Wirt, Mildred A. (Mildred Augustine), 1905-2002

Mildred Wirt Benson, journalist and author of young adult fiction, is a native of Ladora, Iowa and a 1925 graduate of the State University of Iowa (now the University of Iowa). She was the first woman to receive a master's from the State University of Iowa's School of Journalism in 1927. She was also the first author of the Nancy Drew mysteries for the Stratemeyer Syndicate under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene.

Benson also wrote fiction for young adults under her own name and various pseudonyms and was a reporter and columnist for the Toledo (Ohio) times from the 1940s to 1970s and the Toledo blade from the 1970s to the present.

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