Top 3 Girl Detectives from My Childhood

Summer feels made for reading, doesn't it?  It's what I spent most of my time doing when I was a kid and the days stretched long and hot before me.  There was no Netflix where I could watch anything I wanted on demand.  (I can still remember some of the line-up on WTTO Channel 21 that included The Beverley Hillbillies and Gomer Pyle U.S.M.C. )  There were no iPads for playing games; my parents had to drive me to the city library where I would go to the circulation desk and ask for the floppy disk box containing Oregon Trail.  That was always so exciting, even though most of the time I never made it to Oregon, having lost all of my possessions crossing a river along the way.  

Is it possible to carry that much food in a wagon?

The kids and I walked to the library yesterday, and I walked away with a small stack of books to read over the next three weeks.  Ella borrowed a book she's already read and enjoyed once before, and it made me think of the young girls and ladies that I read about over and over growing up. These were my favorites, again and again.

I only ever owned three of these books, but I re-read them on a consistent basis.  Maybe I'll go on an e-bay quest to find more.  Trixie was the more relatable of the amateur female detectives I read.  She was certainly the youngest at 13, which still seems so grown-up when you're 9 or 10.  I learned so many useful things from these books, like how to use a tourniquet if you got bit by a copperhead and that there was a lot more to New York state than the city of the same name.

Of course I read this lady.  What a time capsule for what 18 can look like!  At 18 years-old Nancy could be trusted to stay on a budget with the money her father gave her for clothing, pay attention to the sermon at church, and she held the unwavering respect of Chief McGinnis of the River Heights police force.  She handled being chloroformed and tied up by ne'er do well criminals with aplomb.  Nothing that came her way could take away her desire for the next mystery to solve.  She was always doing exciting things like taking the overnight train to New York, a steamer boat to South America, or driving down to New Orleans in her infamous blue convertible.  She's still my hero.

There was a shelf full of these at my local library growing up, and I didn't re-read them as often as Trixie and Nancy, but Cherry was a good heroine just the same, pursuing her career sometimes as an army nurse and in other books as a house visitor.  And of course, there was always a healthy dose of detection on the side.

Who were your favorite girl detectives?  Is there someone amazing I missed?

"Ned said 'Nancy Drew is the best girl detective in the whole world!'
'Don't you believe him,' Nancy said quickly. 

'I have solved some mysteries, 

I'll admit, and I enjoy it, 

but I'm sure there are many other girls who could do the same.'"