Swifties (was re: I think I hurt myself)

[Haggridd]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at y..., belinda at s... wrote:
> 
> Okay, this obviously identifies me as a newbie, but in casting about 
> for anything to do other than the work on my desk, I found and read 
> the list of Tom Swifties. I think I hurt myself laughing. 
> 
> Humor my ignorance - where did the name come from?(she asked 
> originally.) How was the list compiled? It's too funny. 
> 
> Thanks
> 
> Belinda

There was a series of boys' fiction early in the century about a teen 
scientist/adventurer named Tom Swift.  They were written by a bunch 
of hacks under the collective pen name Victor Appleton.  One of the 
hallmarks of the formulaic way it was written was the use of 
singularly appropriate adverbs to describe how Tom or another 
character spoke about the matter at hand, e.g. "'What a big bomb that 
was!' Tom shouted explosively."  Get it?

The newer series in the fifties and sixties, Tom Swift Jr. (written 
under the pseudonym Victor Appleton II), did not make use of this 
quirk of phrasing, but at that time it became a fad to come up with 
similar phrases, hence, "Swifties" in honor of the old book series.

Haggridd