"Monsieur Oscar Meunier, of Grenoble" [EMPT]
Occasionally we remember members of the BSI who have gone to the other side of the Reichenbach. This one was a particularly difficult one for us.
Irving Kamil, BSI ("Monsieur Oscar Meunier, of Grenoble") died on April 26, 2013 at the age of 86. He was a chemistry teacher, assistant principal and principal in the New York City school system for 41 years, retiring in 1990. Irv graduated from Central Methodist College and received a Master's Degree from Columbia University Teachers College.
Irv was a WWII U.S. Navy veteran, a former member and president of the Cliffside Park Board of Education and president of Temple Israel in Cliffside Park. He wrote over 40 articles that were published in The New York Times and other papers, taught a mystery course at The New School, was a member of The Wolfe Pack, and was an avid three-times-a-week bridge player.
In 1976 Irv, Norm Schatell, and Harlan Umansky founded Mrs. Hudson's Cliffdwellers's of Cliffside Park, NJ after they attended an off-Broadway Sherlock Holmes play. They went to Molly Malone's Pub and as Irv tells the story, they came up with a song for the group, sang it with all their hearts -- and nobody paid the slightest bit of attention to them.
For many years at the BSI Dinner, Irv had the honor of Standing on the Terrace for members of the BSI who had crossed over the Reichenbach. It was his eloquent and sensitive delivery honoring the lives of the members that prompted us to take up a similar effort on this site. He also wrote essays and poems that were published in The Baker Street Journal and other Sherlockian publications, and ran the Cliffdwellers for 21 years.
Irv and his wife of over 60 years, Selma, traveled extensively and during their travels created what he called "non-meeting" Sherlockian societies in places such as the Great Wall of China, on the Amazon, in Sicily, Thailand, New Zealand, Vietnam, Jordan, Antarctica, and the Galapagos, among others.
Irving Kamil was invested into The Baker Street Irregulars in 1981 as "Monsieur Oscar Meunier, of Grenoble."
Another remembrance of his life and his obituary can be read here.
Image credit: (c) 2013 Amy Newman / northjersey.com
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