The extent to which Ms. Benson's writing for the Syndicate had to be altered has been documented. As early as 1938, Syndicate letters have been found in the New York Public Library archives exposing Harriet Adams' control. They disclose for example, the chidings Ms. Benson received for leaving "gaps" in stories, despite detailed outlines. In Carole Kismaric and Marvin Heiferman's book, The Mysterious Case of Nancy Drew & The Hardy Boys, published quotes from letters, from Harriet to Ms. Benson, show that Harriet continually had to remind Benson not to deviate from the outlines. She had to instruct Benson to strive to be more descriptively colorful in her 'texting' and was to make Nancy more "sympathetic" and "kind-hearted" in her behavior, directing that the dialogue Benson was writing for Nancy should not be so curt and "abrasive." The 1980 court case transcript reveals that rewritings of Ms. Benson's texts had to be done and varied from sentences to paragraphs, to whole chapters.
It is noteworthy that it was only following Harriet's death, and the death of other Syndicate employees who could have refuted the claims, that Ms. Benson and others began to declare, unequivocally, that she was the "real" author of the Nancy Drew books. Ms. Benson clearly began to alter statements from her earlier interviews in her attempts to convince others of the significance and salience of her contribution. The New York Times, May 30 article, in its paraphrasing of earlier quoted information provided by Benson for a previous biographical essay, exposes her propagation of this perspective, declaring that "it was harder than it seemed, even if she did not have to come up with the plot."
Conclusion
The Stratemeyer family attempted to disseminate the truth, but to no avail. Responses to earlier articles, and Ms. Benson's obituaries, were ignored. As time passed and none of us was able to achieve publication of letters of clarification in newspapers making these claims, Ms. Benson's pretensions became more and more patulous. Other Syndicate ghost writers began to make authorship claims. Media disinformation and literary conjecture began to masquerade as fact. The importance of the actual authorship of Stratemeyer mystery story outlines, such as those for Nancy Drew, was diminished or forgotten. Harriet's editorial control over the content of Syndicate books was dismissed. In contrast, Ms. Benson's initial minor contribution to 23 of the 57 Nancy Drew stories was elevated to a status that apparently bestowed her with the historical right to claim full authorship. Numerous publication writers and literary pundits, convinced by their own conclusions and Ms. Benson's statements, began declaring that Benson was the true genius behind Nancy Drew. Some rhetoric has gone so far as to state that Harriet's "interference" was detrimental to the popularity of this series.
As a ghost writer, Ms. Benson does not have any legal or moral claim to authorship of Stratemeyer stories. She broke the legal contracts that she had signed as a mature, cognizant individual and sought publicity for herself, fully aware that her claims to authorship of Nancy Drew stories was fallacious. Imagine the dismay in literary circles if all ghost writers, such as Ms. Benson, were to similarly break their contracts, reveal their role in their collaborative assistance in the grammatical padding of the stories of others and claim them as their own. What reliance could those who wish to tell their stories in autobiographies, for example, then place on ghost writers whom they hire to help them tell their own stories? What credence could they place on their legally signed releases and contracted anonymity? Ms. Benson's behavior should be deplored by others, such as those in her former profession.
The controversy this "mystery" has created has been a source of consternation for the Stratemeyer family and Ms. Benson herself. In Douglas Martin's, May 30 The New York Times obituary on Ms. Benson, and in Patricia Leigh Brown's previous May 9, 1993 article concerning her "outing" as Nancy's author, Ms. Benson is quoted as confessing that "I am so sick of Nancy Drew I could vomit." Her discomfort is understandable with knowledge of the facts revealed and those yet to be discovered in the Syndicate's archives.
It is with dismay that the family has found itself in the position of having to defend its Syndicate against her claims. It is puzzling that Ms. Benson wrote under contract for the Syndicate for 26 years of her writing career, happily selling her work to them, content with the legality of her situation, and then, 64 years later, decided to announce this change in her position. Her name should have been placed correctly in context among other Syndicate ghost writers for Nancy Drew. Praise should have been appropriate to her work. In exaggerating the importance of her own contributions, she has made this defense necessary.
Harriet Adams, like her father, spent her writing career producing books of her own and outlines for Syndicate ghost writers as a means to facilitate the further production of herself, and her family's, prolific output. She traveled extensively, always taking copious notes for her stories, such as those for Nancy Drew. Nancy's adventures were based on her experiences, and not Ms. Benson's. She had editorial control over all "textings" for these stories, her own, her sister's and her father's. For 40 years, Harriet faithfully followed Edward Stratemeyer's convention in preserving the anonymity of the author of Syndicate books. She adhered to his desire for secrecy in order to preserve the innocent perception by its young readers that there could be single contributors to the Syndicate's enormous series output. She was modest and principled. When she yielded to persistent media pressure to reveal her identity as the Syndicate books' author, her authority to do so was correct and legal. Ms. Benson did not "write" a single Nancy Drew story. It is a travesty that literary "researchers" and publishers have supported this ghost writer's claims to authorship of Harriet Adams' stories.
