3/7/1963 Such A Killing Crime begins

March 7, 1963.  On this date the action begins in the novel Such A Killing Crime, set in Greenwich Village during the Great Folk Music Scare.  Joe Talley runs a coffee house in New York.  When one of his favorite singers is killed on his stage he hunts for the man's missing demo tape, which may lead him to a killer...

3/6/1996 Patricia Cornwell makes a big deal

March 6, 1996.  On this date the Times-Dispatch reported that crime novelist Patricia Cornwell signed a deal that would deliver $20,000,000 for her next three books.  This apparently made her the highest-paid female crime writer to date.

Source; Beahm, George.  The Unoffical Patricia Cornwell Companion.

3/5/1917 A Jury of her Peers appears

March 5, 1917.  On this date Every Week magazine published Susan Glaspell's story "A Jury of her Peers."  The story was inspired by the murder of John Hossack which the author had covered as a reporter.  She adapted it from her play Trifles, and the story is generally considered her best work.  It is also a feminist classic, with women secretly investigating a suspicious death.  My favorite point: the dead man is Mister Right.  Excuse me, Wright.

You can read the story here.

3/4/1881 Holmes teams up with Watson

March 4, 1881.   According to William S. Baring-Gould's  The Annotated Sherlock Holmes, it was on this date that one of the most famous fictional relationships began, when Dr John H.Watson's new roommate invites him to participate in a case.  Illustration by George Hutchinson.

3/3/1985 ABC starts Moonlighting

March 3, 1985.  The private detective dramedy Moonlighting premieres on ABC.  Starring Cybill Shepherd and a newbie named Bruce Willis, it ran for 66 episodes.

3/2/1831 Seeley Regester registers

March 2, 1831.  Metta Victoria Fuller was born on this day.  She married publisher Orville James Victor and, under the same Seeley Regester she wrote more than 100 novels.  Her book The Dead Letter (1866) is considered the first American crime novel.

3/1/1933 Perry Mason arrives

March 1, 1933.  On this date The Case of the Velvet Claws was published.  Erle Stanley Gardner had been writing stories and novellas at an amazing rate, mostly for Black Mask Magazine, trying to earn enough money to drop being a lawyer and go full-time as an author.  It took another lawyer to help him out: the fictional but wildly successful Perry Mason, who premiered in this book.  75 novels and a hit TV show followed.