Sherlock Holmes Museum

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The Sherlock Holmes Museum is a privately run museum and popular tourist attraction dedicated to Sherlock Holmes. It is situated at 239 Baker Street in central London.^[1]^[2]

The house was formerly an eighteenth century boarding house, and was purchased in 1989 on behalf of The Sherlock Holmes International Society, set up by the museum's proprietor John Aidiniantz. The Museum initially operated a ground-floor restaurant, 'Mrs. Hudson's' with the museum open to the public on the upper floors. A blue plaque was made up by the museum to look like a heritage plaque, identifying it as 221B Baker Street - although the actual address is 239. The Museum - like the address itself - was to prove controversial, and has been denounced as a 'Tourist trap' by many organisations and individuals.^{[attribution needed]}

In the late 1990s, the restaurant closed and the Museum's lucrative shop moved from the attic to the ground floor. The Museum also operates one of the few Victorian Hansom Cabs remaining in the country, but it had to be withdrawn a few years ago because it was refused entry to the Royal Parks as it carried the Museum's advertisement on the side panels. There are plans to bring it out again in mid 2006. The Museum hires a number of actors in character. A Victorian era policeman acts as doorman. Several Victorian housemaids in attendance can be seen around the museum. Despite its short history, the museum continues to be a highly successful attraction, drawing in several hundred thousand visitors a year.^{[citation needed]}

1 The tour
2 Numbering dispute
3 References
4 External links

[edit] The tour

The Museum consists of a tour of three floors of the small Grade II listed Georgian house, with two rooms on each floor, arranged to resemble the rooms occupied by Sherlock Holmes. The sitting room is faithfully reproduced, usually with an actor pretending to be Dr Watson or Mrs Hudson in attendance. Sherlock Holmes' bedroom adjoins. The second and third floor contain a few waxworks and display cases purporting to contain 'exhibits' from the cases. The Museum's staff and programme eagerly propound that this is the 'real' 221B, and that Sherlock Holmes lived there(at least according to the stories). The rooms of Mrs Hudson and Dr Watson are on the second floor.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Numbering dispute

Further information: 221B Baker Street

The address 221B was the subject of a protracted dispute between the Museum and the nearby Abbey National building. Since the 1930s, the Royal Mail had been delivering mail addressed to Sherlock Holmes to Abbey National, and they had employed a special secretary to deal with such correspondence. The Museum went through several appeals for such mail to be delivered to them, on the grounds that they could create mail order jobs from replying to the letters with a gift catalogue. Although these initiatives were all unsuccessful, the issue was resolved in 2002 when Abbey National vacated Abbey House after seventy years, and the mail is now currently delivered to the Museum.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] References

^ Thomas Bruce Wheeler (2003). Finding Sherlock's London: Travel Guide to Over 200 Sites in London. iUniverse. ISBN 0595281141.
^ "Sherlock Holmes 101", Washington Post, January 11, 2004.