In this lesson, you’ll learn about the original ghostwriter behind the pseudonym Carolyn Keene, the author of the much beloved children’s mystery series Nancy Drew, as well as a brief history of the series as a whole.
The Girl Detective
While many young people today credit Harry Potter with sparking their interest in reading, Nancy Drew did the same for youngsters – particularly girls – after her debut in 1930. Many of these avid readers, who spent nights staying up past bedtime with a flashlight under the bedcovers, passed on their affection for Nancy to their children and grandchildren.Now nearly 85 years old, Nancy Drew remains one of the most enduring and iconic characters in American literature. Though primarily geared towards children ages 9-12, the girl detective’s appeal continues, as the first book in the series, The Secret of the Old Clock, sold more than 150,000 copies in 2002 alone. In the current climate of social media and instant fame, it’s hard to imagine that the original author behind such a well-known character remains largely unknown herself.
Yet that is the case of the ghostwriter responsible for breathing life into Nancy Drew.
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The Stratemeyer Syndicate
Edward Stratemeyer, a publisher of children’s books and founder of the Stratemeyer Syndicate, created numerous children’s and young adult series, including the Hardy Boys, the Bobbsey Twins, Tom Swift, and Ruth Fielding. As the 1920s ended, Stratemeyer had an idea for a series about a girl detective. Though he wrote the multiple-page outlines for the first number of volumes, Stratemeyer hired ghostwriters to flesh out the stories and make the characters come to life. The common practice of hiring ghostwriters contractually required the Stratemeyer Syndicate ghostwriters to remain anonymous. For this reason, while many Americans might be able to identify Carolyn Keene as the author of the Nancy Drew series, few may know that this is actually a pen name, or pseudonym.
Mildred Wirt Benson
Perhaps the most well-known real person behind the Carolyn Keene pseudonym is Mildred (Augustine) Wirt Benson.
Benson was born in Ladora, Iowa, in 1905. From an early age, she knew she wanted to be a writer, winning a writing contest at age 14 and writing children’s stories as a youngster herself. She became the first woman to receive a master’s degree in journalism from the University of Iowa. It was during her graduate studies that she submitted a manuscript to the Stratemeyer Syndicate. Stratemeyer hired Mildred Augustine in 1926 to write the final volume in the Ruth Fielding series. She was then hired to write the first Nancy Drew book, The Secret of the Old Clock, published in 1930. The work earned her $125.
Much of Nancy Drew’s high-spirited, adventure-loving ways can be seen in the life of Mildred Wirt Benson. Benson was a tomboy who loved to read, and she blazed a trail in her educational and professional accomplishments. She remained an active writer throughout her life, writing her own children’s series called the Penny Parker Mystery Stories. In addition to writing, Benson earned her commercial and private pilot’s license, leading to many adventures traveling through different parts of the world. Benson was well known throughout the Midwest as a journalist, working for both The Toledo Times and The Toledo Blade, for which wrote a column until shortly before her death in 2002.Benson’s identity as the author of many of the original Nancy Drew books came to light in 1980 during a lawsuit involving the original publisher of the series. Until then, she had remained silent under the provisions of the contract with Stratemeyer and never received any royalties from publication, merchandising, or television or movie deals.
After Edward Stratemeyer’s death, his daughters Edna and Harriet took over the business, and continued to write the outlines for the Nancy Drew books. Harriet Stratemeyer Adams became more heavily involved when, in the late 1950s, she undertook a 25-year rewrite of the original 30 volumes, in an attempt to eliminate racial stereotypes and update and shorten the books in general.In 1993, the first Nancy Drew Conference was held in Iowa City, Iowa, during which the legal owners of Nancy Drew – Simon ; Schuster and Grosset ; Dunlap – acknowledged Mildred Wirt Benson as the author of volumes 1-7, 11-25, and 30 of the original 30 volumes in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series.
Nancy Drew, Then and Now
The Nancy Drew books feature the female lead as a curious, resourceful, independent, clever young woman who not only solves numerous mysteries, but is also capable of getting herself out of difficult and dangerous situations. She lives at home with her attorney father, Carson Drew, in the fairly affluent town of River Heights. A housekeeper, Hannah Gruen, looks after the Drew twosome. Nancy’s two best friends, Bess Marvin and George Fayne, are a pair of cousins who could not be more opposite one another: Bess is very delicate and feminine, while George prefers the outdoors and is more willing to get her hands dirty.
Nancy falls somewhere in the middle of her friends, which may explain why the heroine struck a chord with girls in the 1930s.In a 1999 interview, Mildred Wirt Benson suggested that many girls at the time were thirsty for a heroine like Nancy Drew, looking for a change in the way books were typically written for girls. Updates and modern Nancy Drew series, still published under the Carolyn Keene pseudonym, include The Nancy Drew Files, The Nancy Drew Notebooks, Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew (currently in print), and Nancy Drew Girl Detective (currently in print).
Lesson Summary
Despite numerous changes, updates, and revisions, the Nancy Drew series remains one of the most popular and beloved characters in publishing history, not only for young girls, but readers of all backgrounds. Though the independent, high-spirited character was created by Edward Stratemeyer in the 1920s, the ghostwriter Midred Wirt Benson — using the pseudonym Carolyn Keene — wrote 23 of the original 30 volumes in the Nancy Drew series, including the first book, The Secret of the Old Clock. Benson was recognized by the series publishers as the author of these volumes in 1993. Harriet Stratemeyer Adams also played a pivotal role in the development and continuation of the series, as she rewrote all of the original volumes in order to remove racial stereotypes.
The Nancy Drew character is still alive today in multiple spin-offs and new series, still published under the Carolyn Keene pseudonym.
