How hot was Sir Arthur Conan Doyle?

Answer 1

Quite hot after the Sherlock Holmes stories became popular. He was able to write full time, earning a lot of money (per word for his stories in The Strand and in other magazines and in royalties of his books.) He asked for twice his usual rate per word if The Strand wanted Sherlock Holmes as the hero in The Hound of the Baskervilles and he got it - no argument.

His opinions were sought after by reporters, and he was not shy to give them.

He was one of the leading lights of Spiritualism.

He knew many of the literary men of his time, including Rudyard Kipling, whom he introduced to Golf.

He popularized skiing and tobogganing in Switzerland.

He got V.I.P. treatment wherever he went. The Canadian government asked him to visit Jasper National Park when it opened in 1914, to popularize tourism, and the Canadian Pacific Railway took him and Lady Conan-Doyle there in their President's train.