How Harriet (Otis Smith) Saved
the Stratemeyer Syndicate
by James D. Keeline
The Stratemeyer Syndicate
The Stratemeyer Syndicate is mainly known as the pro-
ducer of popular juvenile series, such as the Hardy Boys
and Nancy Drew. These series, which have proven to be
the best known and longest running were developed at
the end of Edward Stratemeyer’s life. He outlined four
of the Nancy Drew volumes for Mildred A. Wirt (1905-
2002) and the three volumes of the breeder set were is-
sued on April 28,1 less than two weeks before his death
but immediately after he contracted the illness to which
he succombed.
After Edward Stratemeyer died on May 10, 1930, his
property was inherited by his wife, Magdalene Baker
Van Camp Stratemeyer (1867-1935). However, she
had been troubled by heart problems and was a semi-
invalid at the time she became a widow. They had two
daughters, Harriet and Edna, who were designated as
executors of the estate.
Harriet Stratemeyer and Edna Stratemeyer
Harriet Stratemeyer was born on December 11, 1892.
At the time, her father had just begun a part-time edi-
torial position with Street & Smith which promised a
steady income compared with writing alone for the
dime novel and story paper publishers.2 She graduated
from Barringer High School in February 1910 and Har-
riet next went to Wellesly College in Wellesley, Mas-
sachusetts, for four years.3 While there she wrote for
the local newspaper. Upon returning from college in
1914, she worked on some manuscripts which her fa-
ther brought home; however, when in 1915 she married
Russell Vroom Adams (1888-1965), a broker who had
arranged some investments for Edward, this practice
was discontinued.
Edna Camilla Stratemeyer was born on May 29, 1895.
After graduating from the North 7th Street Grammar
School in Newark, Edward arranged for her to attend
a boarding school called the Centenniary Collegiate
Institute in Hackettstown, New Jersey. However, she
became so homesick that she returned home in October
1909.4 At various times when Edward was sick at home,
1 Copyright date usually indicates when copies are received
by the Copyright Office.
2 See Stratemeyer’s Literary Account Book. NYPL.
3 Stratemeyer to Dean of Wellesley College. 27 Sep 1909.
4 Stratemeyer to Centenniary Collegiate Institute. 3 Sep
1909, 18 Sep 1909, 19 Oct 1909, 27 Oct 1909, 3 Nov
1909.
Edna took dictation from him to conduct Syndicate
business from home. She stayed in the family home at
171 North 7th Street for many years until she married
Charles Wesley Squier (1881-1950) in 1938. The home
was sold a few years later.
Edward Stratemeyer’s Estate
Upon their father’s death, the sisters’ first plan was to
sell the Syndicate. Of course this was during the Great
Depression and so it was no simple thing to do. Details
on these negotiations are lacking in the business files at
NYPL but there are references to two ghostwriter fami-
lies, the Garis family and the Duffield family, as poten-
tial buyers. Another potential buyer was a young fan of
Stratemeyer named Wallace Palmer of Independence,
Missouri, who met Edward a couple times in the late
1920s.
Since none of the candidates could come to terms with
the sisters they decided, somewhat reluctantly, that the
business could neither be sold nor abandoned.5 They
began the process to learn as much as they could about
their father’s business. As Edna later noted to her sis-
ter, Edward told them little about his business details, a
practiced she continued with her own daughter.
With the death of Edward, the Syndicate entered into a
critical time. The economic uncertainty would threaten
any business but having its founder die at this point is
especially acute. Would Nancy Drew be beloved today
if it had ended after The Mystery at Lilac Inn?
By November 1930, the sisters had settled their father’s
estate and arranged to move the Syndicate offices from
New York City to East Orange, New Jersey, nearer their
respective homes in Maplewood and Newark.
During this period between Edward’s death in May and
the move in November 1930, Harriet Otis Smith, Strate-
meyer’s personal assistant of more than fifteen years,
ran the day-to-day operations of the company and kept
it from foundering. She came to the office each day,
alone, and corresponded with publishers, ghostwriters,
and fans while carefully deferring all important and es-
pecially new business decisions to the sisters.
At the sisters’ request, Smith prepared summaries of
Edward’s relations with individual publishers to help
Harriet meet with them.
She also gathered material connected with the series
Edward was working on just before he took ill, the Buck
5 Edna C. Stratemeyer to Harriet Otis Smith. 19 Jul 1930.
and Larry Baseball series. Indeed, one report of his last
hours mentioned that he visualized himself in one of the
games in the Baseball Joe series. However, since that
series had ended earlier, it is almost certain that it was
this new Buck and Larry series on his mind at the end.
This sports series proved challenging for the sisters be-
cause of the large numbers of characters, their positions
and batting order, and the descriptions of the games.
Even though the stories were ghostwritten by others,
there are copious notes by Harriet Adams at NYPL for
the first volume in this series she attempted.
Edna meanwhile was offering title suggestions for the
Hardy Boys even though she had not read any of the
books and knew little about the series. Smith was pa-
tient with Edna and thanked her for the titles but ex-
plained that the real challenging work was associated
with the plots themselves. Shortly thereafter Edna had
reviewed some of the books and offered better sugges-
tions.
Miss Smith was an unusually capable assistant to Ed-
ward and, after he died, was probably the single person
who knew the most about the Syndicate operation. One
could say that she knew all of the secrets and where the
bodies were buried. The sisters hoped that she would
stay on but once the office move to East Orange was an-
nounced, Smith found that she neither cared to move
nor commute. Of course there could have been other
reasons why she might not care to work with Edward’s
daughters but these were not stated and without evi-
dence, it is unfair to encourage speculation.
After the sisters opened their new office, they hired Ag-
nes Pearson to perform similar duties. However, the
absense of Miss Smith was acutely felt because of the
lack of what today might be called an “institutional
memory.”
For example, after Edward’s death Smith corresponded
with Walter S. Rogers, the prolific Syndicate artist for
more than 700 illustrations in some 300 volumes. She
went over details for the cover art for Don Sturdy on
the Ocean Bottom (1930).6 However, just a few months
later when Altemus asked the sisters for the address for
the artist, they claimed they could not find it.7 This gap
is doubtless the reason why Rogers’ illustrations vanish
from Syndicate books after a run of approximately 20
years from 1911 to 1931.
One of the mysteries about the Hardy Boys is how they
graduate from high school in one volume8 and in the
next volume they are back in high school permanently
6 Harriet Otis Smith to Walter S. Rogers. 21 Aug 1930.
7 Stratemeyer Syndicate to Henry Altemus Co. 19 Jan
1931.
8 Dixon, Franklin W. What Happened at Midnight.
without explanation.9 This, too, is likely due to the sis-
ters’ lack of intimate knowledge for this series and the
departure of Miss Smith.
Harriet Otis Smith
Who was Harriet Otis Smith? She was born on March
21, 1868 in Circleville, Ohio, in Pickaway County, some
26 miles south of Columbus. Her parents were Sarah
Denny Osborn (1831-1892) and Palmer Cone Smith
(1823-1900). He was a prominent attorney in Ohio and
had argued a couple cases in front of the United States
Supreme Court.
Smith is registered with the Daughters of the American
Revolution10 and was a member in the early 1900s. She
counts several direct-line ancestors who were involved
in the war which led to the establishment of the United
States. For example, Joseph Otis (1725-1810) was a
member of the legislature and brigadier general of mili-
tia. He protected Barnstable Harbor, in Massachusetts,
where boats sought refuge from privateers in the war.11
Going back further along a different line, John Alden
(1598-1687) of the Mayflower and Plymouth Colony
was her 8th great grandfather. He is believed to be the
first person from the Mayflower to set foot on Plym-
outh Rock and he was the 7th signer of the Mayflower
Compact after Myles Standish. I have not learned if
Harriet Otis Smith was ever a member of the Mayflower
Society however.
Harriet Otis Smith was the youngest of four daughters,
the only children of Palmer and Sarah Smith. Harriet
maintained associations with the two sisters who sur-
vived into adulthood and their families for the rest of
her life.
In particular Harriet often lived with or near her old-
est sister, Jeanette Sterling Smith. Knowing something
about Jeanette provides an opportunity to better un-
derstand Harriet Otis Smith because they have several
things in common:
* Both were members of the DAR.
* Both were important in establishing womens’ clubs in
their respective home towns.
* Both were musically talented and spent some time study-
ing this in Europe.
* Both moved to New York City in 1911.
* Both contacted Stratemeyer in 1914 to seek writing
work.
9 Dixon, Franklin W. While the Clock Ticked.
10 DAR 34389.
11 DAR 34389.
 Jeanette Sterling Smith
Harriet’s oldest sister, Jeanette Sterling Smith (1860-
1932), married Charles Matthias Greve (1840-1904).
He was some twenty years older and had served in the
American Civil War from the Second Kansas cavalry
and the Kansas light artillery for the Union forces.
He later established a pharmacy with his brother in
Cincinnati for a few years before this partnership was
dissolved in 1888. He next moved to Chattanooga, Ten-
nessee, and purchased a pharmacy there which he ran
until his death in 1904.
After the death of her husband Mrs. Greve became editor
of the Woman’s Page of the Chatanooga Times, owned and
operated by Adolph Ochs, owner and controlling voice of
the New York Times. In 1911 Mrs. Greve went to New York
where she accepted a position as associate editor of Mc-
Call’s Magazine which she retained for 10 years.12
Greve was an aspiring novelist and also wrote short
pieces of fiction. On January 3, 1914 Greve first wrote
to Stratemeyer, offering to write for him. She received
his address from the author of Mrs. Wiggs of the Cab-
bage Patch (Century 1901).
Through Mrs. Alice [He]gan Rice I obtained your name and
address, a friend of hers having done some literary work for
you. I am writing to inquire if there is a possibility of that
sort for me. I have written a great deal--stories and feature
stuff--have had five years experience in newspaper work, in
charge of a woman’s Sunday page. For the last three years I
have been engaged in magazine work in New York City.
For several reasons I desire to make a change and engage in
more purely literary work than I am now doing. If I could
come to Newark to see you, or have an interview with you
when you chance to be in New York and have the time to
spare, I should be greatly pleased.13
Edward described, in general, the kinds of materials he
handled and sent one of the publisher catalogs listing
the series. He also stated that all manuscripts must be
typed, based on his experiences with Weldon J. Cobb.
Greve replied:
I have a typewriter, the Blickensderfer, but are practicing
on the standard keyboard, and expect to purchase an Un-
derwood.14
She sent some of her shorter pieces as samples.
Yours to hand with specimens of your printed writings for
fashion magazine.
I have looked these over, but the only thing that is at all in
12 “Native of City Taken In South. Mrs. Jeanette Greve,
at One Tim Editor of McCalls, Dead. Dies in Knoxville.
Daughter Dean of Women at Tennessee School.” Circlev-
ille Herald. 4 Apr 1932. p. 1.
13 Jeanette Sterling Greve to Stratemeyer. 3 Jan 1914.
14 Jeanette Sterling Greve to Stratemeyer. 8 Jan 1914.
the style of our girls stories is the short item called ‘Aunt
Dinah’s Recipes.’ A girls’ story in that style of treatment
might be all right.
As I wrote before, I could not give you any encouragement
until I had seen a long story of yours for young people. We
do not handle short stories at all. The price for book MS.
depends entirely upon the value of the story to our Syndi-
cate. We do not handle single stories, but only such as can
be used in a series. If you wish at any time to submit any-
thing that might be used as the first of a series of girls’ books
I shall be pleased to look over either the whole MS. or four
or five specimen chapters.15
Although she did not write for the Syndicate, on at
least two occasions Stratemeyer wrote rare letters of
introduction for Greve in 1919 to George H. Doran and
Dodd, Mead:
Will you allow me the privelege of introducing you to a lady
who has written a manuscript which you may find to your
advantage to publish? This lady, Mrs. Jeanette S. Greve,
has done considerable work for the newspapers and mag-
azines, both as a writer and an editor, and has also done
considerable publicity work for the New York State Suffrage
campaign.
The volume which she has penned is somewhat out of the
lines that I am handling, but you may find it well worth
considering, having , as it has, a somewhat unusual back-
ground.16
Greve worked as a publicity director for Carrie Chap-
man Catt (1859-1947), a colleague of Susan B. Anthony
(1820-1906) and twice president of the National Amer-
ican Woman Suffrage Association, the first time after
being selected by Anthony to succeed her and the sec-
ond time coincident with the passage of the Nineteenth
Ammendment to the United States Constitution.
Early in her residence in New York she became interested
in settlement work, which led her to believe in the necessity
of votes for women, and she took a very active part in the
hard-fought campaign for Woman’s Suffrage. She was Mrs.
Carrie Chapman Catt’s publicity director, and traveled with
her over New York State.17
Greve later moved back to be near her daughter, Harriet
Cone Greve, who was Dean of Women at the University
of Tennessee at Knoxville for 30 years.
While she lived in the winters with her daughter, Greve
spent summers of each year in a cottage she purchased
in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, in the Smoky Mountains.
Feeling that she was too far from her daughters, both of
15 Stratemeyer to Mrs. Jeanette Sterling Greve. 12 Jan 1914.
See also letter dated 6 Jan 1914.
16 Stratemeyer to George H. Doran. 17 Feb 1919. Se also
similar letter dated 2 Apr 1919 to Dodd, Mead.
17 Vann & Dixon. Denny Genealogy, Second Book. (Tuttle,
1947). pp. 199-201.
 whom lived in the South, she returned to Tennessee from
New York, in 1926, and bought a rustic cabin from a moun-
tain family, in Gatlinburg, just before the opening of the
Great Smoky Mountains National Park. For six years she
lived among the mountain people, teaching them much of
hygene and traveling long distances over mountain trails
to carry disinfectants to injured persons. She was beloved
by her neighbors and taken in as one of themselves. From
Thanksgiving to Easter, when the weather was too cold for
her to live in her cabin at Gatlinburg, she stayed with her
daughter, Harriet Greve, Dean of Women at the University
of Tennessee, in Knoxville.18
Harriet Contacts Stratemeyer
On April 22, 1914, three months after Jeanette, Harriet
Otis Smith wrote to Edward and offered the first four
chapters of a story which she called “The M.D.R.T. in
the Kentucky Mountains.” Stratemeyer did not find
that the story suited his purposes. He said that it was
“cleanly written” but stated that it “seems to lack a
‘holding point’ or sustaining interest.” He offered some
suggestions of how to improve it, depending on the age
for which the story was intended. He also stated that he
would be willing to look at other stories she might offer
if they would be the first volume in a series.
Stratemeyer had been struggling somewhat to offer
more series for girls to his publishers and some of the
writers he had used previously were not fully satisfac-
tory so he was eager for new talent in this area.
As I have said many times, it is the hardest thing in the
world for me to get a satisfactory girls’ story. The authors
who write something really good are as rare as snowflakes
in June.19
Stratemeyer also remarked on Smith’s statement that
she was “a graduate of the Miller Business School20 ...
both in stenography and typewriting.” On April 28 he
asked if she had “ever taken down stories from dicta-
tion ... 4,000 to 5,000 words per day.” She replied
that although she had not done that with stories, she
18 Vann & Dixon. p. 199-201.
19 Stratemeyer to Cupples & Leon. 2 Dec 1911. See also
Stratemeyer to Lilian C. Garis. 7 Nov 1911.
20 The Miller Business School was established about 1894
by Charles M. Miller (1864-1933) in New York and of-
fered classes on a variety of topics including “touch” type-
writing, stenography, and commercial law. In December
1912 he hosted a demonstration of a new device called a
Stenotype on which words were spelled phonetically us-
ing fewer keys than an ordinary typewriter because mul-
tiple keys were pressed as if one were playing a musical
chord.
See “592 Words a Minute on Stenotype. Operators of the
New Shorthand Machine Leave Stenographers Far Be-
hind. Writes Ordinary Letters Which are Struck in Com-
binations on a Narrow Ribbon of Paper to Represent all
Sounds.” New York Times. 5 Dec 1912. p. 6.
had “taken, one after another at one sitting, as many
as forty letters averaging three hundred words to the
letter” [12,000 words total] in a magazine office where
she worked.
Stratemeyer Opens His First Office in NYC
Stratemeyer opened his first Manhattan office by No-
vember 1, 1914. After establishing his Stratemeyer Syn-
dicate in 1905, his business grew in size and complexity.
The number of volumes increased as well as the number
of series containing those volumes.
The number of publishers rose from two to six. Most
of these publishers had offices in New York City. When
Edward was working from his home office, he would
make a trip once a week to meet with them.
More volumes meant more ghostwriters. After starting
with two, this grew to as many as eleven in the most ac-
tive year of his life. More ghosts meant more hands to
write the stories but it also meant more letters to them.
He selected an office on the 12th floor of the Pullman
Building, a narrow skyscraper overlooking Madison
Square Park at 17 Madison Avenue. He later remarked
that this location was ideal because it was
within seven or eight minutes’ distance of every worth-while
publishing house in the metropolis, except the downtown
house of Harper.
Although Stratemeyer mentions Harper, he issued no
books through them. However, he was probably most
interested in the publishers he did use by this point
such as Cupples & Leon, Grosset & Dunlap, Sully &
Kleinteich, and Hearst’s International Library. These
were all quite close to this office location. The publisher
for his personal writings, Lothrop, Lee & Shepard, was
in Boston.
In planning for this office, and recognizing the growth
and increasing complexity of his Syndicate, he likely
considered the sort of help he might need. He had been
using the services of a proofreader, Louis H. Patterson,
for some time because most of his publishers were not
strong in this department and he wanted to present the
best manuscripts possible.
It seems likely that he consulted with people from Sully
& Kleinteich since he soon contacted Edith B. Ordway,
whom S&K had sent the MS of the first Janice Day vol-
ume for comment. She lived in Medford, Massachusetts
and likely he considered her for long-distance editorial
work.
He also found a classified ad from a person who was
seeking an editorial position. His letter to “Z, Box 221”
at the New York Times was received by Florence Hull
Winterburn (1858-) who replied promptly and de-
scribed her qualifications. She stated that if he was also
looking for someone who could supply “expert type-
writing or stenography” that her daughter was looking
for such a position.
Winterburn wrote articles and books on a number of
topics in the field of child development. Had Strate-
meyer read her article called “A Child’s Taste in Fiction”
(New England Magazine, Nov. 1902), he might have
reached the conclusion that she would not have ap-
proved of the Syndicate’s products and that she would
be more aligned with librarian Clara Whitehill Hunt,
the librarian from the Newark and later Brooklyn Pub-
lic Libraries who felt that books like Stratemeyer’s, and
Alger’s and Optic’s, were a waste of library space and
resources. Even without this knowledge, Edward did
not offer her the position and it does not appear that he
brought her in for an interview.
Stratemeyer Hires Harriet Otis Smith
The same day that Edward replied to Winterburn, he
also wrote to Harriet Otis Smith, he contacted her again
to see if she was still looking for work along this line.
He described his intent:
I shall probably need the services of somebody to take down
letters and also get manuscripts ready for the printer ....
Possibly I might be able to try you on original work, as you
stated that was what you some day hoped to do.21
After exchanges of several letters in October,22 includ-
ing some delays in opening the office, Smith began
working, first on a trial basis and then permanently, in
Stratemeyer’s new office at the beginning of November
1914. By November 5, 1914, Edward wrote to another
applicant to state
Just at present we have all the assistance we require in our
literary department. I will, however, keep your letter before
me, and if in the future I can make use of your services I will
let you know.
Among Smith’s first work was sending out letters to
publishers, ghostwriters, and artists to announce the
new office. She also typed replies to a number of fan
letters from Stratemeyer’s dictation.
She proved valuable in her ability to not only take down
letters and stories from dictation but also to review
the incoming manuscripts and compare them against
the outlines provided. In time she was able to detect
consistency flaws with the previous volumes and times
when the writer was not turning in their best work or
21 Stratemeyer to Harriet Otis Smith. 5 Oct 1914.
22 Stratemeyer to Harriet Otis Smith. 5 Oct 1914, 16 Oct
1914, 17 Oct 1914, 31 Oct 1914, 3 Nov 1914.
Harriet Otis Smith to Stratemeyer. 8 Oct 1914, 15 Oct
1914, 19 Oct 1914, 2 Nov 1914.
possibly the work of a second ghostwriter.23
She worked with Stratemeyer until his death and for
several months afterward until they moved the offices.
After the Syndicate
After leaving the Syndicate in November 1930, the
Stratemeyer sisters heard from her from time to time.
In June 1931 she was in New Smyrna, Florida.24 In 1932
she asked for a referral to the Garden City Publishing
Company.25 In 1934 she referred Grace May North
Monfort of Santa Barbara, California, as a Syndicate
ghostwriter for the X-Bar-X Boys and a couple other
volumes.26
Smith also wrote a letter of condolence when Edward’s
widow, Magdalene, died in May 1935.27 This contact
prompted a brief exchange. The sisters thanked her for
her sentiment and asked about the names of the ghost-
writers who worked on the Ruth Fielding series because
someone asked if a person whose maiden name was
Smith and married name was Mrs. Arthur Zerbe had
worked on them.28 Miss Smith replied that the early
volumes were the work of W. Bert Foster and no one
named Smith.
I would remember that surely, even if I should have forgot-
ten a few of the writers who wrote only a few stories. But, as
you know, your father picked his writers carefully and there
were a few changes in the staff. Nor do I recall any one on
the list by the name of Zerbe.29
Smith’s letterhead in 1935 identified her as one who
created indexes for books and periodicals and was a re-
viewer of manuscripts, reader of proofs, and a research-
er.
I have been doing work here this past year or more, although
I have had none given to me this spring. You can see by my
paper the nature of the work. So far “Research” has brought
no responses, but I have found at one time or another work
23 Stratemeyer to John W. Duffield. 14 Jul 1922.
24 Stratemeyer Syndicate to Harriet Otis Smith (New Smyr-
na, FL). 12 Jun 1931.
25 Harriet Otis Smith (127 1/2 W. Union St., Circleville, OH)
to Stratemeyer Syndicate. 27 May 1932.
26 Stratemeyer Syndicate to Grace May North Monfort
(Santa Barbara, CA). 20 Aug 1934.
27 Harriet Otis Smith (14 Irving Pl., NYC) to Stratemeyer
Syndicate. 1 Jun 1935, 7 Jun 1935.
Stratemeyer Syndicate to Harriet Otis Smith. 5 Jun
1935.
28 Thomas B. Sheehan, American Book Bindery, 75 Varick
St., NYC to Stratemeyer Syndicate. 25 May 1935.
29 Harriet Otis Smith (14 Irving Pl., NYC) to Stratemeyer
Syndicate. 7 Jun 1935.
 under all the other headings. I trust the Stratemeyer Syn-
dicate has not suffered during this depression, which has
more or less forced me back into the labor market.30
Unmarried, childless, and with one of the most com-
mon American surnames, Miss Smith was difficult to
trace during the period after 1930. In addition to the
letters mentioned, she also wrote two published let-
ters to the editor of the New York Times31 and was a
subscriber to some of the campaigns for the American
Natural History Museum expeditions, including some
by Roy Chapman Andrews before Stratemeyer died.32
Residences
Despite her statement to the Stratemeyer sisters about
not wanting to move to New Jersey in 1930, Miss Smith
had moved around quite a bit. In addition to living in
Europe for a time, she also lived in Ohio, Tennessee,
New York, Florida, and Georgia. As stated in her obitu-
ary:
In 1937, when with advancing years she felt the climate of
the North too severe, she moved to St. Augustine, Fla.
She lived there, across the street from the Florida Naval
Academy, until 1945 when “she came to Athens, where
she remained until her death.”
Most of her residences were tied to the locations of rela-
tives. However, it is not apparent that she had any fam-
ily in Florida. Her move to Athens, Georgia, is easier to
understand. Several members of Jeanette’s family lived
there, including those with connections to the Univer-
sity of Georgia there and executives with the Coca-Cola
bottling plant of Athens.
While in Athens she lived in the Georgian Hotel and
later in a house at 557 Meigs Street.
Harriet Otis Smith died on January 9, 1958 at a local
hospital. She was less than two months shy of her 90th
birthday. Services were conducted at the graveside in
Oconee Hill Cemetery in Athens.
Legacy
Edward Stratemeyer considered Harriet Otis Smith to
be a very valuable assistant. When future ghostwriter
Josephine Lawrence visited the Stratemeyer Syndicate
in 1917 as a reporter from the Newark Sunday Call to
30 Harriet Otis Smith to Stratemeyer Syndicate. 7 Jun
1935.
31 Harriet Otis Smith to New York Times. Published. 20
Oct 1935, 8 Mar 1937.
32 Listed in On the Trail of Ancient man: A Narrative of
Field Work by Roy Chapman Andrews. (1926). p. 364.
Listed in Annual Report of the American Museum of
Natural History, v. 55. (1924). p. 209; v. 59. (1928). p.
230; v. 60. (1929). p. 174.
write an interview, he described his method of writing
and referred to Smith33
I’ve an unusually competent stenographer. The average
stenographer, you know, doesn’t have much of an idea of
punctuating, paragraphing or taking down dialect.
She was a faithful assistant who clearly valued Strate-
meyer’s sense of secrecy concerning the operations of
the Syndicate. Her occupation listings in census, ship
passenger lists and even her obituary carefully avoid
mentioning the Syndicate in favor of generic phrases
like “assistant to a publisher.” One relative stated that
she knew that her great aunt had some connection with
books like Nancy Drew but not many details.
During the months when she was running the Syndicate
office for the sisters, some series needed new volumes.
With the sisters’ approval she took some of Stratemey-
er’s own paragraph-length plot proposals for the pub-
lisher and expanded them to the multi-page outlines
suitable for the ghostwriters.
One of these was for the fifth Nancy Drew volume, The
Secret at Shadow Ranch. Fans of this series recall that
this volume introduced her chums, Bess and George.
When writing to the sisters in 1935 she congratulated
them on keeping the Syndicate running
I trust the Stratemeyer Syndicate has not suffered during
this depression ... it cannot have been easy for you since the
responsibility came to you during the trough of the prosper-
ity wave. At such a time, however, one can look with more
pride on achievement than if one had been carried on the
crest of the wave.34
However, in a sense, that success in an economically
turbulent time also belongs, in part, to Smith. After all,
would we think about the Hardy Boys in the same way
if it had concluded with volume nine, The Great Airport
Mystery, or Nancy Drew with volume four, The Mys-
tery at Lilac Inn, or without Bess and George?
Thank you Harriet Otis Smith.
33 [Lawrence, Josephine]. “The Newarker Whose Name is
Best Known.” Newark Sunday Call. 9 Dec 1917. p. 1.
34 Harriet Otis Smith (14 Irving Pl., NYC) to Stratemeyer
Syndicate. 7 Jun 1935.