Victor Appleton was the house pseudonym used by the Stratemeyer Syndicate for the original Tom Swift series. The books were created as part of a highly successful system of juvenile adventure fiction developed by Edward Stratemeyer in the early twentieth century. The Tom Swift stories, first appearing in 1910, followed the exploits of a brilliant young inventor whose daring adventures and imaginative machines captured the enthusiasm of generations of young readers and helped shape the development of modern juvenile science fiction.