Edith Meiser

Edith Meiser (May 9, 1898 – September 26, 1993) was an American actress, playwright, novelist, and radio dramatist whose career spanned Broadway, film, and radio from the 1920s through the 1960s. Born in Detroit, Michigan, she is particularly recognized for her extensive work adapting Sherlock Holmes stories for American radio audiences in the 1930s and 1940s.

Meiser's early education took her across multiple continents. She attended the Liggett School in Detroit before studying at the Kox Schule in Dresden, Germany, and the Ecole de la Cour de St. Pierre in Geneva, Switzerland. She subsequently enrolled at Vassar College, where she became active in the college drama society, performing in productions including L'Aiglon, Jezebel, and Punishment, the last of which she wrote herself.

Following her graduation, Meiser gained experience performing with several prominent theatrical organizations, among them the American Shakespeare Festival, the Theater Guild, Edward Albee's vaudeville circuit, and Jessie Bonstelle's Summer Stock Company. She made her Broadway debut in 1923 in The New Way and went on to accumulate more than twenty Broadway credits over a career that extended to 1960. Her stage work included The Carefree Tree, The Magic and the Loss, Getting Married, I Gotta Get Out, Fata Morgana, The Guardsman, Garrick Gaieties, and Sabrina Fair, among other productions. Her final Broadway credit was the 1960 production of The Unsinkable Molly Brown. Meiser also appeared in films, including Middle of the Night, It Grows on Trees, and Queen for a Day.

Beyond performing, Meiser built a substantial career as a writer for radio. Among her radio credits was The New Penny, the first radio serial starring Helen Hayes. Her interest in Sherlock Holmes dated to adolescence, when a ship's purser aboard the SS Bremen gave her a Holmes book during a voyage to Europe at age fifteen. Years later, working alongside her then-husband Tom McKnight, Meiser transitioned from stage writing to radio and determined that Holmes would be well suited to the medium. After more than a year of effort to secure a sponsor, she found one in George C. L. Washington, the inventor of the first instant coffee and himself a Holmes enthusiast, who agreed to back the series that became The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.

The program premiered on October 20, 1930, with an adaptation of "The Adventure of the Speckled Band," featuring William Gillette as Holmes and Leigh Lovell as Dr. Watson. Richard Gordon subsequently took over the role of Holmes through 1933, followed by Louis Hector from 1934 to 1935, with Gordon returning for the final season in 1936. Every episode across the run was adapted or written by Meiser. A survey of American radio editors conducted at the end of the first season found that 94 percent named The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes the best radio program then on air. In 1935, Meiser also authored a radio adaptation of Gillette's stage play Sherlock Holmes, in which Gillette reprised the role opposite Reginald Mason as Dr. Watson.

Three years after the conclusion of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, the popularity of the Rathbone and Bruce film series prompted Meiser to return to Holmes for radio. From 1939 through 1943, she wrote all episodes of The New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, starring Basil Rathbone as Holmes and Nigel Bruce as Watson. She departed the series following a dispute with a sponsor over the level of violence in the scripts. Beginning in 1953, Meiser collaborated with co-writer Frank Giacoia on a Sherlock Holmes comic strip series distributed by the New York Herald Tribune Syndicate.

Meiser was also active in the professional governance of the theater community, serving on the board of governors of Actors Equity and as chairwoman of the Equity Library Theater. In 1987, the University of Minnesota Libraries acquired the Edith Meiser Collection, comprising original scripts, recordings, and related materials. In 1991, at the age of 93, she was invested as a member of The Baker Street Irregulars in recognition of her contributions to sustaining public interest in Sherlock Holmes throughout her career. Meiser died at age 95 at Roosevelt Hospital.