rederic Dannay was not only a highly popular writer and an influential editor, he was also a great bibliophile.In 1938, Dannay edited Challenge to the Reader, the first of numerous Queen-edited anthologies (70), including 101 Years' Entertainment; Great Detective Stories, 1841-1941 (1945). Dannay updated and expanded Haycraft's list a number of times until it reached its final form in 1952 and became known as the Haycraft-Queen Cornerstones list (or H-Q). This list begins with Voltaire's Zadig in 1748 and continues through the early 1950s.
Under their Queen pseudonym, Dannay and Lee published a number of books and essays relating to the history of detective/mystery fiction that began to generate interest in collecting. Dannay's critical writings in EQMM, are partly collected in their major critical works on the detective short story. Among those books were The Detective Short Story, which appeared in 1942 followed by In the Queen's Parlor, and Other Leaves from the Editors' Notebook in 1957. Their most influential work was Queen's Quorum, A History of the Detective/Crime Story which was published in a variety of forms until its final appearance in 1969. Dannay was the principal author of this landmark scholarly work which provided in-depth historical and bibliographical information regarding the most important short-story volumes by single authors in the genre. The work of many writers was discussed following a time line from 1845 with Poe's Tales up through 1967 when Queen gave up adding to the "lustrum." Although wide ranging, the book centers around the best books in each era or decade, and these volumes are now know as "Queen's Quorum." This important work gave focus and direction to a generation of new collectors and "Queen's Quorum," like the "H-Q List" is used as a "shopping list" by many collectors today.

arly in 1945, a group of mystery writers met at a New York watering hole to discuss forming a professional organization. Among those present were Ellery Queen, Baynard Kendrick, and Erle Stanley Gardner. From this small meeting grew the Mystery Writers of America, with membership in the thousands and nine chapters nationwide. The MWA holds regional monthly meetings and an annual meeting in New York at which the Edgar Awards are given. They excluded most of Ellery's classic novels from award consideration.
But Ellery Queen' did receive more awards than any other 'writer' in crime fiction history, and has left an indelible,uniquely American mark on the crime genre.

For nine years The Adventures of Ellery Queen was a weekly favorite on the radio; and in 1950 TV Guide gave the Ellery Queen program its national award for the best mystery show on TV. Ellery Queen has won an unprecedented five annual Edgars (the national Mystery Writers of America Awards, similar to Hollywood's Oscars), including the Grand Master award in 1961 (voor 1960), three MWA scrolls and one Raven (Edgar) and both the silver and gold Gertrudes awarded by Pocket Books, Inc. Mystery writers of Japan gave him their gold and onyx Edgar Allan Poe ring at that point only awarded to only five non-Japanese authors. In 1968 Iona College honored Queen with its Columbia Prize in Mystery
For the record, Ellery Queen received his most recent Edgar nomination in 1964 for The Player on the Other Side in the "Best Novel" category. The full list of Ellery Queen's Edgars is (year shown is year of award for work published in the previous year):

• 1945 Ellery Queen (CBS) Best Radio Drama
• 1948 for anthology and magazine editing Short Story Award
• 1950 "for ten years service through EQMM." Short Story Award
• 1951 Special Edgar: for Queen's Quorum: The 125 Most Important Books of Detective-Crime Mystery Short Stories. (Note: Queen's Quorum was first published in nine parts in EQMM during 1949-1950.) ?
• 1969 40th anniv. of The Roman Hat Mystery Special

Since 1983, the MWA has also issued "Ellery Queen Awards," given to the person who has best exemplified the spirit of Ellery Queen, for outstanding writing teams and editors. The 2003 recipient was Ed Gorman.