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Mysterious t ewksbury
nancy dreW and ...
G
The
host Writer
of Bird Haven farm
By Lee & C.G. WoLfe
“Ned said ‘Nancy Drew is the best
girl detective in the whole world!’”
“Don’t you believe him,” Nancy said
quickly. “I have solved some mysteries, I’ll admit and I enjoy it, but
I’m sure there are many other girls
who could do the same.”
Carolyn Keene, Nancy’s Mysterious Letter
teenage detective named Stella Strong or Diana Dare didn9t sound right to publishers Grosset
& Dunlap, so Edward Stratmeyer9s latest fictional brainchild entered the book world as Nancy
Drew. A native of New Jersey, Stratmeyer was the creative genius behind the Stratmeyer Syndicate, a
successful book packager that employed pseudonymous ghost writers to produce a series of popular
children9s books that included Tom Swift, the Bobbsey Twins, and the Hardy Boys.
a
To give NaNcy her voice, Stratmeyer entrusted 24 year-old
Iowan, Mildred Wirt (later Benson) to develop his plot summaries
and chapter by chapter outlines. A prolific writer with 135 published titles to her credit, Wirt was behind a half a dozen series at
the Stratmeyer Syndicate and published a number of series under
her own name. But
