Ellery Queen's Mystery Calendar

This might just have been the most disappointing experience I have ever had in the world of publishing.

Sometime around 1974 or 1975, I proposed the idea of a mystery calendar to the folks at EQMM. They liked the idea, and hired me to do the research. I spent many hours in the University of Michigan libraries, digging up birth and death dates of key authors, publication dates of important novels, release dates of classic films, and so on.

When the calendar was finally published, some 70% of the information which appeared in the 365 date squares was supplied by me. On the back cover, however, the credits listed Ellery Queen as editor-in-chief, Eleanor Sullivan as editor, and Mimi H. Pardo and Chris Steinbrunner as contributing editors. In a section headed "Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following for their help," my name was printed 19th in an alphabetical listing of 26.

I was pissed. I expressed my displeasure to Eleanor Sullivan. She was unsympathetic. And I didn't submit another story to EQMM until 1984.

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