R.I.P. Donald J. Sobol, Encyclopedia Brown Author, 1924-2012 | Hacker News Reader

R.I.P. Donald J. Sobol, Encyclopedia Brown Author, 1924-2012

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128 pointstokenadult29 comments

Donald Sobol is probably, apart from my parents, a big reason I have a mind that works. R.I.P. Encyclopedia Brown. Your 25¢ per day + expenses brought justice to those who had little other hope. And bravo for expensing an occasional sundae to the adults, too.

And of course how could they call it the FIRST Battle of Bull Run when there hadn't been a SECOND ONE YET?

That's the one Encyclopedia Brown book that I actually remember! Was it particularly popular or something?

According to Amazon and Wikipedia, "The Case of the Civil War Sword" was part of the very first Encyclopedia Brown book, which probably explains why we remember it.

Encyclopedia Brown Boy Detective was one of the first books I actually owned as a child (I lived close to a library), actually getting it from my school's Reading is Fundamental Days. I must have read that book over and over again, always forcing myself to try and "forget" how the mystery was solved so I could reread them and try to pick up the "clues"

The cover I had (which depicts the Civil War sword mystery) looked exactly like this one http://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-media/product-gallery/0553...

I always wondered why that boy behind Bugs Meanie had only a floating head with no body. But it's still way better than the red cover they have for it now.

Well, World War I was referred to as "the first world war" as early as 1914 [1] and the term was fairly popular even before World War II, so there is some precedent.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_I#Names

Those books were like the MacGuyver TV series for me - loved them as a kid, but upon revisiiting them as an adult wondered what the hell I was thinking. Oh well, I guess he knew his audience. RIP.

I had a slightly different experience. I loved the Einstein Anderson books as a kid, but could never get into the Encyclopedia Brown stories, since I could never understand the ending explanations. Coming back as an adult, I felt unnecessary vindication in finding how many of the ending explanation simply didn't make sense.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ConvictionByCount...

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ConvictionByContr...

Still, I also recognize that the books were a great introduction to mysteries and deduction for a lot of students and his passing does sadden me.

Hah! Nice link. I do remember some of those from childhood, including this one which I found to be false even as a kid:

"""One solution in Encyclopedia Brown Takes the Cake relied on the fact that the culprit had used glycerin tears that fell from the outside corners of her eyes instead of the inside, thus revealing them to be fake, as "If only one tear falls, it will run from the inside corner of the eye, by the nose, and not from the outside corner." Only, none of that is true. """

As a child I felt the endings were less about deductive reasoning and more about "ha ha! here is a clue I wrote about in a way to deliberately make you, the reader, not attach importance to it!"

Having said that I did read all the Encyclopedia brown in the School library so they were still good, just not great.

I have to agree. The characters and situations have held up upon re-reading, but the explanations are very hit-or-miss.

Like many other people here, I absolutely loved the series and would rush to the school library to get the next book in the series. It taught me at a young age to be very logical and think through problems.

Bugs Meany and Sally, you will be missed.

I read a lot of Encyclopedia Brown and the Great Brain up until the time I discovered Robb White.

The Great Brain series was awesome and inspirational. Definitely recommend to any budding young (7-15?) hackers afoot. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Brain

My sisters and I and later my own kids all loved the Great Brain books. Anybody here with a kid reader in your life who hasn't tried them yet, get them them!

I loved the Encyclopedia Brown books too, though of course they were more formulaic. Pretty sure I didn't have the patience to figure out many of the mysteries, though. Why do that when you can just skip to the end?

I re-read them a few years ago, they were still fun. Combining the pioneer days feel with complicated schemes is a winning plan.

Other favorite childhood series- The Mad Scientists Club and The Three Investigators.

I've never been much of a reader, but I absolutely loved these books when I was a kid. Finding one I hadn't read yet at the school library was like finding hidden treasure. RIP Mr. Sobol, you brought many children a lot of joy.

That was sad to read, I read these stories and loved them. I agree that they had the ability to make you think about what had to be true in order to 'solve' the particular case. An excellent critical thinking tutorial.

I loved the Encyclopedia Brown books so much, they were the model for my short stories I wrote for school, back at that age. :)

Those books were the impetus for my first startup: a mystery and math problem solving stand.

I had no customers (something about a 5 year old with a bristol board setting up shop on a tranquil suburban street strikes me as ineffective...), but I've kept the poster I made as a 5 year old kid to stay humble.

Thank you and R.I.P. Donald Sobol... you're the reason I do what I do.

This is one of a few things that made me want to be smarter as a kid.

Encyclopedia Brown was my shit when I was a young boy. I hope it was a fulfilling life and he knew how much he did for us.

He also wrote "Two-Minute Mysteries", starring Dr. Haledjian, his companion Octavia, and the bounder Bertie Tilford.

Good times.

I loved those books. Sorry to hear about his passing. RIP.

I read more Encyclopedia Brown books than I can count. One at a time just wasn't enough. This reminds me that I need to see if my daughter is interested in reading them...

Sorry to see you go Mr. Sobol, but thank you for the wonderful books!

Rest in peace. Loved his books, but I always sucked at his mysteries. Because of that, his books made me retain semi-trivial information (e.g. dogs can't see color as well as humans do) that I have no regrets over.

Topless Robot did a good summary on how ridiculous some of the "mysteries" were:

http://www.toplessrobot.com/2009/07/the_10_most_ridiculously...

A book for children, ridiculous? Never!

Wow, number 9 pretty ridiculous. The perp used the Roman numeral IIII instead of IV, and that's what jewelers do, so it must be the jeweler (and this particular one)? And most expensive watches don't even follow that?

(On a side note, I have seen IIII in the 4-spot on clocks, but only in a few places in San Francisco.)

First book I ever read was an Encyclopedia Brown book. Sad to hear it.

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