Franklin W. Dixon books in order

Franklin W. Dixon is not a real person but a house pseudonym used since 1927 by a team of ghostwriters working for the Stratemeyer Syndicate, the American book-packaging firm that created the Hardy Boys detective series for young readers.

Edward Stratemeyer, the syndicate's founder, devised the brothers Frank and Joe Hardy in 1926 and sold the idea to the New York publisher Grosset & Dunlap, which chose the series name. The first three volumes, The Tower Treasure, The House on the Cliff and The Secret of the Old Mill, appeared together in 1927. The Canadian writer Leslie McFarlane wrote most of the early books from syndicate outlines and is believed to have written the first sixteen; later contributors included John Button, Andrew E. Svenson and Stratemeyer's daughter Harriet Adams. Adams and her sister Edna Squier supplied later outlines and edited every book until the mid-1960s. The Dixon name also appeared on the Ted Scott Flying Stories (1927 to 1943), largely written by John W. Duffield.

From 1959 Grosset & Dunlap had the first 38 books rewritten over roughly fifteen years, shortening them from 25 chapters to 20, modernising the prose and removing racial stereotypes. In 1980 Adams moved new titles to Simon & Schuster, which bought the syndicate in 1984. The original series ran until 2005, followed by spin-offs such as the Casefiles and Undercover Brothers.

For collectors

Collectors concentrate on the titles Grosset & Dunlap issued up to 1979, the point at which it lost the right to publish new Hardy Boys stories. Copies printed between 1927 and 1932 with their dust jackets are very scarce, and a true first printing of The Tower Treasure is regarded by enthusiasts as the prize of the series. The 1932 first edition of volume 11, While the Clock Ticked, is described as extremely rare. Because the titles stayed in print for decades in many bindings, collectors distinguish original-text from revised-text copies and dust-jacket from picture-cover issues by checking them against a format and printing guide.