Encyclopedia Brown is a series of books featuring the adventures of boy detective Leroy Brown, nicknamed "Encyclopedia" for his intelligence and range of knowledge. The series of 29 children's novels was written by Donald J. Sobol, with the first book published in 1963 and the last published posthumously in 2012. In addition to the main books, the Encyclopedia Brown series has spawned a comic strip, a TV series, and compilation books of puzzles and games.

Frank W. Bolle was an American comic-strip artist, comic book artist and illustrator, best known as the longtime artist of the newspaper strips Winnie Winkle and The Heart of Juliet Jones; for stints on the comic books Tim Holt and Doctor Solar, Man of the Atom; and as an illustrator for the Boy Scouts of America magazine Boys' Life for 18 years. With an unknown writer, he co-created the masked, Old West comic-book heroine the Black Phantom. Bolle sometimes used the pen name FWB and, at least once, F. L. Blake.