All books in the various

Tom Swift Tom Swift is the main character of six series of American juvenile science fiction and adventure novels that emphasize science, invention, and technology. First published in 1910, the series totals more than 100 volumes. The character was ...

book series. All books are credited to the pseudonym Victor Appleton (or, in the case of the ''Tom Swift Jr.'' series, Victor Appleton II), while the character was created by

Edward Stratemeyer Edward L. Stratemeyer (; October 4, 1862 – May 10, 1930) was an American publisher, writer of children's fiction, and founder of the Stratemeyer Syndicate. He was one of the most prolific writers in the world, producing in excess of 1,300 ...

for his book packaging house, the

Stratemeyer Syndicate The Stratemeyer Syndicate was a publishing company that produced a number of mystery book series for children, including Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys, the various Tom Swift series, the Bobbsey Twins, the Rover Boys, and others. They published and ...

. Counterparts to the Tom Swift character and series are later Stratemeyer creations,

The Hardy Boys The Hardy Boys, brothers Frank and Joe Hardy, are fictional characters who appear in several mystery series for children and teens. The series revolves around teenagers who are amateur sleuths, solving cases that stumped their adult counterp ...

and

Nancy Drew Nancy Drew is a fictional character appearing in several mystery book series, movies, and a TV show as a teenage amateur sleuth. The books are ghostwritten by a number of authors and published under the collective pseudonym Carolyn Keene. Crea ...

, the former of which Swift crossed over with in the fourth series.

The original ''Tom Swift'' series

The first novels to feature the ''Tom Swift'' character were released in 1910 by Grosset & Dunlap. The series was created by

, and written by several ghostwriters in its duration. The first 38 titles were published by Grosset & Dunlap, with two ghostwriters:

Howard Garis Howard Roger Garis ( – ) was an American author, best known for a series of books that featured the character of Uncle Wiggily Longears, an engaging elderly rabbit. Many of his books were illustrated by Lansing Campbell. Garis and his wife, Li ...

wrote the first thirty-five titles, while

Harriet Adams Harriet Stratemeyer Adams (December 12, 1892 – March 27, 1982) was an American juvenile book packager, children's novelist, and publisher who was responsible for some 200 books over her literary career. She wrote the plot outlines for many boo ...

wrote the final three. Two more titles were published as a part of the

Big Little Book series The Big Little Books, first published during 1932 by the Whitman Publishing Company of Racine, Wisconsin, were small, compact books designed with a captioned illustration opposite each page of text. Other publishers, notably Saalfield, adopted ...

(by rival

Western Publishing Western Publishing, also known as Western Printing and Lithographing Company, was a Racine, Wisconsin, firm responsible for publishing the Little Golden Books. Its Golden Books Family Entertainment division also produced children's books and ...

), and were ghostwritten by Thomas Moyston Mitchell.

''Tom Swift Jr.''

Officially titled ''Tom Swift Jr.'', the second series was published by Grosset & Dunlap from 1954 to 1971.''Tom Swift and the Visitor from Planet X''
an
''Tom Swift and the Electronic Hydrolung''
are in the public domain, and are available as downloadable texts from

Project Gutenberg Project Gutenberg (PG) is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, as well as to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks." It was founded in 1971 by American writer Michael S. Hart and is the oldest digital libr ...

''Tom Swift'' (1981)

The third Tom Swift series was launched following the

moving publishers to

Simon & Schuster Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest pu ...

. The series was published under the publisher's Wanderer imprint (as were the ''Nancy Drew'' and ''Hardy Boys'' books at the time), and lasted from 1981 to 1984. This series took place in outer space and featured fan-favorite character Aristotle the Robot, who was introduced in the second volume. The series was cancelled in 1984, when Simon & Schuster bought the Syndicate. Two titles — ''Chaos on Earth'' and ''The Micro World'' — were written by Neal Barrett, but not published before its cancellation. The manuscripts of the two titles are in the Syndicate's archives, which are held at the New York Public Library.

''Tom Swift'' (1991)

The fourth Tom Swift series was created as a counterpart to

The Nancy Drew Files ''The Nancy Drew Files'', or the ''Nancy Drew Case Files'', is a detective fiction series started in 1986 and released by Simon & Schuster, New York. It is a spin-off of the original series of novels featuring Nancy Drew, with a greater emphasis ...

and The Hardy Boys Casefiles spin-offs, and was published by Archway from 1991 to 1993. The series had two books which crossed over with the Hardy Boys, a sub-series titled ''Hardy Boys and Tom Swift Ultra Thrillers'' — ''Time Bomb'' (August 1992) and ''The Alien Factor'' (June 1993).

''Tom Swift: Young Inventor''

The fifth series to feature the Tom Swift character was published by Aladdin from 2006 to 2007. The series served as a counterpart to Nancy Drew: Girl Detective and The Hardy Boys: Undercover Brothers series, both of which were reboots of their original series. Like its counterparts, a big part of the reboot was that titles were now written in first-person narration. The series was cancelled in late 2007, while its counterparts were rebooted into trilogies. A seventh title, ''Extraterrestrial Highway'', was planned for publication in February 2008; however, it ultimately remained unpublished. There are ISBN's registered for volumes 8-11 in this series, but the titles and status of the manuscripts are unknown.

''Tom Swift Inventors' Academy''

The sixth series to feature the Tom Swift character was launched by Aladdin in July 2019. It features a young Swift, age is around thirteen, who attends a school for young inventors and scientists. This series, a counterpart to the Hardy Boys Adventures and Nancy Drew Diaries series, is told in first-person narration, and published in eBook, paperback, and hardcover. Audiobooks of the first five titles released on CD narrated by Timothy Andres Pabon. A boxed set of the first four paperbacks was also published using cover art from the first book.

References

Notes

{{wikisource, Portal:Stratemeyer_ Syndicate#Tom_Swift, Tom Swift Books Book series introduced in 1910