Tom Swift is cool! When I was growing up I had many of his books and they always stimulated the imagination. In retrospect he was way ahead of his time. Most of the books I had as a kid were written in the late 50’s or early sixties.
While the tomes were always predictable, they were actually based on scientific research. I looked back at some excerpts from ‘Tom Swift and the Triphibian Atomicar” printed in 1963. Sounds a lot like some of the hybrid cars that are being produced only cooler. And his car gets much better mileage.
Excerpt:
…She and Sandy soon forgot the frightening experience the sheer exhilaration of spinning along as quietly as a breeze. The lack of engine noise, Tom explained, was due to the car being driven by four small electric motors, one of them mounted at each wheel.
“And that steering lever does everything?” Phyl asked.
“Practically everything,” Tom said. “Accelerates, slows, stops, turns, or reverses–depending on how you move the stick.”
Passing motorists goggled admiringly at the bronze, bubble-hooded sports car. As Tom drove farther into the country, the highway skirted pleasant green woodland on the left, while off to the right the blue waters of Lake Carlopa sparkled in the June sunshine.
Sounds convincingly like a 2005 Toyota Prius
