Journalist, Mildred Wirt had been hired to write this series that Edward Stratemeyer had created. He sent her an ouWhere There’s a Will, There’s a Way
Journalist, Mildred Wirt had been hired to write this series that Edward Stratemeyer had created. He sent her an outline of the story, and in 4 weeks she had it finished and sent back to him. He accepted it as it was written even though he felt that it had taken too much time for her to get to the action in the story. He was so correct, as I was bored myself until more than half way into the book. (This information on Edward’s displeasure with the story can be found in the biography of Mildred Wirt, “Missing Millie Benson.”)
The Secret in the Old Clock was published in 1930 and was the first Nancy Drew book to hit the market, and this, during the Great Depression. It sold for only 50 cents, a price that many could still afford to pay. It became a great success and continues to be to this very day. (Missing Millie Benson)
Nancy Drew is a young sixteen year old blonde haired girl who wished to become a detective. I was sixteen years old when I first began reading this series, having first found “The Secret in the Old Attic” in my mom’s hallway closet where she kept her books.
Nancy’s mother had died when she was three years old, and she lives with her father, Carson Drew, who is a criminal and mystery case attorney. Her father’s sister, Hannah, also lives with them. Nancy has a friend named Helen who doesn’t become involved in this mastery with her, unlike her other friends in this series. And most importantly, Nancy has a blue roadster. Now a roadster would be fun to own.
In this first story, Old Man Crowley has died and left his estate to relatives that had never treated him kindly, relatives that no one in town really cared about and who believed that the estate had fallen into the wrong hands. But there is a talk of another will that Crowley had written at a later date. Where is it? And that is where Nancy begins her career as a young detective. “If there is a will,” she says, “there is a way,” to find the will.
Nancy had driven into the city to run an errand for her father, but on the way home she had taken the scenic route along River Road. Now that had to have been fun driving her blue roadster along the river’s road. But she also realized that a storm was brewing and hoped to get home before this happened because the road could get pretty muddy and dangerous. Alas, she was not to get home before the rain; instead she saw a farm house with a barn and quickly drove into the barn in order to get out of the rain. She was greeted by a couple of young girls who were related to Old Man Crowley and who were much more worthy of his inheritance, as she soon found out.
So, the story crawled on. Nancy began talking to other relatives and then one woman who cared for him when he was ill. Then she went to see the relatives that had inherited his estate, and this is where the story finally picked up, and I found that I couldn’t put the book down after that.
Note: Copyright 1930 Written by Mildred Wirt
January 23, 2019 My second reading and review of this book.
I read this as a child, and I cried. It may have been the first real novel that I had ever read, as I was actuallyNot As I Remembered It 66 Years Ago.
I read this as a child, and I cried. It may have been the first real novel that I had ever read, as I was actually6 into reading comic books at that age.
My brother was reading The Grapes of Wrath at that same time and was asking our mother if it were true about the dust bowl and depression and what the people went through. It was, she said.
My father had given my older brother a collection of John Steinbeck books, so the reason we chose him to read. I grew to love Steinbeck, but I am not so sure about this book now. It was just too sad for me as a child of ten or so.
I remember as a child I would lose all my dogs to death, and the baby lamb that my step dad brought home. I sat there with the lamb in my lap as it was dying, and I asked God, Why? I got no answer. A few years later I began to feel that every animal I ever loved died. And, well, they still do.
This book was not what I remember4ed, but I really had no idea what I remembered as it was too long ago. I also didn’t remember that this book was four stories. It was about Jody’s growing up years. I was glad for this, as I liked two of the other stories better. Only they were all too short. I was also glad that I did not cry this time.
I really loved the story about the old pisano, Gitano, who showed up on the ranch saying that he was born there and desired to die there.
Jody asked him questions about the mountains to the west of the farm that was situated near Salina, CA. Jody only knew that they lead to the ocean. Gitano had only adventured there once but only remembered that it was quiet.
Jody wanted to hike the mountains, and that is what I would have done since I spent my youth hiking the hills in our small town of Paso Robles, CA and going to the river with my dogs, whichever one I had at the time. Jody didn’t venture out, and I wonder if that was because he had a strict father, a father I was glad to not have had. Yet, my own father was mean, but my mom divorced when I was 8. I had free range of the town, the hills, and the river after that.
Then Jody’s grandfather came to visit, and I would have loved that story to go on as well as the one about the pisano. It was not to be. As soon as his grandfather arrived, problems broke out in the family, well, only with Jody’s dad, and it was not going to be a nice visit, except that Jody wanted to learn from him. He wanted to know about his trip out to California by wagon train, as he had been the wagaon train master.
All in all, it seemed like everything was dying around Jody, mostly by his own hands, such as horn toads, snakes, mice, etc. It left me with a feeling that I didn’t wish to hear anymore. Kids can be so cruel at times, and it made me to remember how my boyfriend (first husband) and I put a mouse in a flashlight, but when we took it out he was almost dead. I think he survived. I hate memories like that, or when we shot frogs at the river with a b-b gun. How cruel. I wonder what my mom would have said if she had known. I know if I had had kids, I would hope that I would have taught them to not harm animals.
I would not have liked farm life, unless we were just raising food crops. And it seems like the older I get the less I like harming anything unless it is poisonous snake or spider or anything that is about to harm me. But real life isn’t so easy on a person, and it certainly wasn’t easy on Jody. Notes: I loved this when I was young, so I am keeping the 4 or 5 stars. I would only give it three stars today. RerRead June 26, 2019
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