Zebulon Vitruvius Pike's Page

Zebulon Vitruvius Pike (listed on the title pages as Vitruvius Pike) was the hero of a series of late Victorian Era science fiction and adventure dime novels. The first novel, "Vitruvius Pike and the City of the Sun", was written by Eli Bollinger and serialized in New Dime Novels in 1875. Subsequent stories were serialized sporadically in other American dime novels, pulps and British penny dreadfuls. After Bollinger's death in 1904, finished but previously unpublished stories appeared in Argosy and The Popular Magazine for several more years.

The character of Vitruvius Pike, a veteran of the American Civil War, was a mercenary adventurer and world explorer. Common themes were encounters with lost civilizations, archaeological treasure hunts, political intrigue and the foiling of criminal masterminds with advanced technology; many of the same themes common with other dime novels and pulps. Pike was uncharacteristically progressive in his politics for the times and stories often afforded women and minorities equal value in the story's execution.

The Vitruvius Pike name was often treated as a pseudonym and many of the volumes were written in the first person, often referring to events in previous stories and correcting misstatements of "my chronicler, Mr. Bollinger."

The Vitruvius Pike novels were written at a higher level than contemporary potboilers and had a difficult time holding a place in any one publication. Bollinger kept the stories in publication for thirty years by taking his stories to any publisher that would pick up his next story. Oftentimes, the staff writers of the publications would then lift the plot of Bollinger’s story to produce a number derivative works of lesser quality that are longer remembered because they are attached to more popular and widely published characters.

Partial list of Vitruvius Pike Books
Vitruvius Pike and the City of the Sun
Vitruvius Pike and the Ironclad Titan
Vitruvius Pike and the Chrotronic Sphere
Vitruvius Pike and the Jigsaw Man
Vitruvius Pike and the Galvanic Assassins
Vitruvius Pike and the Clockwork Chambermaid
Vitruvius Pike and the Undersea Battleship
Vitruvius Pike and the Antediluvian Valley
Vitruvius Pike and the Infernal Machine
Vitruvius Pike and the Phantom Dirigible
Vitruvius Pike and the Antipodal Columbiad
Vitruvius Pike and the Selenite Invasion
Vitruvius Pike and the Airship Princess
Vitruvius Pike and the Phlogiston Detonator
Vitruvius Pike and the Saurian Labyrinth

Other Media
Republic Pictures produced "City of the Sun" in 1937 although the film failed to deliver on the source. Changes to the plot included the dropping of the Custer expedition, the moving of the city's location from the Black Hills of South Dakota to some indeterminate American Southwest location, the early introduction of Pike's Japanese assistant, Amy Somerton, a character that did not appear in print until "The Galvanic Assasins", the casting of Miss Somerton as a caucasian and, most distractingly, the apparent absence of the whole underground city. What could have been accomplished with matte paintings was instead reduced to narrow canyons and paper-mache tunnels.

A Vitruvius Pike radio series was proposed in 1946. Two scripts were written, but, for unknown reasons, the series was never produced. A television pilot script for a series was pitched to several networks in 1958, however, it was never filmed and no copies of its script are known to have survived. Columbia Pictures attempted another Vitruvius Pike film in 1965. A script was written and approved, and filming was to have begun in 1966. However, the project was canceled, due to the poor box office returns of 1964's "First Men in the Moon", and a change in Columbia's management. Another television pilot was pitched unsuccessfully in 1972.

A number of Vitruvius Pike stories were published in Japanese periodicals beginning with a translation of "The Clockwork Chambermaid", which appeared in Shōnen Sekai ("The Youth's World") in 1898. A manga series was adapted and serialized sporadically in Shūkan Manga Akushon ("Weekly Manga Action") from 1967 to 1970. Serial chapters were collected in 3 tankōbon volumes that have not been licensed in English. TMS Entertainment acquired the television rights in 1971 but failed to produce either a series or OVA.