Sherlockians from around the globe will gather in Santa Fe next fall for the Fourth Biennial John Bennett Shaw Memorial Conference for Sherlockian Studies. The international seminar, scheduled for Sept. 25-27, 1998, is sponsored by Santa Fe Community College. An expected 200 attendees will hear a keynote address by Jon Lellenberg, B.S.I., and attend workshops and presentations on a wide variety of subjects related to the retired London consulting detective, Sherlock Holmes, his life , his work, and his co-workers. Of particular interest this year are the detectives older brother, Mycroft Holmes, and the American operatic contralto (now retired), Irene Adler.

The fourth biennial conference on Sherlockian and Holmesian studies honors the late John Bennett Shaw, B.S.I. and member of countless Sherlockian societies around the world. Shaw presided over the first two conferences at SFCC. Co-sponsor of the conference is The Shawlockians, a scion society of the Baker Street Irregulars. The group was founded in Shaws memory by several of his friends. Richard H. Miller, B.S.I., is also a co-sponsor of the conference, and will be master of ceremonies for the general sessions.

Santa Fe Community College will issue a formal call for papers this November, said SFCCs coordinator, Elizabeth Gutierrez, who is executive assistant to Dr. Rita Martinez-Purson, Dean of Continuing Education at SFCC. The school has been the site of all three previous conferences in this series. The call will be distributed through Sherlockian periodicals in the U.S., U.K., Japan, Australia and Canada, as well as through Internet channels.

Santa Fe Community College, established in 1983, is a two-year degree-granting state-chartered institution devoted to assuring success by the widest possible spectrum of students and to serving the community. The 1998 Sherlock Holmes Conference is one of many offered through SFCCs Division of Continuing Education.