The once-yearly magazine, Beeton’s Christmas Annual, had three stories in the 1887 edition, including one by “A. Conan Doyle”, an unknown, struggling medical practitioner in Portsmouth, Britain. With a death of patients, Doyle had plenty of time to work on his fiction. He several stories based on his time at sea, and then began working on his first significant work, featuring the detective Sherlock Holmes, modeled on Doyle’s former university teacher Joseph Bell, a pioneer in the field of forensic science.

On this day, December 1, in 1887, Arthur Conan Doyle first story involving the now world-famous detective Sherlock Holmes was published in the Beeton’s Christmas Annual. The local newspapers gave positive reviews, giving Doyle the encouragement to write more Sherlock Holmes stories.

Holmes and Watson grew tremendously popular almost immediately after publication, Doyle himself did not much care for the stories, considering them a distraction from “better things” – namely, his historical novels. On one occasion he wrote to his mother saying he is considering “slaying” Sherlock once and for all (her response: “You won’t! You can’t! You mustn’t!”) Doyle went ahead with his plan anyway, plunging Holmes, in a fierce embrace with his nemesis Professor Moriarty, off a cliff, but public outcry forced him to ressurtect Holmes for more stories.