The Submarine Boys and the Middies: Or, the Prize Detail at Annapolis

The year is 1909. The submarine is still a terrifying new weapon, and the U.S. Navy isn't quite sure what to do with it. Sixteen-year-old Jack Benson and his crew, Hal Hastings and Eph Somers, have built their own working submarine, the Pollard, and they're about to find themselves at the center of something much bigger than a teenage engineering project. When the Navy invites the boys to bring their invention to Annapolis and teach actual midshipmen how to operate a submarine, it should be the triumph of their young lives. But the morning after their arrival, disaster strikes: the Farnum, a second experimental submarine, has vanished from its moorings. Now Jack and his friends must race against time, not just to prove their invention works, but to recover a missing vessel and clear their own names before the Navy decides the whole experiment was a mistake. This is boy-adventure fiction at its punchy, optimistic turn-of-the-century best: three teenagers smarter than the admirals, technical know-how that feels genuinely thrilling, and a mystery that proves even the Navy can lose track of its own ships.