Created by Nat Schachner
Pseudonyms include Otis Cameron, Chan Corbett
(1895-1955)
One of the very first of the pulp’s so-called “defective detectives,” NICHOLAS STREET suffered from amnesia, thanks to a severe blow to the head (he took his name from where he was found). When we first meet him, he’s only recently sprung from the hospital, and with the aid of police detective Jim Hard, he’s out to find out who he is. The only clue he has to his identity is a valuable antique jade ring, that may or may not come from the Ming Dynasty, and seems to have magical powers. And that’s not the only strangeness going on–at one point a man transforms into “a bloated, tangled mass of slimy vegetables”!
Ah, the pulps…
At the end of the story, Street decides he’s going to start a detective agency because he’s discovered he likes the work. And discovering his true identity remains “unfinished business.”
Alas, Street only appeared in that one short story, in the October 1938 issue of Dime Mystery, and was never seen again.
But with his amnesia, Street could be a precursor to Memento‘s Leonard Shelby.
SHORT STORIES
- “The Flowering Corpses” (October 1938, Dime Mystery)
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
