The Secret of the Old Clock

Welcome to my new Nancy Drew blog, where I plan to talk a whole lot about Nancy Drew books : )  And today, I'm starting with the very first Nancy Drew, The Secret of the Old Clock.

Let's take a look at the book covers first, or at least the ones currently in my collection.  The one on the left is the Applewood Books edition of the original text (OT), published in 1991, and it has several charcoal illustrations by Russell H. Tandy.  The cover scene is from the book's climax, where Nancy has snatched the clock out of the thieves' moving van and is taking it into the woods to examine it.  Not sure those shoes are the ones I'd choose for such an adventure, but they are cute and you gotta love the cloche hat.

The middle one is the revised text (RT) with a cover illustration by Bill Gillies and the scene is shortly after the Tandy cover, as she's already got the front off the clock.  I love that deep royal blue dress with her blonde hair, but Nancy's facial expression makes her look like a Kewpie doll.  You'll notice that sometimes her hair is very, very blonde, sometimes it's red, and sometimes it's in between on the book covers. 

The one on the right looks the most beat up but it was published last and it's been in my collection for probably something like 35 years, I hope I'm not the one who beat it up but I don't remember if I got it new or used.  Anyway, this is the Rudy Nappi cover; you can see the identifying moon on top of the clock the best on this one and I love Nancy's green dress and 60s hair.  Not gonna lie, when I cut my hair short and it suddenly decided to flip out on the ends like Nancy's, I was not displeased, though sadly mine is boring brown and not reddish like Nancy's on this cover.

I really like the middle cover as your eye can't help but go to Nancy first where I think she's a little too dark in the first one.  However I think the cover on the right wins this time just because it's my childhood book.

On to the two versions of the text, starting with the OT version.

Case File:
The book starts with Nancy discussing Josiah Crowley's recent death with her father, attorney Carson Drew; Nancy is indignant that Crowley's fortune is going to the snooty Topham family as the daughters Ada and Isabel were her nemeses in high school.  They go to lunch with Mr. Rolsted, another lawyer, who believes that Crowley made a second will.  Nancy soon meets Grace and Allie Horner, who tell her that Crowley had promised them money in his will and they also think he wrote a second one.

Nancy has a couple of unpleasant run-ins with Ada and Isabel Topham (who are basically Cinderella's stepsisters) where the other girls are rude to saleswomen in a department store.  Ada breaks an expensive vase and tries to blame it on the saleswoman but Nancy intervenes and Ada is made to pay $50 for it, so now she's big mad at Nancy.  Nancy happens to overhear the other girls talking about the possibility of a second will and they're worried about it.

After visiting the Horner sisters, Nancy goes to visit Matilda and Edna Turner (old maid sisters), William and Fred Mathews (farmer brothers), and Abigail Rowen (elderly widow), who all say that Crowley had promised them money too.  Abigail remembers that Crowley had told her about a notebook that had all the information about his will in it and she knows it was somehow connected to his clock, but can't remember how.  Nancy deduces that the notebook is hidden inside the clock.

Nancy sees her friend Helen Corning, who is selling charity dance tickets, so she takes four tickets to the Topham house as an excuse to go there and ask about the Crowley clock.  Mrs. Topham tells her the clock is in their bungalow at Moon Lake, so Nancy immediately plans to go to Moon Lake and stay at a girls camp with Helen and see if she can get a look at the clock.  En route to camp, Nancy's roadster gets a flat tire but she changes it herself, and once at the camp she takes the camp's boat to try to find the Topham bungalow but the engine cuts out.  She eventually fixes that too but it takes her all day out on the lake by herself.

The next day Nancy leaves the camp and drives over to the bungalow, hoping that the caretaker will let her in so she can look for the clock.  Instead she finds the house mostly empty as thieves are stealing everything.  The thieves catch her and lock her in a closet to starve; she almost gets out by herself when the caretaker finally arrives and lets her out, and they both go to the police to report the thieves.  She leads the police in the direction she thinks the thieves have gone but they split up at a crossroads; Nancy finds the thieves drinking at a roadhouse.  She sneaks into the van parked inside a barn, finds the clock, and almost gets caught again but then the thieves leave and Nancy takes the clock apart and finds the notebook before going back to find the police.

The police and Nancy find the thieves and after a short gun battle they're arrested.  Nancy goes home with the clock and notebook and finds out that Crowley had a $300K estate and his will is located in a safety deposit box under the name Josiah Harkston.  Carson gets a court order to have the box opened and later reads the new will for all the beneficiaries; all the nice poor people get lots of cash and the snooty Tophams get nothing.  They try to fight the will but they end up practically bankrupt.  Nancy goes to visit Grace and Allie, who have fixed up their house and bought lots of chickens with their inheritance; they want to reward Nancy so she tells them she wants to keep the Crowley clock.

Notes:
I read and reread the revised text versions of the Nancy Drew series many times as a child, so I noticed some differences between this and what I'm used to.  Nancy is 16 with curly golden hair cut in a bob, and she drives the roadster; Carson is a "criminal and mystery lawyer" and former DA.  What the heck is a mystery lawyer??  Hannah Gruen is described as their elderly maid and doesn't have much screen time in the book, whereas I'm used to her being their housekeeper and more like a part of the family.  Nancy is always a ball of energy--she never gets in or out of the roadster, she springs.  Also she's got some serious schadenfreude happening with the Tophams, she absolutely gloats when they lose the Crowley estate.  There wasn't nearly as much description of Nancy's wardrobe or tasty food made by Hannah, both of which are mentioned a lot in the RT versions (and food and clothes are frequently mentioned in modern cozy mysteries).

The caretaker, Jeff Turner, has pretty much an entire chapter with Nancy while he tells the story of what happened to him and that scene is 100% why the book was revised, it's terrible to say the least.  Jeff is described as the "negro caretaker" and he's an alcoholic.  The thieves lured him away from the bungalow, got him drunk, and stole the keys; he turns back up once he's sobered up somewhat.  He thinks Nancy might be one of the thieves while she's locked in the closet and so she screams to prove she's a girl, to which he says "Hold yo' siren!" which I think was the funniest line in the entire book and the only good part about this scene.  She takes him to a nearby town to notify the police (he knows the way to the jail because he's been a guest there before, wow) and then literally leaves him standing on the curb while she goes off to chase the bad guys.  Not very kind of her.

The other thing that got a lot of revision was Nancy's interaction with the police.  Once she grabs the clock and meets up with the police for the final chase, Nancy decides against mentioning the clock in her car at all.  The police (and the crooks) are more gun happy--one police officer instructs the men "Don't fire unless it's necessary, but if they resist, pepper them!" and they do get in a gun battle with the thieves.  I heard in a podcast recently that while racism was a big reason for the books to be revised, the publishers also wanted to change Nancy's interactions with the police so the police would be shown in a more positive light.  Both of those happened here.

On to the revised text (RT).

Revised Case File:
This version is similar to the OT, but each of the beneficiaries of the will is given a particular reason for wanting the money (and the names are changed a bit).  Edna and Mary Turner are raising their 5-year-old grandniece Judy and need the money for her; Nancy spends some time with them and plays badminton with Judy.  Grace and Allison Hoover need to fix up their house and Allison wants singing lessons; Nancy arranges for Allison to audition with a famous voice teacher in River Heights.  Fred and William Mathews want to travel; when Nancy first arrives at their farm, she sees an injured "police puppy" and when she picks it up, the mama dog knocks her down (guess they couldn't figure out a way to work traveling into the extended scenes with the Mathews brothers).  Abby Rowen is old and needs medical care, but her scenes with Nancy are pretty much the same as the OT.  Also, when Nancy meets the Turner sisters, they've just sold furniture to a group of men who they found out later had also stolen the Turners' silver, and these thieves end up being the same crew who rob the Topham bungalow in the end, which I thought was a nice extra.  The caretaker's role is greatly reduced and he's only described as being "very tall, thin, and elderly"; he was locked in a shed by the thieves this time and nobody has any alcohol or guns.  The thieves get names in this version (Sid, Jake, and Parky) whereas they were unnamed in the OT.  The scenes of getting the will from the bank are shortened quite a bit and oddly, the estate goes from $300K in the OT to $100K in the RT.

Notes:
In the OT, Nancy was reading about the Crowley case in the papers and discussing it with her dad, whereas here she gets a lot of information when pretty much every other character in the book spills their life story to her unprompted.  Nancy's roadster has been upgraded to a new dark blue convertible and she's now 18.  Hannah participates more in conversations with Nancy and Carson and she has more screen time than in the OT.  Nancy doesn't gloat quite so much about the Tophams not getting the estate, and the Hoovers give Nancy the clock as a memento rather than her asking for it.

Nancy's Skills:  
She is frequently described as a skillful driver and changes a flat tire on the way to Moon Lake with no trouble.  It takes her 8 hours, but she eventually fixes the boat so she can get back to the camp.  She almost got herself out of the closet before the caretaker showed up by using the clothing rod as a lever against the door hinges.

Nancy Drew, Fashion Model:  
In this book, Nancy wears a tan cotton suit (really Nancy, tan?  how boring), a yellow "sunback" dress (I'm guessing that means it's open on the back) with a jacket, a blue summer sweater suit, and a simple green linen sports dress with a matching sweater.  She buys a pale blue chiffon and lace evening gown after Ada rips it and she has it repaired.

Cooking with Hannah:  
Hannah makes apple pudding for dessert one night and now I'm looking up recipes because I want to know more about that.  She also makes waffles for breakfast one day, and sends Nancy with a jar of beef broth and a casserole of chicken and rice for Abby Rowen when Nancy goes to tell Abby about the disposition of the new will.

Nancy's Mysterious Souvenir:
She gets to keep the Crowley clock as a memento of her first solo detective case.

Rating:
Three stars for the OT because the stuff with the caretaker is so egregious.  Five stars for the RT because it's such a big piece of my childhood reading.