Travel Adventure Series
The Travel-Adventure Series is a four volume set published by W. A.
Wilde and Company. The first two titles were written by Thomas W. Knox.
The original intent was that Knox would write all of the books in this
series. Unfortunately in January, 1896 after the second book was
published, Knox died.
His books describe the adventures of Mr. Whitney and his two nephews,
Ned and Harry.
This page is from the Land of the Kangaroo first edition.
 |
Hezekiah Butterworth, the author of perhaps the most popular juvenile
travelogue series, the Zig-Zag books, wrote the other two books in the
series. Thus the first two books have common characters which are
different from the travelers in the third and fourth books. The
Butterworth books chronicle adventures and storytelling of Captain
Henry Frobisher and his nephews and niece.
1. In Wild Africa (Knox) 1895 (6 full page illustrations on glossy paper)
2. Land of the Kangaroo (Knox) 1896 (4 full page illustrations on glossy paper)
3. Over the Andes; or, Our Boys in New South America (Butterworth) 1897 (5 full page illustrations on glossy paper)
4.
Lost in Nicaragua; or, Among Coffee Farms and Banana Lands, in the
Countries of the Great Canal. (Butterworth) 1898 (5 full page
illustrations on glossy paper)
Three formats have been seen.
Format 1. Only Volumes 1-2 were published in this format. The books are
8" x 6". Both titles were illustrated by H. Burgess. Note that these
earlier books list only Boston and the firm's street address in the
imprint. The books cost $1.50
Book #1 First edition has no advertisement for the series.
 |
 |
 |
 |
Format 2. Volumes 1-4
These books are 8 x 6. Three of the four books have glossy full page
pictorial illustrations done by H. Burgess. Over the Andes was
illustrated by Henry Sandham. The books still cost $1.50. The imprint
now states that Wilde is in Boston and Chicago.
A four volume boxed set for $6.00 was available.
No priority exists for either of these covers
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
Format 3.
Cloth cover with pictorial picture. (I have only seen one of the four
titles in this format.)
 |
 |