Rediscovering Nancy Drew

The Nancy Drew Phenomenon: Rediscovering Nancy Drew in Iowa

The Nancy Drew Phenomenon: Rediscovering Nancy Drew in Iowa Carolyn Stewart Dyer ~ ike all jobs, being undergraduate secretary in the School of lb Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Iowa has its slow moments, especially in the summer. Susan Redfern was new to the job in the summer of 1991. She anticipated that slow moments might turn into endless days, so she assigned herself the task of cleaning the alumni files to make room for more. Being the granddaughter ofthe first person to teach journalism full-time at the university and having a desk right under the portrait of George Gallup, founder of the Gallup Poll and the first member of the school's Hall of Fame, Redfern felt a little proprietary about the school's history. Taking the alphabetical approach, Redfern began with the As. Reading through every file she put its contents in order, discarded duplicate materials and other ephemera, and made note of alums with unusual histories-a man who became a millionaire by inventing plastic book covers, another who was married briefly to singer Connie Francis. During breaks she entertained the staffwith stories from the files. Not long into the task Redfern made her most important discovery , the file of Augustine, Mildred, M.A. 1927, the first person to earn a master's degree in journalism at Iowa. Like the founder of the Gallup Poll, Augustine had been a student of Redfern's grandfather, William Maulsby. And she, too, had left a big imprint on American 1 2 THE NANCY DREW PHENOMENON culture. Mildred Augustine Wirt, writing under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene, was the original writer of the most memorable books from Redfern's childhood, the Nancy Drew mysteries. In 1991 Mildred Wirt Benson was a reporter and columnist in Ohio for the Toledo Blade, where she had worked for almost fifty years. First Redfern told the staff about Mildred Benson, and they recounted their Nancy Drew memories. Then, as they came into the office over the next few days, she told the women faculty. Sue Lafky, an assistant professor, immediately recognized an oversight: Mildred Benson was missing from the Hall of Fame. That wasn't surprising ; very few women had been recognized. Most of the luminaries held much more visible positions than Benson. She was an author of children's books, for heaven's sakes, her identity had been obscured behind pseudonyms, and she was then an everyday journalist at a regional newspaper in Ohio. Hardly the profile of a person to hold a banquet for, invite the university president to meet, and enshrine in a portrait gallery. Or so the traditionalists thought. But the women knew better. Nancy Drews were no ordinary children's books. Reading Nancy Drew was a pivotal childhood experience for millions ofgirls. More than eighty million copies had been sold since 1930, and new books were still coming out every month in what may be the longest running continuously published series of children's books. Through the fall and winter, Susan Redfern fantasized misogynist and elitist conspiracy theories to try to understand why Mildred Benson had never been recognized by the journalism school or university, while virtually every Iowa Citian could list the pantheon of famous writers who had passed through the Iowa Writers' Workshop . Sue Lafky simply resolved to get Mildred Benson into the journalism school Hall of Fame. The Hall of Fame selection process is a little mysterious. At some point every year, a memo is circulated to journalism faculty soliciting nominations to add to those left over from the previous year. Most of the nominees are older men-famous or semifamous journalists , journalism educators, or public relations practitioners. A few are younger alumni who have won distinguished awards or risen to highly visible places at an early age. Often the obituaries of the previous year remind the faculty to add someone forgotten and overlooked in the nomination process. THE NANCY DREW PHENOMENON 3 After the nominations are taken, the faculty members rank their choices on another ballot. The actual votes are not announced. The director of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication just announces who will be added to the Hall of Fame at the annual awards banquet, and the sun sets in the west as usual. Relatively new to the faculty, Lafky took a direct, public approach to her Benson for Hall of Fame campaign. She prepared herself with facts about...