In that story there was related how Tom made the acquaintance of an odd individual, named Mr. Wakefield Damon, who was continually blessing himself, some part of his anatomy, or his possessions.  Mr. Damon was riding a motor-cycle, and it started to climb a tree, to his pain and fright.  Afterward Tom purchased the machine, and had many adventures on it, including a chase after a gang of men who had stolen a valuable patent model belonging to Mr. Swift.

Mr. Swift, and his son were both inventors.  They lived together in a fine house in the suburbs of Shopton, New York, and with them dwelt Mrs. Baggert, the housekeeper (for Tom’s mother was dead), and also Garret Jackson, an expert engineer, who aided the young inventor and his father in perfecting many machines.

There was also another semi-member of the household, to wit, Eradicate Sampson, an eccentric colored man, who owned a mule called Boomerang.  Eradicate did odd jobs around the place, and the mule assisted his owner—­that is when the mule felt like it.

In the second volume of the series, entitled “Tom Swift and His Motor-Boat,” there was related the incidents following a pursuit after a gang of unprincipled men, who sought to get Possession of some of Mr. Swift’s patents, and it was while in this boat that Tom, his father, and a friend, Ned Newton, rescued from Lake Carlopa a Mr. John Sharp, who fell from his burning balloon.  Mr. Sharp was a skilled aeronaut, and after his recovery he joined Tom in building a big airship, called the Red Cloud.  Tom’s adventures in this craft are set down in detail in the third volume of the series, called “Tom Swift and His Airship.”  Not only did he and Mr. Sharp and Mr. Damon make a great trip, but they captured some bank robbers, and incidentally cleared themselves from the imputation of having looted the vault of seventy-five thousand dollars, which charge was fostered by a certain Mr. Foger, and his son Andy, who was Tom’s enemy.

Not satisfied with having conquered the air, Tom and his father set to work to gain a victory over the ocean.  They built a boat that could navigate under water, and, in the fourth book of the series, called “Tom Swift and His Submarine Boat,” you will find an account of how they went under the ocean to secure a sunken treasure, and the fight they had with their enemies who sought to get it away from them.  They went through many perils, not the least of which was capture by a foreign warship.

In the fifth book, entitled “Tom Swift and His Electric Runabout,” there was told the story of a wonderfully speedy electric automobile the young inventor constructed, and how he made a great race in it, and saved from ruin a bank, in which his father and Mr. Damon were interested.

Tom’s ability as an inventor had, by this time, become well known.  One day, as related in a volume called “Tom Swift and His Wireless Message,” he received a letter from a Mr. Hosmer Fenwick, of Philadelphia, asking his aid in perfecting an airship which the resident of the Quaker City had built, but which would not work.  In his small monoplane, the Butterfly, Tom and Mr. Damon went to Philadelphia, as Mr. Damon was acquainted with Mr. Fenwick.