The Three Investigators is an American juvenile detective book series first published as "Alfred Hitchcock and the Three Investigators" but also expanded in Germany. It was created by Robert Arthur, Jr., who believed using a famous figure such as movie director Hitchcock would attract attention. Random House, which is owned by Bertelsmann AG, is the U.S. publisher and still holds some of the rights to the books. Other rights are held by the heirs to Robert Arthur, Jr. and the German publisher Kosmos. The "three investigators" are: Jupiter Jones (German name: Justus Jonas), Pete Crenshaw (German: Peter Shaw) and Bob Andrews. The names have been changed again for publishing the books in other cultures, such as in India, where Jupe is "Ganga", Pete is "Ranga" and Bob is named "Shirazi".
Most of the mysteries involved investigation of baffling phenomena (e.g. an ancient Egyptian mummy that apparently whispered and a human skull that seemed to talk).
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The original series ran from 1964 to 1987 and comprised 43 books. Books number 1 to 9 and 11 were written by the creator, Robert Arthur, who also sketched out ideas for a few of the other stories. Arthur had been an editor for several Hitchcock book collections. The other authors were William Arden (Dennis Lynds), Nick West (Kin Platt), Mary Virginia Carey and Marc Brandel (born Marcus Beresford). All of the authors wrote their own introductions and epilogues, which purportedly were dictated by Hitchcock and later in the series by "Hector Sebastian". The illustrators in the series began with Harry Kane and Ed Vebell and include Jack Hearne, Herb Mott, Stephen Marchesi, Robert Adragna and William A. ("Bill") Dodge.
In the original series, the specific ages of the investigators were never revealed, but contextual information indicates that they were likely 13 or 14 years old. They were not old enough to drive a car, but were said to be just a few years younger than their nemesis Skinny Norris, who had a driver's license from a state where the required age for a license was lower. On one occasion it was mentioned that Pete was on the high-school wrestling team. In the later Crimebusters series, it was stated once that the Three Investigators firm was founded when the boys were 13.
The investigators were typically introduced to a mystery through a client or by accidentally stumbling upon something unusual in their scrapyard of Uncle Titus Jones and Aunt Mathilda, who run a salvage business. The boys encountered baffling, sometimes misleading clues and danger before finally solving the mystery. The series was organised around one major theme: however strange, mystical, or even supernatural a particular phenomenon may appear at first, it is capable of being traced to human agency with the determined application of reason and logic. Most mysteries were invariably solved by Jupiter Jones, a supreme logician who implicitly deployed the Occam's Razor principle: that the simplest and most rational explanation should be preferred to an explanation which requires additional assumptions. The boys were able to solve their mysteries with relatively few resources: they generally could get by with little more than a telephone, bicycles, access to a library and - in a nod to the peripheral Hollywood setting of the series - a chauffer-driven vehicle. The last chapter of each book was an epilogue in which the investigators sat with Alfred Hitchcock (and later, "Hector Sebastian"), reviewing the mystery and revealing the deductions through the clues shown earlier in the book.
In 1989, Random House revamped the series, calling it The 3 Investigators — Crimebusters Series. The investigators were now 17 years old, could drive cars and were far more independent. The stories continued to contain an abundance of detecting, but with the addition of more action. The series was well-received, but was halted in 1990, when legal disagreements between Random House and the heirs to the Arthur estate could not be resolved. By 2005, the disagreements were still not settled.
At least eleven novels were published in the CrimeBusters series, which was launched by one of the series' favorite authors, William Arden, pseudonym of Dennis Lynds, who wrote the Dan Fortune mystery series for adults under the pen name of Michael Collins. The other authors were: Megan Stine and husband H. William Stine, G.H. Stone (Gayle Lynds), William MacCay, Marc Brandel and Peter Lerangis.
Random House has reprinted several of the original books in two paperback reprint series, partly to assure their legal rights.
The Three Investigators books have always been very popular in Germany. They are known there as the Die drei ??? (Die drei Fragezeichen, meaning "The Three Question Marks"). While American authors' novels in the series have been published there, German writers have added more, contributing about six new novels per year, with the count being 152 books in 2010. Taped radio dramas (Hörspiele) of the novels have been special favorites in Germany. Many fans listened to them as children and rediscovered them as grown-ups. Of the first 138 titles, 29 won Platinum and another 49 won Gold. When the radio actors, who have been narrating the plays since 1979, toured the country, entire stadiums in major cities like Hamburg were packed.
In the booklet of the German audio play "The Mystery of the Invisible Dog", the episode upon which it was based is erroneously credited to Nick West. Moreover, in Germany there are different revised editions of "The Mystery of the Scar-faced Beggar": one using Alfred Hitchcock as their patron, one using Alfred Hitchcock and Hector Sebastian, and another one using only Hector Sebastian.
Jupiter Jones was renamed as "Justus Jonas", a German adaption of his original name, while Pete Crenshaw is called "Peter Shaw". Bob Andrews retained his original name.
Sixty-one original stories (including Crimebusters) have been published in Poland (by Siedmiorog), where they were recently still very popular.
The books have also been very popular among children and grown-ups in Slovakia where the books are published by Mlade Leta. 60 books were translated, but not in order of original release.
In Italy, the Three Investigators novels have been published in paperback by Mondadori, in the 1970s and 1980s, within their "Giallo per ragazzi" series, which included the Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew and other juvenile sleuths' adventures. The cover author for the Three Investigators books was always Alfred Hitchcock, whereas the inner copyright notice correctly reported the real author (although saying "Text by ..."). No other publications of the novels are known.
In France, the original nine books were published in the 1970s by the Bibliothèque Verte collection of books for young readers under the title "Trois Jeunes Détectives" ("Three young detectives"). In that version, Jupiter was rechristened as Hannibal, nicknamed as "Babal". As in Italy, Hitchcock was touted as sole author.
In 2003, a Three Investigators movie was announced. The first was The Secret of Skeleton Island,[1] which was released in Europe in 2007 and the following year in the U.S. A second movie, The Three Investigators and the Secret of Terror Castle, was released in 2009.[2]
New English-language Three Investigators titles were released in 2005 for the first time since 1990. The German 'American-English' series saw the release of Poisoned E-Mail and The Curse of the Cell Phone. As of May 2008, a total of seven German stories have been translated and published in this format, and an eighth title was planned for publication in October 2008.
The Three Invesigators books have been published in India, in addition to the original American versions, under the name of "Bal Secret Agent 555 Ranga, Ganga & Shirazi". Ranga is Pete, Ganga is Jupe and Shirazi is Bob. These were published by Khel Khiladi Prakashan, West Patel Nagar, Delhi in the 1970s.
The Three Investigators have been published in Pakistan, in Urdu, as "Teen nanhay suraghrasaan" since the 1980s by the "Ferozesons" publications. They have also been published in the monthly "Taleem-o Tarbiat" magazine for children. The names of the characters are "Umber" (Jupiter Jones), "Naseem" (Pete) and "Aaqib" (Bob). The name of their Mercedes driver is Allahdad. They live in Karimabad. Umber is tall and lanky as opposed to Jupiter's character, who is stocky. Naseem, like Pete, is the most athletic of all. The translators are Saleem Ahmed Siddiqui and Maqbool Jahangir. They have done an excellent job in adapting the stories to match the Pakistani culture and geography.
The Three Investigators have also been published in Bangladesh by Sheba Prokashoni as Teen Goenda (meaning: Three Investigators) since the 1980s and became very popular among Bangladeshi juvenile readers. In the Bengali editions, Jupiter Jones is known as Kishor Pasha (a Bangladeshi American). The other two are named as Musa Aman(African American) and Robin Milford(Irish American). Sometimes Gina and Rafian (Gina's pet dog) join them. The chauffeur's name is Hanson. Hitchcock in the American publication is replaced by Davis Christopher, who is also a famous movie director. The character "Skinny Norris" appears as "Shutki Terry" and the famous French thief appears as "Shopa". The character Victor Simon in the Bangladeshi edition appears in the place of "Hector Sebastian". The series shaped the way of life of many Bangladeshi juveniles. The main context is in American society, as it would be very difficult to set up the same plot in Bangladeshi locations. It was translated by Rakib Hasan.
In the French, Vietnamese, Thai, Indonesian and Italian version of the series, the books were at one point published with Alfred Hitchcock listed as their author. The same error was made in some German paperback editions published at the beginning of the 1980s.
Similarly, all British Armada paperback editions of the title "The Mystery of the Moaning Cave" are erroneously credited to Robert Arthur. Moreover, the British series reversed the order of #42 and #43, meaning that the Armada original series ends with "Wreckers' Rock".
In Spain, "The Mystery of the Moaning Cave", "The Mystery of the Laughing Shadow", "The Secret of the Crooked Cat", "The Mystery of the Coughing Dragon", "The Mystery of Monster Mountain" as well as "The Mystery of the Headless Horse" are erroneously credited to Robert Arthur. The new Latin-American edition takes the name of "Los tres detectives" instead of "Los Tres Investigadores", which was used in Spain for earlier editions.
The Three Invesigators books have been published in Indonesia under the name of "Trio Detektif". These were published by Gramedia Pustaka Utama (the biggest book publisher in Indonesia), Jakarta from the 1980s to 1990.
The characters are described, below, using in-universe tone.
The Headquarters is the office of the Three Investigators. It is a house trailer, hidden among the piles of scrap in the salvage yard. It has many secret entrances and a telephone. The headquarter has a small lab,a dark room and an office with desk,typewriter,telephone, taperecorder and reference books.
There were 43 published books in the original series, and one The Mystery of the Ghost Train that was never finished. There are four books in the Choose Your Own Fate books that feature The Three Investigators. Random House created the Three Investigators Crime Buster series between 1989 and 1990.
As a result of the series remaining popular in Germany, German publisher Kosmos started in 1993 to publish new books written by German authors. These books, along with the American ones, are the basis for the German radio dramas, which are more popular than the books. As of August 2009, 94 books would have been published in German, of which 73 books have been produced as radio dramas. All in all, this would result in a canon of 149 books and 140 radio dramas published up to May 2010.
In 2007, a Three Investigators movie, The Three Investigators and the Secret of Skeleton Island, was released in Austria, starring Chancellor Miller as Jupiter, Nick Price as Pete, and Cameron Monaghan as Bob. It was followed in 2009 by The Three Investigators and the Secret of Terror Castle.[4]
The German love for the adventures of The Three Investigators has produced another unforeseen offshoot. Ulrich Krauße translated a novel into Latin (EAN 9783981389203) with three German Latin teachers working as the publisher's readers.
In 2011 the book "De Tribus Investigatoribus et Fato Draconis" became a bestseller among Latin students.