from The Writer's Almanac Oct. 4, 2007
http://www.elabs7.com/functions/message_view.html?mid=278396&mlid=499&siteid=20130&uid=78e6a90f1c
It's the birthday of Edward L. Stratemeyer,
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2004/11/08/041108crat_atlarge
(books by this author)
born in Elizabeth, New Jersey (1862), one of the first American writers to
capitalize on the new market in children's literature created by universal primary
school. At the time, most children's books taught moral lessons, but Stratemeyer
said, "A wide awake lad has no patience with that which is namby-pamby. ... He
demands real flesh and blood heroes who do something." Stratemeyer also figured
that his books would sell better if they had recurring characters, so he created
one series after another, the Motor Boys, the Outdoor Girls, the Bobbsey Twins. His
work was so popular that he couldn't keep up with the demand, so he created the
Stratemeyer Syndicate, incorporated in 1910, a kind of fiction factory with dozens
of writers banging out dozens of novels under numerous pseudonyms. Stratemeyer
wrote the outline for each book and made sure that each had exactly 25 chapters and
that every chapter ended with a good cliffhanger.
When detective fiction took off in the 1920s, Stratemeyer created a detective
series for kids called the Hardy Boys, and it was his most popular series yet. He
followed the Hardy Boys with a series about a girl detective named Nancy Drew.
Publishers believed that books for boys always sold more than books for girls, but
the Nancy Drew books were the most popular books that Stratemeyer ever published.
Nancy Drew was also the last character Stratemeyer created himself. He died of a
heart attack in 1930, the same year that the first Nancy Drew mystery came out. The
title of the book was The Secret of the Old Clock. His syndicate ultimately
published more than 700 titles, and it still sells about 6 million books a year.
Karen DeFrank, LMS
Bullock School
Glassboro NJ
kdefrank@glassboroschools.us
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