And while I have a few minutes that are occupied in the journey to the house I will introduce my new readers more formally to Tom Swift and his friends.

Tom though only a young man, was an inventor of note, as his father was before him.  Father and son lived in a fine house in the town of Shopton, in New York state, and Mrs. Swift being dead, the two were well looked after by Mrs. Baggert their housekeeper.  Eradicate Sampson, as I have said, was the man of all work about the place.  Ned Newton who had a position in a Shopton bank, was Tom’s particular chum, and Mr. Wakefeld Damon, of the neighboring town of Waterfield, was a friend to all who knew him.  He had the odd habit of blessing anything and everything he could think of, interspersing it in his talk.

In the first volume of this series, called “Tom Swift and His Motor-Cycle,” I related how Tom made the acquaintance of Mr. Damon, afterward purchasing a damaged motor-cycle from the odd gentleman.  On this machine Tom had many adventures, incidentally saving some of his father’s valuable patents from a gang of conspirators.  Later Tom got a motor boat, and had many races with his rivals on Lake Carlopa, beating Andy Foger, the red-haired bully of the town, in signal fashion.  After his adventures on the water Tom sighed for some in the air, and he had them in his airship the Red Cloud.

“Tom Swift and His Submarine Boat.” is a story of a search after sunken treasure, and, returning from that quest Tom built an electric runabout, the speedest car on the road.  By means of a wireless message, later, Tom was able to save himself and the castaways of Earthquake Island, and, as a direct outcome of that experience, he was able to go in search of the diamond makers, and solve the secret of Phantom Mountain, as told in the book dealing with that subject.

When he went to the caves of ice Tom had bad luck, for his airship was wrecked, and he endured many hardships in getting home with his companions, particularly as Andy Foger sought revenge on him.

But Tom pluckily overcame all obstacles and, later, he built a sky racer, in which he made the quickest trip on record.  After that, with his electric rifle, he went after elephants in the interior of Africa and was successful in rescuing some missionaries from the terrible red pygmies.

One of the mission workers, later, sent Tom details about a buried city of gold in Mexico, and Tom and his chum together with Mr. Damon located this mysterious place after much trouble, as told in the book entitled, “Tom Swift in the City of Gold.”  The gold did not prove as valuable as they expected, as it was of low grade, but they got considerable money for it, and were then ready for more adventures.

The adventures soon came, as those of you who have read the book called, “Tom Swift and His Air Glider,” can testify.  In that I told how Tom went to Siberia, and after rescuing some Russian political exiles, found a valuable deposit of platinum, which to-day is a more valuable metal than gold.  Tom needed some platinum for his electrical machines, and it proved very useful.