Mildred Benson

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Mildred Wirt Benson
Born (1905-07-10)July 10, 1905
Ladora, Iowa, United States
Died May 28, 2002(2002-05-28) (aged 96)
Toledo, Ohio, United States
Occupation Author
Genres Children's books

Mildred Augustine Wirt Benson (July 10, 1905 – May 28, 2002) was an American journalist and author of children's books, in particular the earliest Nancy Drew mysteries. Writing under Stratemeyer Syndicate pen name Carolyn Keene from 1929 to 1947, she contributed to 23 of the first 30 originally published Nancy Drew mysteries.

While she wrote scores of books under her own and many other names, she is perhaps best known as one of 28 individuals who helped produce the Nancy Drew books. Edward Stratemeyer hired Mildred Benson in 1926 to assist in expanding his roughly drafted stories in order to satisfy increasing demand for his series.

Benson was born Mildred Augustine in Ladora, Iowa to Lillian and Dr. J. L. Augustine.[1] She married Asa Wirt, who worked for Associated Press, and, after Wirt's death in 1947,[2][3] married George A. Benson, editor of the Toledo Blade newspaper of Toledo, Ohio three years later;[4] he died in 1959.[2][5] She earned her degree in English from the University of Iowa in 1925, returned and earned her master's degree in journalism in 1927, the first student to do so there.[1] She worked for 58 years as a journalist, writing a weekly column for the Toledo Blade and continuing to work full-time (mostly writing obituaries) until a few months before her death, from lung cancer, in 2002 at the age of 96.[1]

Published book rights for the Nancy Drew series were owned by the Stratemeyer Syndicate and are currently owned by Simon & Schuster. As with all syndicate ghostwriters, Benson was paid a flat fee of $125 to $250 for each Stratemeyer-outlined text, the equivalent of three months' pay for a newspaper reporter at that time. At Edward Stratemeyer's death, under the terms of his will, all Syndicate ghostwriters, including Benson, were sent one fifth of the equivalent of the royalties the Syndicate had received for each book series to which they had contributed.

As with all Syndicate ghostwriters, under the terms of her contract, Benson signed away all rights to her texts and any claim to the Syndicate pen name, Carolyn Keene. She was, however, permitted to reveal that she wrote for the Syndicate. The Stratemeyers protected their Syndicate pen names to preserve series continuity as contributors to the series came and went. Simon & Schuster currently maintain the same system.

The character of Nancy Drew was conceived by Stratemeyer, who provided Wirt with index card thumbnail sketches. Wirt was the first ghostwriter to expand Edward's roughly-drafted Nancy Drew plots, writing the first five books. Texts were then edited and rewritten as required, and the Syndicate approved and had all final books published under the Syndicate's name. Subsequent Nancy Drew stories (with some exceptions), for which Wirt provided text, were all re-written by Edna Stratemeyer Squier and, primarily, Harriet Stratemeyer Adams, after their father's death in 1930.

However, in 1980, Benson's testimony, which she offered in a court case involving the publishers, revealed her identity to the public as a contributor to the Nancy Drew mystery stories. With only this, and without access to the Stratemeyer Syndicate archives now held at the New York Public Library, the public[who?] presumed that she had a primary authorship claim to the Nancy Drew stories and pen name Carolyn Keene, who also "wrote" the Dana Girls series. In 2001, Benson received a Special Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America for her contributions to the Nancy Drew series.

Benson's favorite Nancy Drew story was The Hidden Staircase, the second mystery in the series.[citation needed]

Benson also wrote many other series, including the Penny Parker books, which were published under her own name and which she told interviewers were her favorites. They were the adventures of a young newspaper reporter, and Benson herself continued writing for newspapers until her death. She wrote under a dozen names and published more than 130 books, according to the Mildred Wirt Benson Works page at NancyDrewSleuth.com.

Books Written[edit]

Series[edit]

Nancy Drew (as Carolyn Keene)[edit]

  • 1. The Secret of the Old Clock, 1930
  • 2. The Hidden Staircase, 1930
  • 3. The Bungalow Mystery, 1930
  • 4. The Mystery at Lilac Inn, 1930
  • 5. The Secret at Shadow Ranch, 1931
  • 6. The Secret of Red Gate Farm, 1931
  • 7. The Clue in the Diary, 1932
  • 11. The Clue of the Broken Locket, 1934
  • 12. The Message in the Hollow Oak, 1935
  • 13. The Mystery of the Ivory Charm, 1936
  • 14. The Whispering Statue, 1937
  • 15. The Haunted Bridge, 1937
  • 16. The Clue of the Tapping Heels, 1939
  • 17. The Mystery of the Brass-Bound Trunk, 1940
  • 18. The Mystery at the Moss-Covered Mansion, 1941
  • 19. The Quest of the Missing Map, 1942
  • 20. The Clue in the Jewel Box, 1943
  • 21. The Secret in the Old Attic, 1944
  • 22. The Clue in the Crumbling Wall, 1945
  • 23. The Mystery of the Tolling Bell, 1946
  • 24. The Clue in the Old Album, 1947
  • 25. The Ghost of Blackwood Hall, 1948
  • 30. The Clue of the Velvet Mask, 1953

Penny Parker (as Mildred A. Wirt)[edit]

  • 1. Tale of the Witch Doll, 1939
  • 2. The Vanishing Houseboat, 1939
  • 3. Danger at the Drawbridge, 1940
  • 4. Behind the Green Door, 1940
  • 5. Clue of the Silken Ladder, 1941
  • 6. The Secret Pact, 1941
  • 7. The Clock Strikes Thirteen, 1942
  • 8. The Wishing Well, 1942
  • 9. Saboteurs on the River, 1943
  • 10. Ghost Beyond the Gate, 1943
  • 11. Hoofbeats on the Turnpike, 1944
  • 12. Voice from the Cave, 1944
  • 13. Guilt of the Brass Thieves, 1945
  • 14. Signal in the Dark, 1946
  • 15. Whispering Walls, 1946
  • 16. Swamp Island, 1947
  • 17. The Cry at Midnight, 1947
  • 18. Unpublished Title, would have been 1948

Dana Girls (as Carolyn Keene)[edit]

  • 5. The Secret at the Hermitage, 1936
  • 6. The Circle of Footprints, 1937
  • 7. The Mystery of the Locked Room, 1938
  • 8. The Clue in the Cobweb, 1939
  • 9. The Secret at the Gatehouse, 1940
  • 10. The Mysterious Fireplace, 1941
  • 11. The Clue of the Rusty Key, 1942
  • 12. The Portrait in the Sand, 1943
  • 14. The Clue in the Ivy, 1952
  • 15. The Secret of the Jade Ring, 1953
  • 16. Mystery at the Crossroads, 1954

Penny Nichols (as Joan Clark)[edit]

  • 1. Penny Nichols Finds a Clue, 1936
  • 2. Penny Nichols and the Mystery of the Lost Key, 1936
  • 3. Penny Nichols and the Black Imp, 1936
  • 4. Penny Nichols and the Knob Hill Mystery, 1939

Connie Carl (as Joan Clark)[edit]

  • 1. Connie Carl at Rainbow Ranch, 1939
  • 2. Connie Carl on Skis, would have been 1939 (made into Penny Parker #4)
  • 3. Untitled Third volume, would have been 1939 [6]

Madge Sterling (as Ann Wirt)[edit]

  • 1. The Missing Formula, 1932
  • 2. The Deserted Yacht, 1932
  • 3. The Secret of the Sundial, 1932

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c "Nancy Drew's first author dies". USA Today. Toledo, Ohio: Gannett Company Inc. May 29, 2002. Retrieved May 16, 2012. 
  2. ^ a b "Nancy Drew author dies". BBC News World Edition. May 29, 2002. Retrieved May 16, 2012. 
  3. ^ Douglas Martin (May 30, 2002). "Mildred Benson, Author of Nancy Drew Mysteries, Dies at 96". The New York Times. Retrieved May 16, 2012. 
  4. ^ Douglas Martin (May 30, 2002). "Mildred Benson Is Dead at 96; Wrote 23 Nancy Drew Books". The New York Times. Retrieved May 16, 2012. 
  5. ^ Myrna Oliver (May 30, 2002). "Mildred Benson, 96; Author Gave Life to Nancy Drew". Los Angeles Times. Tribune Company. Retrieved May 16, 2012. 
  6. ^ The end of the manuscript of Connie Carl on Skis hints at another adventure for Connie when she wins the contest, which is a modeling job. No further information on the title is available.

External links[edit]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mildred_Benson
en.wikipedia.org
crawl=CC-MAIN-2013-48
246001
application/http; msgtype=response
sha1:4JWMYYOUAZ6C65HS3PKKLFVZ3KUVS5GW
<urn:uuid:1c53f534-100a-4147-98dc-828c49b15c82>
2013-12-10T13:24:11Z
208.80.154.225
sha1:XHMAEEVXMFDYS6S4MJLJL6IDZMDMKESA
<urn:uuid:cf19f769-8d12-411f-ac6f-a2084e6585b6>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mildred_Benson
response
<urn:uuid:f6e29a98-90dd-4b47-90b4-b89df133f8db>
robots: classic
hostname: ip-10-33-133-15.ec2.internal
software: Nutch 1.6 (CC)/CC WarcExport 1.0
isPartOf: CC-MAIN-2013-48
operator: CommonCrawl Admin
description: Wide crawl of the web with URLs provided by Blekko for Winter 2013
publisher: CommonCrawl
format: WARC File Format 1.0
conformsTo: http://bibnum.bnf.fr/WARC/WARC_ISO_28500_version1_latestdraft.pdf