Customer Reviews

Tom Swift and His Big Tunnel

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This story in the original series is not one of the stronger ones, in that there is no "great" invention. To me, one of the greatest strengths in all of the Tom Swift series was the grandiose nature of the inventions. A Mr. Job Titus approaches Tom, seeking his help in blasting a tunnel through the Andes Mountains in Peru. The Titus Brothers Company has been hired by the Peruvian government to blast a long railroad tunnel through the mountains and they have encountered some extremely hard rock. This has slowed them considerably, and they are in danger of falling behind schedule and failing to meet their deadline. Tom agrees to aid them and he travels to the construction site in Peru.

The site is primitive and the workforce is made up of a small number of white overseers and a large number of native laborers. Given the date when the original was written, the natives are lazy and the whites hard working. After some labor difficulties when an entire work gang disappears from the tunnel and some attempts by rivals to sabotage the job, Tom's group triumphs. In their construction, they unearth an entire ancient city that was somehow buried in a hollow space in the mountain. In fact, the proposed location of the railroad tunnel goes right down an arterial road on the edge of the town. This means that no part of the city has to be destroyed for the railroad and Tom's group is saved a large amount of excavating. This was absurd; it is difficult to see how a hollow mountain could somehow grow around a city.

I cannot get excited about this story, the invention of a more powerful explosive is the only new idea and some of the plot lines are very farfetched, even for a Tom Swift story.