd ever heard of was fictitious, a detective character "in a series of short stories that ran many years ago in one of the popular mystery magazines." Who was the character (and author)?

I asked in that thread, without success.

posted by Zed to Writing & Language (8 answers total)

The character of Dupin created by Poe?

That would be my first guess as Dupin was the first detective as we understand detectives and created before even the term "detective" was created. Poe himself was incredibly interested in puzzles and continually was thinking up riddles. The three stories featuring him were published in the 1840s, which certainly would have been "many years ago" in 1934.
posted by zizzle at 3:25 PM on May 6, 2010

I thought Dupin, too, but I remember him being more interested in logic puzzles and oddities, while Gardner seems to be referencing mechanical puzzles - things like puzzle boxes, dexterity puzzles, and ancestors of things like Rubik's Cubes and geometric puzzles. Plus, Poe's works were serialized novels, not so much short stories.

I'm assuming Gardner means American mystery magazines and not British ones like the Strand. The mags were full of detectives who have faded into history, so it's possible Gardner is referring to one of the less famous detectives - it's unlikely he'd forget Poe or Dupin's name, but a minor pulp author? Perhaps.
posted by julen at 4:32 PM on May 6, 2010

It might behoove you to write the guy a letter and just ask. He's like 99 years old but still has all his wits.
posted by overeducated_alligator at 4:51 PM on May 6, 2010

In 1934 Martin Gardner was 20 years old. Are you sure you have the details right? I can't get the PDF open.
posted by futility closet at 7:23 PM on May 6, 2010

Here's the full quote and source from the PDF, for those who can't open it. Source: Martin Gardner, “A Puzzling Collection,” Hobbies, September 1934, p. 8.

As a youngster of grade school age I used to collect everything from butterflies and house keys to match boxes and postage stamps—but when I grew older ... I sold my collections and chucked the whole business, and began to look for something new to collect. Thus it was several years ago I decided to make a collection of mechanical puzzles....

The first and only puzzle collector I ever met was a fictitious character. He was the chief detective in a series of short stories that ran many years ago in one of the popular mystery magazines.... Personally I can’t say that I have reaped from my collection the professional benefit which this man did, but at any rate I have found the hobby equally as fascinating.

posted by Kattullus at 7:54 PM on May 6, 2010

I would ask him yourself, or if that doesn't elicit an answer, go with a collector in the mystery magazine genre. The problem is that over the years there were so many. Now, there's a timeframe here, and a few details, so someone familiar with the regular repeat characters should be able to offer some suggestions.
posted by dhartung at 10:34 PM on May 6, 2010

Response by poster: As a first stab, I just emailed the person who wrote the article in the book (whose title, strangely not present in the PDF, is The Mathemagician and Pied Puzzler.) If that doesn't pan out, I'll try dropping Mr. Gardner a self-addressed stamped postcard.
posted by Zed at 10:56 AM on May 7, 2010

Response by poster: The author of the article replied, indicating that he'd asked Gardner, had made inquiries among pulp magazine collectors, and still doesn't know. So I think this is liable to remain a mystery.
posted by Zed at 5:17 PM on May 9, 2010