When I decided to start a blog chronicling my experiences
throughout my life with pop culture and re-printing some of my better pieces
from the past there was no question in my mind what image I would use as the
splash backdrop. There was only one image that could sum up what I wanted to
achieve with the blog and illustrate my journey through life. That image is the
original cover of the 1967 Random House release of the seventh Three
Investigators adventure The Mystery of
the Fiery Eye. Those kids at night in front of that old house digging and
searching, that’s me-digging and searching, both physically and metaphorically
and many times in an old house.
The Three Investigators series of books was a huge part of
my just-before-teenage-years. There was something about their capers that spoke
to me. They were a bit more human and kitschy than the Hardy Boys and more
nuanced than Encyclopedia Brown.
The template for the series was nearly ridiculous. 3 early
teens that use a junkyard as their home base and get around in a chauffeured
Rolls whose services they won in a contest and solve mysteries sometimes with the
counsel of Alfred Hitchcock. Sounds plausible, right?
But there was something very human about the characters,
especially to an awkward pre-teen. The leader of the gang was Jupiter Jones, a
way-too serious for his years kid, self conscious about his weight, it didn’t
help matters that as a kid he played a character named ‘Baby Fatso’. in a bunch of baby food commercials, and that people would shout that to him in public places. Pete Crenshaw was the athlete and muscle of
the group who appealed to the young ladies and brought an aw-shucks attitude to
the proceedings. Bob Andrews was the bookish one, smaller than the rest who
worked at the library and did the research they needed for each case. Guess
which one I identified with?
When I was thinking about them it occurred to me that I knew
nothing of the background of the genesis of the actual series. Turns out its
quite fascinating.
The Three Investigators was the brainchild of a fascinating
fellow named Robert Arthur, Jr. A graduate of William and Mary and early
Greenwich Village bohemian he made his living throughout the 30s and into the
40s writing for pulps, including Amazing Stories and the great Black Mask. In
1940 he took a class on writing for radio at Columbia University. He then
created one of the finest scary anthologies ever on the air: The Mysterious
Traveller. At the time scary shows with a character introduction were very
popular (The Whistler, The Hermits Cave, The Witches Tale). Each week after a
lonely train whistle the Mysterious Traveller would invite you to listen to his
tale. Essentially the listener was made to feel like they were on a train late
at night and a creepy man was sitting behind them and keeping them a captive
audience and spinning a yarn. What set it apart from the others, which were
basically gory noirs or stories that would eventually become known as Giallo,
was that they almost always had a mystical and supernatural bent. Only 70 of
the 370 episodes (Most of which Robert Arthur wrote himself) exist now. You can
hear them here.
When radio dried up Arthur made his money writing for Alfred
Hitchcock Presents and Thriller. His connection to Alfred Hitchcock led to him
editing those great big short story collections
He also hit upon the idea of a series of mysteries for young
readers that would be entertaining and serve as an introduction to the form.
Hence the Three Investigators, of the 43 books he wrote 11 and I have read 16.
So after this research and thinking about these books it
occurred to me that I haven’t read one of them in 32 years. Since I still have
all of them I decided to pick one up. I went with The Secret of Terror Castle. Besides it being the first one I also
remembered it was my favorite and I plowed through it in a day in the summer of
1980. I also read it in a day in the grim gothic winter of 2015.
Upon reading it not only was I enormously entertained but I
was really tickled to learn the germs of some of my obsessions as an “adult”
may have been planted here.
Jupiter becomes obsessed with making their first case a
success, and by case he means he learns that Alfred Hitchcock is seeking an authentic
haunted house for his new film. Bob learns of a haunted mansion in the Hollywood hills that
turns out to be the disused property of a mysteriously vanished Lon Chaney like
silent film star. I will spoil nothing else, go read it.
But there it all is. Silent film, disgraced Hollywood
royalty, exploring abandoned places-I am sure those all interested me before I
read this, I am also sure that’s what hooked me.
I am going to read a few more in the coming days. I bet they
go over my love of cryptozoology and kitsch mysticism as well.
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