Keene, Carolyn, was the collective pen name of a group of authors who wrote stories about Nancy Drew, a popular girl detective in American literature. Nancy Drew is the heroine of dozens of mystery novels aimed at young female readers. She is an attractive and intelligent teenager who lives with her widowed father, the successful lawyer Carson Drew. Nancy solves mysteries with the help of her friends Bess Marvin and George Fayne and her boyfriend, Ned Nickerson. In early volumes of the series, she investigates her cases driving a roadster (open car) in and around her fictional hometown of River Heights.
Nancy Drew was created by the American author and publisher Edward Stratemeyer. He employed a staff of authors to write the books, along with many other series aimed at young readers, including the “Hardy Boys” and “Bobbsey Twins” series. Mildred Wirt Augustine (later known as Mildred Wirt Benson) wrote the first Nancy Drew novel, The Secret of the Old Clock (1930). She also wrote many other books in the “Nancy Drew” series.
The popularity of the novels led to a Nancy Drew motion picture series in the late 1930’s and several later films for movie theaters or television. The character was featured in a television series from 1977 to 1978. A “Nancy Drew” TV series also ran in 1995, and another series began in 2019. Several companies have produced video games based on the stories and characters. New “Nancy Drew” novels continue to be published, and many earlier stories in the series have been revised or rewritten. For example, in later books, Nancy’s roadster was replaced several times with more current car models.
See also Stratemeyer, Edward .
