Nancy Drew Mystery Stories [Series title]

Nancy Drew Mystery Stories [Series title]

The Secret of Red Gate Farm
The Clue in the Diary
The Clue in the Jewel Box
The Clue of the Whistling Bagpipes
The Crooked Banister

Carolyn Keene, book's author

New York: Grosset & Dunlap

1941, 1953-1958, 1965, 1971

1st edition: 1971

Madison Theodore researched and wrote the event description in 2018.

For a description of the book, please click on the image of the event label/description or scroll to the bottom of the page for the section entitled "Text" for a transcription of the attached document.

Literature / Children's Literature

SPECIAL PZ7 .N363 Se c.1941
SPECIAL PZ7 .N363 Cl c. 1955
SPECIAL PZ7. N363 Cl c. 1965
SPECIAL PZ7 .N363 Cl c. 1965
SPECIAL PZ7 .N363 Cr 1971

English, book's contents
English, event description

To see this book on November 15, 2018 in the “Event Photographs” Collection, please go here [Photograph of Books] 05454 and here [Photograph of Books] IMG_0582.

NANCY DREW MYSTERY STORIES: The Secret of Red Gate Farm and The Clue in the Diary and The Clue in the Jewel Box and The Clue of the Whistling Bagpipes and The Crooked Banister | CAROLYN KEENE | NEW YORK: GROSSET & DUNLAP | 1941, 1953-1958,1965, 1965, 1971 1st Ed.

This collection of Nancy Drew Mystery Stories shows how bookbindings changed stylistically over time. One obvious change is the way Nancy Drew dresses. In The Secret of Red Gate Farm (1941), Nancy wears the more feminine clothing of the 1930s. However, on the cover of The Clue in the Diary (mid-1950s), Nancy dresses in the style of the war years, which used less fabric and focused on utility. Both covers have a simple design, with a solid cloth background and a stamped silhouette of Nancy holding a magnifying glass. The main changes in cover design occurred in the 1960s, when the “yellow spines” were released. These covers feature colorful illustrations of Nancy. The Clue in the Jewel Box and The Clue of the Whistling Bagpipes (both 1965) demonstrate this new cover art style. In the 1970s, the art style changed again - now instead of detailed illustrations, the covers feature solid, smoke-like backgrounds with Nancy and other objects seemingly coming-out-of the background. This can be seen in The Crooked Banister (1971), where Nancy, the robot, and the staircase appears to be materializing out of red smoke.

Through the years, the endpapers also changed. In The Secret of Red Gate Farm, the endpapers are cream with an orange silhouette of Nancy and her chums. In The Clue in the Diary; however, the endpapers are navy blue and cream, and are much more detailed than the endpapers of the 1940s. In the 1960s two different styles of endpapers were used, the first was select cover art illustrations rendered in two shades of blue, and white, and the other style was a black and white drawing of the same cover art pictures. Finally, in the 1970s, the endpapers changed yet again, and this time they are black and white drawings, decreased in number, and enlarged in size.

One final, yet minor change is the paint on the top edges; in the 1940s they were painted red, but starting in the 1950s, they were painted black. These differences show how a book, or in this case, a book series, can change in appearance over time.

The Secret of Red Gate Farm’s frontispiece is a lithograph, but in the 1950s, these all changed to steel-plate engravings.

These books were donated to Special Collections in 2018 by alumnus Erin Miller, class of 2018. They came to her from her grandmother.

Book / Unpublished Print Document