NANCY DREW

Real Name: Nancy Drew

Occupation: Investigative Reporter

Known Relatives: Carson (father), mother (name unrevealed, deceased), Nancy (great-aunt),

Base of Operations: River Heights, Maryland

First Appearance: (Literary) Secret of the Old Clock (1927), (Modern) Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Series, Episode “Mystery of the Old Lighthouse” (1977)

History: In 1930, writer Edward Stratemeyer encountered a young female judicial assistant named Nancy Drew. Smitten by her plucky personality and spirit, he used her name to create a similar persona of his literary Nancy Drew, a young girl who loved to solve mysteries. Published under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene, the novels became a huge success in Stratemeyer’s series of mystery novels for young adults and teenagers. Nancy even began sending him ideas from her real life to incorporate into his stories.

Her nephew, Carson, meanwhile, had a daughter in 1961 that turned out to be just as vivacious as her great-aunt. Nancy also started out as a judicial assistant, but this time to her father. Possessed with a gifted intelligence and intuitive instincts, she also loved a good ghost story and was even honored to be part in the paranormal research at the local lighthouse.

Nancy also became brief friends of Frank and Joe Hardy from Bayport, Michigan, while exploring rumors of vampires in Eastern Europe, and while she dallied with both brothers, she never really became romantically involved with either of them. Eventually becoming an investigative reporter for her local newspaper, she still parlays her zest for uncovering mysteries into her work.

In recent years, in an effort to create a strong role model for young girls, television has tapped into Nancy's history as well as that of her namesake in order to try and create a TV series about her life, but neither series turned out to be potentially successful. A young actress named Tracy Ryan portrayed Nancy Drew in 1995 only to be replaced by Maggie Lawson in 2002. 

 Comments: Bonita Granville first portrayed Nancy Drew in several movies in the late Thirties. She was replaced by Louise Curry in 1942 and then by Shirley Patterson in 1943.

In the 1970s, Nancy returned to life; this time wonderfully portrayed by Pamela Sue Martin (later of Dynasty fame), but upset by the way she was being written out of the series, actress Janet Louise Johnson-Julian was called upon to replace her.