THE BIRTH OF A PHENOMENON

In 1927 two brothers solved The Mystery of the Tower Treasure. Three years later in 1930 an intrepid teen girl solved The Secret of the Old Clock. Teenagers solving mysteries became a literary trope, but The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew were just a link in a long chain of kid lit created by one man. Edward Stratemeyer struck gold when he formed a syndicate to produce children's literature. Though some of the syndicate's characters have gone to the literary graveyard, The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew endure even today.

Edward Stratemeyer wrote 13,000 books under various pseudonyms. He would outline plots and pass them on to ghost writers who filled in the story. Stratemeyer was born in 1863 in Elizabeth, New Jersey to German immigrant parents ; his father was a tobacconist. Stratemeyer found inspiration in the Horatio Alger rags-to-riches stories he read. When Stratemeyer was a teen he operated a printing press in the basement of his father's shop. He distributed stories he wrote to family and friends.

In 1889 he sold a story he wrote for $76 - a large sum for the time. In 1890 he opened a paper store in Newark. Stratemeyer wrote stories under pseudonyms in various genres. In 1894 he completed his first full-length book. He finished work began by his boyhood hero Horatio Alger when Alger became too sick to write.

Stratemeyer begin writing the Rover Boys series in 1899 and started his syndicate in 1905. Stratemeyer recognized that entertaining books for children were an untapped market. Children's books were usually morally aspirational. Stratemeyer's characters had adventures and traveled. Stratmeyer would contract ghost writers to write under pseudonyms he created. Books were written under pseudonyms because pseudonyms seemed to sell better ; children might be confused or turned off if their favorite series suddenly had a different author. Stratemeyer would outline the plots of the books and the ghost writers would flesh out the story.

Characters never varied and even though locations changed, the situations were always similar. Books were always written in a series, never a standalones. So, Nancy Drew would always live in River Heights. Her father would always be an attorney. Nancy would always be 18. She would never have friends other than Bess and George (unless they were one-off plot contrived friends who were never mentioned again.) Ned Nickerson would be her only boyfriend. Nancy could go to a ranch, or a ski resort, but never too far from home and never overseas. She would always solve the mystery by the end of the book. Each book series had their own particular formula. The formula system worked and The Stratemeyer Syndicate sold massive volumes of books and made millions of dollars. Stratemeyer died in 1930 at age 67. His daughters would take over and guide the syndicate into a new era.

ARTICLES :

Edward Stratemeyer. Wikipedia.

The Stratemeyer Syndicate. Wikipedia.