An Ode to Nancy Drew...and Other Heroes

Nancy Drew - she was my first hero. A fearless teenage detective, endlessly saving the innocent citizens of River Heights (and other exotic international locations) from shadowy figures in the dark.

One cold winter night, when I was in first grade, my mother came home from the Bexley Public Library with a beat-up copy of 'The Witch Tree Symbol.' Tucked under the blankets in my parent's big bed, we read together, night after night, my mother helping me sound out the big words.

To this day, I remember the picture on the cover - a sinister, gnarled looking old tree with Nancy crouching behind. Just the cover art alone fueled my imagination, without even having read a word.

Many years later, when I was in journalism school, I was lucky enough to interview Mildred Wirt Benson, one of the original writers hired by Edward Stratemeyer of the Stratemeyer Syndicate, to bring the plotlines of Nancy Drew mystery stories to life. I tracked her down via the web and some good old-fashioned 'detective work' if you will, and called her at the Toledo Blade newspaper, where she wrote a weekly column.

Under the pseudonym of Carolyn Keene, Wirt Benson gave Nancy a personality of her own and a sense of spunk - much of which she'd taken from her own personal life. Also the author of volumes of Kay Tracey; Flash Evans; Ruth Darrow; Penny Parker, etc., etc... - Wirt Benson would have been a hard act to measure up to, as I am guessing the Nancy Drew writers who followed in her footsteps could atest.

Wirt Benson was the first woman to receive a master's in journalism from the University of Iowa. As if that weren't trailblazer enough, she stated in one interview that she enjoyed treking in the jungles of central and south America. Add to that the fact that while in her sixties, she became a licensed commercial and private airplane pilot - can there be any question as to who put the spunk in Nancy Drew?

In a 1985 interview with Osha Davidson of 'Iowa Alumni Magazine,' Wirt Benson explained: "The plots provided me were brief, yet certain hackneyed names and situations could not be bypassed. So I concentrated upon Nancy trying to make her a departure from the stereotyped heroine commonly encountered in series books of the day."

Wirt Benson passed away in May 2002. It was a sunny Tel Aviv afternoon, and I was sitting in an Internet cafe reading over the day's New York Times. Her obituary caught my eye. I remember feeling such a sense of loss. This strong woman, this imaginative writer, was in so many ways, responsible for the person - and the writer - that I'd become.

And so, here is my ode to Nancy Drew - and my expression of ever-lasting gratitude to Mildred Wirt Benson.