Mildred A. Wirt
Mildred A. Wirt, born on July 10, 1905, in Ladora, Iowa, was a prolific American author known for her contributions to juvenile fiction, particularly as the original ghostwriter for the beloved Nancy Drew series. Wirt began her writing career early, publishing her first story at just fourteen. After receiving a degree in English and a master's in journalism, she flourished under the guidance of Edward Stratemeyer, the head of a publishing syndicate. She adopted the pseudonym Caroline Keene and wrote her first Nancy Drew mystery, "The Secret of the Old Clock," in 1930, ultimately contributing over twenty titles to the series. In addition to Nancy Drew, Wirt wrote numerous novels under various pseudonyms and also worked as a newspaper reporter. Her later years saw her shift focus to journalism while continuing to write articles, including aviation content after obtaining her pilot's license. Wirt received several posthumous honors, recognizing her significant impact on children's literature, and she passed away on May 28, 2002, at the age of ninety-six.
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Mildred A. Wirt
Author
- Born: July 10, 1905
- Birthplace: Ladora, Iowa
- Died: May 28, 2002
- Place of death: Toledo, Ohio
Biography
Mildred A. Wirt was born Mildred Augustine on July 10, 1905, in Ladora, Iowa. She began writing at an early age and published her first story at age fourteen. In 1925, after earning a B.A. in English at the State University of Iowa, she worked for a year as a reporter for a newspaper in Clinton, Iowa. The following year, she headed for New York City in search of a writing job. While writing work for women was scarce, she made a valuable contact who would soon provide the venue through which Wirt would become famous: Edward Stratemeyer, the owner of a syndicate that published a slew of popular juvenile fiction series.
Returning home, Wirt in 1927 became the first woman to earn a master’s degree in journalism at the University of Iowa. Shortly thereafter, Stratemeyer invited her to write an entry in the syndicate’s Ruth Fielding series and Wirt accepted the challenge, producing her first novel, Ruth Fielding and Her Great Scenario (1927), under the pseudonym Alice B. Emerson. After writing several successful Fielding entries, she was offered the opportunity to write novels for a new series featuring a young female detective named Nancy Drew for a flat rate of $125 to $250, with no possibility of additional royalties. Under the syndicate-owned pseudonym Caroline Keene, Wirt wrote the first Nancy Drew mystery, The Secret of the Old Clock (1930); she eventually penned more than twenty entries in the series, concluding with The Clue of the Velvet Mask (1953). Under the same pseudonym, she also wrote a dozen novels in The Dana Girls Mystery Stories series between 1936 and 1954.
In 1928, she married Asa Wirt, who worked for the Associated Press. The couple moved to Cleveland, Ohio, and later to Toledo, Ohio. Between the 1930’s and the early 1960’s, Wirt churned out nearly 140 juvenile and young adult novels under her own name and a variety of pseudonyms of her own or her syndicate’s invention, including Frank Bell, Don Palmer, Joan Clark, and Helen Louise Thorndyke. She contributed entries to many series of both the syndicate’s creation and her own, including Flash Evans, Penny Nichols, Doris Force, Honey Bunch, Penny Parker, and Dot and Dash. At the same time, Wirt wrote many stories and articles for publication in periodicals such as St. Nicholas Magazine and Calling All Girls.
In 1944, Wirt began working as a reporter for the Toledo Times. In 1950, three years after her first husband died, she married the newspaper’s editor, George Benson, who died in 1959. By the mid-1960’s, Wirt had stopped writing fiction in favor of her full-time job as a court reporter. During that decade, she acquired her pilot’s license and wrote a number of aviation articles for various publications. When the Toledo Times folded in the 1970’s, Wirt went to work for the Toledo Blade, where she maintained a regular column virtually until her death.
In 1993, Wirt was inducted into the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame. In 1994, she was inducted into the Iowa Women’s Hall of Fame and received the University of Iowa Distinguished Alumni Award. Perhaps most significantly, in the 1990’s the current Nancy Drew franchise owners, publishers Simon and Shuster and Grosset and Dunlap, officially, legally, and publicly recognized her as the original Carolyn Keene. Vindicated at long last for her excellent fictional work, which has enthralled millions of children over the years, Wirt died on May 28, 2002, at age ninety-six.