Tom Swift

Tom Swift was a long-running book series from the Stratemeyer Syndicate (later to publish Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys). Debuting in 1910, the title character is a boy inventor, whose age would progress into early adulthood (and even father Tom Swift, Jr. in a spinoff series) but regressed back over the various incarnations. Each book title reflects his current invention, several times with "Electric" as an adjective: Tom Swift and His Electric Runabout, Tom Swift and His Electric Rifle, and Tom Swift and His Electric Locomotive. As with other Stratemeyer series, all books were credited to a pen name (Victor Appleton), though most of the early books were written by Uncle Wiggily creator Howard Garis.
The writing style was heavy on "Tom said" phrasings, usually accompanied by an adverb (and later spawning the punning joke style "Tom Swifties," where the adverb matches the statement, such as "'We're out of hay,' said Tom balefully.") 
The heyday of the Tom Swift books ended in 1941, but revivals of varying tenures have cropped up periodically, as late as 2019.
==References==
*The 1967 Pak-Nit industrial films employ a voice-over narrator to add "said [character]" for each statement, and using a Swifties-esque pun in Shrinkenstein, "begged Shrinkenstein as he shrank into a corner."
*At the end of a "Rowlf-In" segment in a 1969 IBM industrial film, Rowlf teases as a coming attraction, Tom Swift and His Electric Writing Machine.
*The script for Sesame Street Episode 1087 called for Mr. Hooper to donate a Tom Swift book to the bookmobile, but different titles were substituted for the final episode. The script uses Tom Swift and His Electric Airplane, which was not an actual title, combining the "Electric" motif with aeronautic titles such as Tom Swift and His Airship.
*John Crichton has an Alice in Wonderland-esque dream in the Farscape novel Ship of Ghosts in which, as he falls through the darkness, a shelf stacked with complete collections of Tom Swift and The Hardy Boys books drifts by.
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Category:Literary References