While the Clock Ticked: A Dixonian Portrayal of the Great Depression

by Brandon Booth

No author who wrote during the most distressful times of American history--the Great Depression--can escape the issue Americans faced at hand: loss of fortunes, bank failures, job losses, bread lines. John Steinbeck portrayed the stark realities of the Depression by writing about a family migrating west because they lost their land to a dust bowl. F. Scott Fitzgerald honed in on economic class difference in his novel The Great Gatsby. Those authors told it like it was. What about Franklin W. Dixon? The average reader at first glance might overlook such hardships. Therefore Dixon paints a rosy picture of the era: nice house, roadster, friends not hard up for
money but for ice cream, hungry for adventure. But Dixon does not forget that this is the Great Depression. That comes out in the plight of the principal outlandish characters in While the Clock Ticked, Dalrymple and Applegate.

Dalrymple is a shrewd banker. He had his head above water right from the beginning of the Great Depression. He saw alot of banks fail because customers and failed businesses could not pay their loans. Dalrymple’s bank was not going to fail. He
would not lend Amos Wandy money for some gimmick. Dalrymple could see Wandy’s freelance project was not going to pay dividends. Bombarded with requests for
loans, Dalrymple would lock himself in the secret room at a dilapidated house. “I am a busy man, and when I leave the bank and return to my house at Lakeside, business matters often follow me.” (Dixon, 1932, 30). He was that desperate to return to the secret room after several death threats. Although he stated that he had no intention of occupying the house, he could risk losing his Lakeside home in the event of a bank failure.

Hurd Applegate is a victim of the stock market crash. Though he is still living at the Tower Mansion, he has almost no money. Gone are the days when the Tower
Mansion was the masterpiece mansion of Bayport. He had to fire Henry Robinson, the caretaker from the first tome “The Tower Treasure” because he could no longer pay him. “[The Hardys] were near Hurd Applegate’s house and they saw that he was out mowing
his lawn.” (Dixon, 125). Applegate's only asset left are his stamps that someone someday would buy. But he got gypped by Jensen.

How could the reader not notice the distress of Applegate and Dalrymple during the Depression era? Applegate accused Dalrymple of stealing his stamps. Characters get angry and say things they don’t mean to say. Dixon chose subtle ways to paint the stark realities of the Great Depression. Way to go Dixon.

Table of Contents' Contents: An Analysis of Hardy Boys #11, Red and Blue spine editions

by Kenneth Maage

The fact that Franklin W. Dixon rewrote his works from the 1920s, updating them for 1962 can be categorically confirmed, while some in the Hardy Boys Literary Society and other Hardy Boys scholars believe the rewrite to be performed by a third party. Many attribute both works to the hand of Franklin W. Dixon. This second view is the one taken by this author for the purpose of comparison in this essay. To examine the main differences between Dixon’s 1932 version and his 1962 work, one needs look no further than the first few pages, to the table of contents.

The first thing one notices is the confident spacing Dixon uses between lines, as if he knows that his readers, in their leisure of the late 1920s and early 30s, have time to peruse the offerings. Readers in this time have defeated the aggressors of World war I and have yet to experience the rest of the Great Depression and World War II. Dixon is saying in the spacing of the table of contents--”take time to peruse
the contents of this book.” In his 1962 version Dixon has compressed the lined spacing. In the anxiety of the cold war, Dixon has chosen a line spacing for the table of contents that reflects both the decrease in leisure time as well as a desire to conserve natural resources.

The second thing one observes is that in both versions Dixon has chosen Roman numerals to represent the chapter numbers. While this might be viewed as a unifying aspect, one can see that Dixon is saying two different things, in a more detailed analysis. In 1932 he is saying “Remember the fall of Rome because of their drunkenness and debauchery.” In this he’s encouraging the moral thrust of prohibition. In 1962, he’s reminding readers of how Rome spread its culture and democratic principals to the ends of the then known world. In this he’s encouraging readers to stand firm in the global struggle against communism.

The third thing we notice is the 1932 table of contents is split into two pages, while in 1962 it’s contained on one page. In this, Dixon is reminding the 1932 readers that the world reamins undiscovered. We must continue to explore by “turning the page,” as it were. In 1962 Franklin W. Dixon is reminding readers that the next great step in exploration is to leave the confines of the page entirely and travel to
the moon. As the Russians have shown, they had the lead in space exploration.

In conclusion, we see the masterful hand of a brilliant artist when we examine any part of the Hardy Boys books, even the table of contents.

"Grab your dancing shoes and prepare to party!" A pediatric view of suburban life

By Christopher Waln

Phil opens this tome by bursting into the Hardy home and enticing his friends to go dancing, which he mislabels partying. Because who, really, would confuse dancing with having a good time? Anyway, Frank remarks on his appearance by comparing him to a fashion plate. My aunt Lisa used to play with fashion plates and she fondly tells tales of rubbing the chalk over the paper with the plates underneath to create all manner of outfit drawings. We’re not told which skirt and top combination Phil has on right now, but he’s humming the opening bars of Vette Smashs’s #22, “I Pop My Clutch When You Wear Red.” So we can gather from that . . . well, not much, really.

On the way to the concert, which, incidentally, is neither a party nor a dance, Phil explains that he recently started dating Chrome Jewel from the band. Then we see a small exposition about how there are actually two local bands on the verge of making it big and they hate each other. The other band is the delightfully named Green Machine. My esteemed father, who read this book to me page by page at bedtime each night and then ran out of time to type my dictated causerie for the last meeting of the HBLS, never got a Green Machine. He had a Big Wheel and while he would debate his green machine owning best friend, Mike, endlessly about the merits of the big wheel, he secretly admired and even coveted his friend’s far more cool ride.

The next scene is a little too stupid to even bother discussing save for the fact that it introduces two elements. One is that the Hardys can fight, and this is such a lame book that maybe that had to be presented so that, were this my first exposure to the Hardy Boys from my esteemed father, I would be told early on that the Hardys are cool and not actually the lame fairy dancer types with a penchant for standing around back stage watching nothing in particular that they appear to be the rest of the book. Option two is that we need to be introduced to Geo Kasper in a bold way because he actually plays an integral part in the plot, what little of it there is. While he’s guarding the back entrance he’s quietly singing Vette Smash’s country crossover hit #46, “The Dog Likes My Ride Better Than Yours.”

So the band plays two sets, Phil gets pushed by an unknown assailant, and two agents are vying to get the band to sign with them. This leads up to the big publicity stunt in which the band members will bungee jump off of a bridge to promote the band’s new soon to be hit #141, “Unfurl My Bungee Cord Of Love.” Ms. Miyazaki graciously refers to this tripe as “an interesting stunt.” The next day the Hardys are helping Phil load equipment from the storehouse and discover that an extra bungee has been intentionally cut. Phil begins furiously scribbling notes to the next song, Vette Smash’s #142, “Please Don’t Bobbitt My Bungee.” The Hardys and Phil manage to stop the jump and discover that the lead guitarist’s cord had been cut. We were told earlier that Kasper also played a pretty mean guitar, and here he’s looking at the action still quietly singing “The Dog Likes My Ride Better Than Yours.” So Ken hops in his red sports car and speeds away.

He manages to show up in time for that night’s concert, however, and it’s another two-fer. During the second show the lightning generator goes awry and poor Chrome Jewel, in her metallic outfit, takes a bolt of juice and goes down. That completely interrupts the smash hit from the first self titled album, #6, “My Distributor Cap Came Loose and Now My Juice Is Everywhere” and also puts an end to the show. Julie is, fortunately, just fine and the band soon takes to blaming Phil for all of it’s ills of late. He’s a little hurt by the accusation and during his didactic diatribe on the merits of being a friend of Frank and Joe and therefore could not possibly be a bad guy, Ray grabs the backup keyboard and starts playing the melody to Vette Smash’s #134, “Speeding Down the Highway to Loser-Ville, Population: You.”

Just in time for the next concert, they make up with Phil and that allows our imperturbable onlookers, Frank and Joe, to come and stand around while more exciting events unfold. They soon do. Green Machine takes the stage first even though Vette Smash was supposed to. As the lead guitarist is about to strike the downbeat to their first ever hit, “Big Wheels Suck, And So Do You,” he gets shocked by the guitar. As I lay in my crib I thought I heard the voice of my esteemed father falter ever so slightly and as I looked over I saw a lone tear run down his cheek. “For the Big Wheel?” I asked. He simply nodded and went on.

So Green Machine leaves in a huff and Vette Smash provides a new guitar and heads on. They, of course, lead the show with maybe their biggest hit of all time, #101, “Suck, Squeeze, Pop, Poof. Another Otto Cycle Friday Night.”

The next day, since it was Saturday, the boys slept in and then went to help the band set up for yet another concert. Ken’s car nearly ran over the boys so they hopped on the motorcycles to give chase. The car got in front of a train and the boys were behind it. When the train passed they spotted the car stuck in a ditch. Ken was in the trunk and the car was wiped clean of fingerprints. The Hardys failed, however, to check the cd still playing Vette Smash’s #18, “My Engine’s Still Hot.” Ken was fine in time for the Power Bar concert and Kasper was discovered as the bad guy. Even though the concert was on Saturday night, the third and final encore ended with the remix 17-minute dance version of “Suck, Squeeze, Pop, Poof.”