"Am still in limbo on the Nancy Drew case. The appeal has not yet been heard so Mrs. Adams of the Stratemeyer Syndicate continues to claim authorship because of ownership. However, the entire story now is on court record at least. They continue to hold my original books, which annoys me..."
-- Mildred Wirt Benson, Dec., 1981

correspondence: browse artifacts

As curator of the UI Libraries’ Iowa Authors Collection, librarian Frank Paluka regularly sought donations of manuscripts from novelists who were Iowa natives. Among his correspondence is a letter to Mildred Wirt Benson requesting any personal papers showing “the development or successive stages of a work -- research notes, early or rejected drafts, revisions, editorial correspondence, proofs, even letters from readers” to donate to the library. Her response to this inquiry is sure to break the hearts of archivists, researchers, and fans everywhere:

“Unfortunately, last year I tossed out everything I could find. These included many written plots upon which stories were based and accepted, prior to the writing. These might have been of interest. Now I have little of anything, as most of my [manuscripts] sold and the one or two that did not, I have burned.”

Benson was able to soften the blow by promising a few survivors of the purge, including a fan letter and some other items represented in this digital collection.

But although his initial request was largely unsuccessful, Paluka did eventually acquire a correspondence collection from Benson in the form of the two dozen plus letters he exchanged with her over a 30-year time span. This correspondence included details from Benson on her early life and writing career, as well as candid views on her business relationship with the Stratemeyer Syndicate.

The letters also contain acknowledgement for several monetary donations Benson made to the UI Libraries. Although many of her novels were initially banned by public librarians who found such popular series fiction to be tawdry and sensationalistic, she didn't seem to hold a grudge against the institution. In fact, Benson's final column for The Toledo Blade, written on the day she died, described her lifelong love of libraries:

“I consider it an honor to have been born near the turn of the 20th century, at about the time when public libraries were first coming into popular use. I lived then in Ladora, Iowa, a small town of only a few hundred persons. It never was large enough to support a public library... It was not until I entered college that I actually obtained enough books to satisfy me.” [3]

This regard has become mutual, as Nancy Drew novels have long been a staple of most public libraries' young adult sections, and Benson's correspondence forms a valuable part of archival collections held by the Iowa Women's Archives and the New York Public Library.