dime novel
The dime novel is a form of late 19th-century and early 20th-century American popular fiction issued in series of inexpensive paperbound editions. The term ''dime novel'' has been used as a catchall term for several different but related form ...
s published primarily for boys. The first novel, ''Frank Reade and His Steam Man of the Plains'', an imitation of Edward Ellis's '' The Steam Man of the Prairies'' (1868), was written by Harry Enton and serialized in the Frank Tousey juvenile magazine ''Boys of New York,'' February 28 through April 24, 1876. The four Frank Reade stories concerned adventures with the character's inventions, various robot-like mechanisms powered by steam.
A very long series of juvenile novels followed which featured the son of Frank Reade, ''Frank Reade Jr.'', as its teenaged inventor-hero. These stories were written by Luis P. Senarens (1865–1939) with the pseudonym ''Noname''. Extremely popular during their time, they were often reprinted and new stories have been created as recently as 2011, in the pulp short story collection, '' Wildthyme in Purple''. They were first serialized in ''Boys of New York'', then the individual novels were collected in the ''Franke Reade Library'' series that followed. Some were later reprinted in ''Wide Awake Library''.
His inventions included
airship
An airship, dirigible balloon or dirigible is a type of aerostat (lighter-than-air) aircraft that can navigate through the air flying powered aircraft, under its own power. Aerostats use buoyancy from a lifting gas that is less dense than the ...
s of the dirigible-balloon and helicopter type, submersibles, steam-driven and electrical land vehicles, and
steam
Steam is water vapor, often mixed with air or an aerosol of liquid water droplets. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization. Saturated or superheated steam is inv ...
- and
electric
Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter possessing an electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described by Maxwel ...
-powered
robot
A robot is a machine—especially one Computer program, programmable by a computer—capable of carrying out a complex series of actions Automation, automatically. A robot can be guided by an external control device, or the robot control, co ...
s.
The Frank Reade stories are perhaps the best known of the many boys' invention fiction series published in America during the later 19th century. Frank Reade Jr. has appeared as an older man in Alan Moore's '' Nemo: Heart of Ice'', and the Reade family as a whole has also been featured in Paul Guinan and Anina Bennett's ''Frank Reade: Adventures in the Age of Invention''.
Examples
* #12 ''Frank Reade and His Steam Man of the Plains; Or, The Terror of the West'' (1876)
* #14 ''Frank Reade and His Steam Horse'' (1876)
* #16 ''Frank Reade and His Steam Team'' (1876)
* #18 ''Frank Reade and His Steam Tally-Ho'' (1876)
* #20 ''Frank Reade, Jr., and His Steam Wonder'' (1882/1893)
* #22 ''Frank Reade, Jr., and His Electric Boat'' (1882/1893)
* #26 '' Frank Reade Jr., and His Air-Ship'' (1883-84/1893)
* #34 ''Across the Continent on Wings; Or, Frank Reade Jr.'s Greatest Flight'' (1885/1893)
* #44 ''Frank Reade, Jr., and His Queen Clipper of the Clouds'' (1893)
* #53 ''From Pole to Pole; Or, Frank Reade, Jr.'s Strange Submarine Voyage'' (1890/1893)
* #58 ''Frank Reade, Jr., and His Electric Coach; Or, The Search for the Isle of the Diamonds'' (1890/1893)
Steampunk
Steampunk is a subgenre of science fiction that incorporates retrofuturistic technology and Applied arts, aesthetics inspired by, but not limited to, 19th-century Industrial Revolution, industrial steam engine, steam-powered machinery. Steampun ...
*
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. Inaugurated in 1910, the sequence of series comprises more than 100 volumes. The fi ...