2025 blog in review

This is a brief post to look at 2025 for this blog - a brief year in review. I've previously looked at the first year of the blog and found it useful to review what was accomplished.

Let's look at the most-read blog posts in 2025 (and trust me, we aren't talking huge number here). First, I posted 68 (sixty eight) times in 2025. I have to say I am surprised to find I posted more than once-a-week. 

What has been 'popular'? I don't share every blog post on social media - for me that's Bluesky @221bcooee.bsky.social , and the Facebook page 'The Stranger's Room' for Sherlockians - but posts I do share get many more views.

Here are the five most viewed blog posts this year:

1. June 2025: Untangling the skein

This post includes a description of my finding of a letter by Conan Doyle in 1885 with the first reference to the first Sherlock Holmes story 'A Study in Scarlet'. The letter is held by the State Library of New South Wales (SLNSW). The article was published in the 'Sherlock Holmes Journal'. There were a series of blog posts afterwards that transcribed the four letters held by the SLNSW.

While only six months old, this post is already the most-read post on my blog.

2. October 2024: Tucked in the back - a philately connection

Even though I'm only assessing 2025 views, the second most-read post was from 2024. This short post describes a copy of Susan Rice's 'A Compound Of Excelsior' that included special stamps in the back.

3. August 2025: Watson's Tin Box meeting brief report - 18 August 2025

After each Watson's Tin Box meeting, I write up a report of the meeting. That includes the agenda, and I try to capture the discussion of the story, describe the Evidence Box on display, and make a brief report of the guest presentation. I try to include photos, and capture any fun elements.

4. April 2025: My Musgrave Monograph monomania - third (and final) version

This article is the culmination of my effort to catalog and collect all of the Musgrave Monographs published by the Northern Musgraves. Along the way I sorted out a couple of 'not monograph' publications from the Northern Musgraves also. 

5. September 2025: Edgar W. Smith's output

So glad this was read - like number 4 above - this post was the first step in cataloging and showing covers of all the publications by Edgar W Smith and his Pamphlet House. 

Was there a post I'm surprised was not more popular? I'll choose two, a Sherlockian and a Doylean:

1. Charles Blasson, Doyle's Boer war dresser and secretary. This post compiled information about Blasson, and his time spend with Doyle. I looked at Blasson partly because of other research on Doyle's time in South Africa, but was glad to take this diversion into the life of a young man who lost his life in the service of his country.

2. A walking tour of Martin Beck's Stockholm. This is very left-field for my blog, but I really love the Martin Beck novels, and the Beck books are set in the true Stockholm of the time (just like Holmes in London). I hope over time people visiting Stockholm (or living there!) will find the post and have a chance to visit some of the sites. 

So what about 2026 and the blog? 

Well one thing I enjoy is being able to post the text of my articles here once they've been published. I have a few articles that I know are coming along in 2026, and look forward to sharing them here. I share them on the blog to allow as many people as possible to read them - I know it's hard to subscribe to multiple journals, buy all the books, and then once a book is sold out it is rare and even more expensive.

I'll also continue creating meeting reports - for Watson's Tin Box, and for other meetings I attend. I hope those stand as a useful record, and taking photographs is a nice way to show to others who may be curious what a meeting is like. I hope through these posts that people who are curious can learn more about what meetings are like, and take the plunge to join in.

Quite a few of my posts are 'finds' - tidbits or observations from newspapers and other primary sources that I find interesting or entertaining.