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Description

This picture is interesting, because it gives us a look at two different things: 1) that angry lady in the middle, holding the broom, is Hannah Gruen, Nancy's housemaid who would, in the Revised Editions, be upgraded into a surrogate mother for our otherwise mom-less girl detective. In the Original Versions, she's just the hired help and Nancy does not hold her in the esteem of a mother figure. This picture reflects that (this is the first time Hannah has been depicted in one of the illustrations). Later illustrations of Hannah would show her as a skinny, kindly, grandmotherly old lady. 2) The sneering woman on the far right is a typical example of Nancy's villains from this period of her history: the uncouth members of the working class who don't know their place and somehow managed to finagle their way into some more deserving rich person's money. The difference between Hannah (who is also a member of the working class) and this other woman is that Hannah does know her place and does not seek to escape it. Maintaining the social status quo is very, very important in Nancy Drew's world--in fact, that's essentially Nancy's mission in life. It would take over 50 years before this aspect of the series would finally be reconceptualized (basically, until the death of/sale of the company by Harriet Stratemeyer-Adams, who was very much a member of the upper class and saw Nancy as her creation, even her daughter, and therefore made Nancy into a stalwart defender of the upper class against the lower-class scoundrels who sought to cheat their way up the ladder).

For all the pomp and circumstance today about Nancy being some kind of great feminist figure, or progressive heroine, she was actually intended to be exactly the opposite of that from her creation until at least 1980, 50 years later. She was a stalwart defender of the status quo and constantly sought to maintain the social structure that she directly benefited from.

Description

This picture is interesting, because it gives us a look at two different things: 1) that angry lady in the middle, holding the broom, is Hannah Gruen, Nancy's housemaid who would, in the Revised Editions, be upgraded into a surrogate mother for our otherwise mom-less girl detective. In the Original Versions, she's just the hired help and Nancy does not hold her in the esteem of a mother figure. This picture reflects that (this is the first time Hannah has been depicted in one of the illustrations). Later illustrations of Hannah would show her as a skinny, kindly, grandmotherly old lady. 2) The sneering woman on the far right is a typical example of Nancy's villains from this period of her history: the uncouth members of the working class who don't know their place and somehow managed to finagle their way into some more deserving rich person's money. The difference between Hannah (who is also a member of the working class) and this other woman is that Hannah does know her place and does not seek to escape it. Maintaining the social status quo is very, very important in Nancy Drew's world--in fact, that's essentially Nancy's mission in life. It would take over 50 years before this aspect of the series would finally be reconceptualized (basically, until the death of/sale of the company by Harriet Stratemeyer-Adams, who was very much a member of the upper class and saw Nancy as her creation, even her daughter, and therefore made Nancy into a stalwart defender of the upper class against the lower-class scoundrels who sought to cheat their way up the ladder).

For all the pomp and circumstance today about Nancy being some kind of great feminist figure, or progressive heroine, she was actually intended to be exactly the opposite of that from her creation until at least 1980, 50 years later. She was a stalwart defender of the status quo and constantly sought to maintain the social structure that she directly benefited from.