7/31/1930 What happened today? The Shadow knows...

July 31, 1930.  On this date the Detective Radio Hour, sponsored by pulp publisher Street and Smith, featured a mysterious narrator called The Shadow.  This became so popular that by the following spring The Shadow Magazine sprang forth, starring a much more fully developed character, designed and usually written by the prolific Walter Gibson.  By 1937 The Shadow radio show had the characteristics now so familiar: "Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?  The Shadow Knows!"  He had "the power to cloud men's minds so they cannot see him."  And "The tree of crime bears bitter fruit."  So watch out.

7/30/1973 Day of the Jackal released

July 30, 1973.  The Day of the Jackal was released this day.  Fred Zinnemann directed the film version of  Frederick Forsyth's first novel, about an attempt to assassinate Charles DeGaulle.

7/29/1909 Chester Himes is born

July 29, 1909.  Chester Himes, arguably the first great African-American mystery writer, was born this day in Jefferson City, Missouri.  He started writing while in prison for armed robbery.  He is best remembered for the Harlem Detectives novels he wrote, featuring Coffin Ed Johnson and Gravedigger Jones, two Harlem police detectives.  Three of them were made into movies, starting with Cotton Comes To Harlem in 1970.

Ishmael Reed wrote that Himes "taught me the difference between a black detective and Sherlock Holmes."

8/28/1946 Burt Lancaster does Ernest Hemingway, sort of

August 28, 1946.  This day saw the release of The Killers, starring Edmond O'Brien  and Ava Gardner.  Other important roles were played by Burt Lancaster and William Conrad, in their film premieres. 

The first twenty minutes is an accurate filming of Ernest Hemingway's story of the same name, part of his Nick Adams cycle.  It describes hired killers coming to a small town to kill an ex-boxer called the Swede.  The rest of the flick, in which the crime is investigated,  is made up from scratch. 

It does offer an explanation of Swede's fatal mistake.  For a different take on that, read Leigh Lundin's surprising discovery.

7/28/2011 John Grisham wins Harper Lee

July 28, 2011.  On this date John Grisham's novel The Confession won the first Harper Lee Award for Legal Fiction.  The prize is named, of course, in honor of the author of To Kill A Mockingbird.  Grisham's book is about the trial of a man accused of murdering a cheerleader.

7/27/188? Australian mystery fiction begins

July 27,188?.  Fergus Hume's The Mystery of a Hansom Cab, published in 1886, is usually considered the first Australian mystery novel.  It begins on a smoky night in Melbourne, July 27, when a dead body is discovered in a hansom cab.  Hume self-published the book and sold 25,000 copies of the first edition.  Over a million copies were sold in Britain and the United States combined.  Not a bad start.

7/26/1993 Doll's Eyes

July 26, 1993.  Bari Wood's novel Doll's Eyes was published on this date.  It's a psychological thriller about a person who kills people in the hope of feeling pity for them.  It was turned into the movie In Dreams, directed by Neil Jordan, starring Annette Bening.