# Really Bad Encyclopedia Brown Solutions (or Other Kid Lit. Items That Ticked You Off) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 19, 2005, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400 "2005-09-19T18:26:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/21 "2005-09-19T22:54:49Z")
You know what is really sad? That it is taking me forever to write this post because I can’t figure out how to describe the set-up in a way that makes sense. No wonder the EB writers had such trouble. Anyway … There was one that stands out in my memory about a theft. The real criminal, when questioned, tries to shift the blame to an innocent person by saying that he (the real criminal) saw the innocent person at the crime scene. He (the real criminal) claims that while he did not see the other person directly, he saw the reflection of that innocent person in a silver spoon that he (the real criminal) happened to be holding. The “gotcha” moment is supposedly that the reflection in a spoon is upside-down, and I guess in EB’s world that means you couldn’t recognize a person if you saw him upside-down, so the real criminal is obviously lying about seeing the innocent person at the crime scene. Now, despite the randomness of claiming to see a person commit a crime in a silver spoon, without bothering to, you know, maybe turn around and get a better look, the idea that you couldn’t recognize a person simply because the image is upside-down is crazy dumb, right? Oh, the other really sad part is that like the OP, I am still sincerely ticked off about this _years_ later. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/22 "2005-09-19T22:55:55Z")
> [@Jayrot](#): > > Yep, that’s it exactly. So it seems that a good amount of the EB plotlines were just cribbed from other stories? :dubious: Donald J. Sobol was cribbing from himself, at least. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/23 "2005-09-19T23:04:01Z")
> [@Wolfian](#): > > I also remember a story in which two crooks, a guy and a girl, cross-dress in order to steal money from a diner (I can’t remember the exact details). EB’s little girl friend solves the case by noting that the guy dressed as a girl is sitting facing away from the door. Ladies are supposed to sit facing the door as a matter of common couresty. Fair enough, and I learned a lesson, but how did she know that crooks knew that. Heck, she even said that the reason EB didn’t know the answer because guys today don’t know their manners. Her _name_ was Sally Kimball! Anyway, I assumed it was either because (a) they were adults, and at the time of the book’s publication could safely be assumed to know this, or (b) the woman, at least, would’ve known, and perhaps insisted so many times that it’d be habit. ---
**Author:** ![middleman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@middleman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/middleman)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/24 "2005-09-19T23:08:29Z")
> [@Lute Skywatcher](#): > > The _Encyclopedia Brown_ version is in [The Case of the Secret Pitch](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0553157361/103-5102539-9755811?v=glance). I think that was the one I read. Or maybe even a version from the Boy Scout magazine I got as a kid. But I seem to recall going back through the story looking specifically for evidence of the windless day. I seem to recall none. Maybe I am misrembering why I got mad. Perhaps they DID say it was a windless day and I was mad because there are other things besides wind (like a big truck) that could get a balloon into a tree. ---
**Author:** ![middleman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@middleman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/middleman)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/25 "2005-09-19T23:13:13Z")
Man. Rage and frustration have filled my posts with errors. I apologize. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/26 "2005-09-19T23:18:52Z")
I was mildly pissed about the Great Brain episode in which he bets a bunch of people that he can magnetize a stick, and then wins the bet by throwing a boomerang and having it come back. (1) If these other people are at ALL smart, they should still demand to win the bet, as he has not “magnetized” anything, he’s just throwing a stick which comes back (2) Boomerangs don’t just go forward, then turn around and come back. They go in a circle. It doesn’t look a thing like magnetization. Plus, they’re REALLY hard to learn to throw consistently, not to mention construct, details that are glossed over. ---
**Author:** ![BobT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8e8cbc/32.png) [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/27 "2005-09-19T23:22:20Z")
[Encyclopedia Brown was murdered](http://www.theonion.com/content/node/29537) ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/28 "2005-09-19T23:24:30Z")
There was one where some kid got his bagels and lox stolen at some sort of town picnic or block party or something (I forget exactly what, some kind of outdoor event for the whole town…4th of July, maybe?). EB said they could nail the thief by watching the water fountain because The lox would make the thief thirsty. Then they bumrushed the first person to get a drink of water, who of course confessed immediately. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![middleman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9a140/32.png) [@middleman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/middleman)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2005, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/29 "2005-09-19T23:29:37Z")
> [@Diogenes the Cynic](#): > > There was one where some kid got his bagels and lox stolen at some sort of town picnic or block party or something (I forget exactly what, some kind of outdoor event for the whole town…4th of July, maybe?). EB said they could nail the thief by watching the water fountain because The lox would make the thief thirsty. Then they bumrushed the first person to get a drink of water, who of course confessed immediately. :rolleyes: In the Jim Crow Days they had “Whites Only” Water Fountains, “Black Only” Water Fountains, and “Lox Eating, Bagel Thieving Only” Water Fountains. I thought we had eliminated all that… ☹ 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Taber](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ac91a4/32.png) [@Taber](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taber)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/30 "2005-09-20T00:21:19Z")
> [@Jayrot](#): > > Yep, that’s it exactly. So it seems that a good amount of the EB plotlines were just cribbed from other stories? :dubious: I don’t know who’s cribbing from who, but every single EB?Great Brain etc… has to hve the requisite “I heard thunder, so I turned, and then lighting lit up the scene, so I could see innocent person commit the crime” ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/31 "2005-09-20T00:37:02Z")
> [@](#): > > I don’t know who’s cribbing from who, but every single EB? **Great Brain** etc… has to hve the requisite “I heard thunder, so I turned, and then lighting lit up the scene, so I could see innocent person commit the crime” Not the Great Brain. The Great Brain did RESEARCH. I remember when he exposed a bunch of land swiindlers by actually taking soil samples and sending them to a lab for analysis to see if the swindlers’ claims would hold up. That kid was awesome. ---
**Author:** ![HazelNutCoffee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@HazelNutCoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HazelNutCoffee)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/32 "2005-09-20T01:37:52Z")
The fact that Sally always solved the cases because of some “feminine” bit of knowledge pisses me off to this day. All the cases requiring observation/common sense/obscure bit of knowledge were solved by Brown, while Kimball got to solve the ones which allowed her the last word to Brown: “That is because you are a guy” or something along those lines. She was supposed to be a tomboy, for crying out loud - how would she know that women are supposed to sit facing the door? Of course, hypocrite that I am, I always waited in vain for an episode where she and Brown would finally reveal their true feelings and have steamy se… err, go to the next school dance together. ---
**Author:** ![Raygun99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Raygun99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raygun99)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/33 "2005-09-20T01:51:06Z")
> [@stpauler](#): > > There was another one of EB’s stories that got my goat a bit like the one up there. There was some contest where Bugs Meany had a collection of ping pong balls in a vat and he had to pick out a specific one blindfolded (or something like that). EB noticed that there was a thermos that was under the table early and called Bugs on the fact that he kept the ping pong ball cold in the thermos and was able to find it by the temperature of the ball. I never understood how a thermos could get a ping pong ball that cold that one could notice the temperature. > > It was just really poorly constructed, much like this post. David Stern is rumoured to have fixed the first NBA Draft Lottery in exactly this fashion, to give Patrick Ewing to the Knicks. ---
**Author:** ![Podkayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Podkayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Podkayne)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/34 "2005-09-20T02:12:52Z")
> [@HazelNutCoffee](#): > > Of course, hypocrite that I am, I always waited in vain for an episode where she and Brown would finally reveal their true feelings and have steamy se… err, go to the next school dance together. There has got to be Encyclopedia/Sally fanfic somewhere on the internet. And _I_ am not going to be the person who Googles for it. ---
**Author:** ![Tracy\_Lord](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ec9cab/32.png) [@Tracy\_Lord](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tracy_Lord)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/35 "2005-09-20T02:18:10Z")
> [@Raygun99](#): > > David Stern is rumoured to have fixed the first NBA Draft Lottery in exactly this fashion, to give Patrick Ewing to the Knicks. He put Patrick Ewing in a giant thermos? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/36 "2005-09-20T02:25:09Z")
No, just his balls. ---
**Author:** ![Askia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Askia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askia)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/37 "2005-09-20T02:26:42Z")
> [@BobT](#): > > [Encyclopedia Brown was murdered](http://www.theonion.com/content/node/29537) Nice! ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/38 "2005-09-20T02:41:12Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > I was mildly pissed about the Great Brain episode in which he bets a bunch of people that he can magnetize a stick, and then wins the bet by throwing a boomerang and having it come back. > (1) If these other people are at ALL smart, they should still demand to win the bet, as he has not “magnetized” anything, he’s just throwing a stick which comes back > (2) Boomerangs don’t just go forward, then turn around and come back. They go in a circle. It doesn’t look a thing like magnetization. Plus, they’re REALLY hard to learn to throw consistently, not to mention construct, details that are glossed over. As I recall the story, the Great Brain just told the kids that he could throw a stick and make it come back to him. Since apparently no one else had ever heard of boomerangs in 19th century Utah, it was an easy bet. Man, I _loved_ those books. I’m vaguely remembering reading an autobiography by the author - the books were all based on his real life childhood. The Great Brain was a zillion times better than Encyclopedia Brown, because they were about much more than swindling all the other kids in town. Remember when that one kid got tetanus and his leg turned _green_ and had to be amputated? That made a major impression on 8-year-old me. ---
**Author:** ![Millit\_the\_Frail](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/51bf81/32.png) [@Millit\_the\_Frail](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Millit_the_Frail)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/39 "2005-09-20T02:52:42Z")
The worst one for me was a “Two-Minute Mystery” for which the solution was something along the lines of “A lady would never put away her new mink stole upon bringing it home from the store! She would first try it on and fawn over herself in the mirror for a while.” Thus, the non-fawning woman was guilty, or something like that. Stereotype much? Oh, and yes, these mysteries get recycled like crazy. I once won a radio contest (“The Mystery Files of Simon Q!”) because the case was exactly like an EB story I had read. ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2005, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400/40 "2005-09-20T03:05:16Z")
> [@middleman](#): > > The reason the sleuth knew it was THAT guest is because there is a popular saying, which I have ONLY HEARD USED IN THAT STORY, “a narrow flight away”; which means upstairs. Anyone who didn’t fire the arrow would have thought the sleuth said “a narrow flight” instead of “an arrow flight.” Wow, 33ish years later, I _still_ remember that EB story. Made little sense then or now. I remember being 10ish, reading that, and thinking “what a gyp!”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/really-bad-encyclopedia-brown-solutions-or-other-kid-lit-items-that-ticked-you-off/322400.md?page=3)