5/15/1923 The hardboiled dick bursts in, shooting.

May 15, 1923.  Carroll John Daly's "Three Gun Terry" appears in Black Mask Magazine.  It is usually considered the first hardboiled private eye story.  As WIlliam F. Nolan wrote in his anthology The Black Mask Boys:


"Three Gun Terry" represents a "major" first in the genre of crime fiction. It is the first tough detective story starring the world's first wise-cracking, hard-boiled private investigator...

Terry Mack is the prototype for ten thousand private eyes who have gunned, slugged, and wisecracked their way through ten thousand magazines, books, films and TV episodes.