Tom Swifties

Edward Stratemeyer, a children’s writer, was the American equivalent of the creator of Billy Bunter, Charles Hamilton (1876–1961), also known as Frank Richards, Hilda Richards, Owen Conquest, Ralph Redway, and two dozen other pseudonyms.

Stratemeyer was born in Elizabeth, New Jersey, in 1862 but in 1890 moved to Newark, where he died in 1930. From 1899 onwards he produced several series of children’s books, featuring characters such as the Rover Boys (published under the name of Arthur M Winfield), the Bobbsey Twins (as Laura Lee Hope), the Hardy Boys (as Franklin W Dixon), Nancy Drew (as Carolyn Keene), and Tom Swift (as Victor Appleton). Now Charles Hamilton wrote every word that appeared under his numerous pseudonyms (an estimated lifetime’s output of …