While young Tom Swift is in a jewelry store shopping for a ring for Mary, he meets a man who claims to be willing to teach Tom how to make diamonds. Later, the man (who happens to be one of the party that Tom rescued in the book Tom Swift and his Wireless Message) tells Tom his story - how he was approached by a group of men who knew how to make diamonds, how he actually watched them make diamonds, and how he gave them some money, and how they dumped him (but not before giving him a fortune in diamonds). The man urges Tom to go with him on a hunt for these diamond makers. Victor Appleton was used as a pseudonym by the Stratemeyer Syndicate, most famous for being associated with the Tom Swift series of books. Created by Edward Stratemeyer, the Stratemeyer Syndicate was the first book packager to have its books aimed at children, rather than adults. The Syndicate was so successful that at one time it was believed that the overwhelming majority of the books children read were from the Stratemeyer Syndicate.