Irene Elliott Benson

Irene Elliott Benson was an American author associated with the early wave of Camp Fire Girls fiction, a popular branch of children's series books published in the 1910s. Reliable online library and ebook records confirm works including How Ethel Hollister Became a Campfire Girl (1912), Ethel Hollister's Second Summer as a Campfire Girl (1912), Campfire Girls' Lake Camp; or, Searching for New Adventures (with Stella M. Francis), and Quest of a Secret (1918).

Her best-known stories center on Ethel Hollister and other girls learning confidence, responsibility, and friendship through camp life and outdoor experience. Modern summaries of the surviving texts show that her novels mix adventure with personal growth, often contrasting social expectations with a heroine's wish for a fuller, more independent life.

Little biographical information about Benson herself is easy to confirm from the sources available here, but her books remain accessible through public-domain archives such as Project Gutenberg and library listings. That continued availability has helped keep her work in circulation for readers interested in vintage girls' series fiction and the history of early 20th-century children's literature.