The Happy Six by Penn Shirley (1916)
The Happy Six follows Molly, Kirke, Weezy, and Donald Rowe and their twin neighbors, Paul and Pauline Bradstreet, as they prepare for and undertake a European journey. The club, formerly called The Merry Five, becomes The Happy Six when little Donald is admitted. Their excitement over travelling is interrupted when Kirke’s beloved fox-terrier, Shot, disappears after following Kirke and Captain Bradstreet to Mr. Keith’s ranch. Kirke wrongly suspects the Chinese worker Sing Wung, who had driven the dog away, especially after Shot’s collar is found hidden in a hedge. At the ranch, Kirke and Paul help Mr. Keith and Sing Wung dig and blast a new well. When a rope breaks as Sing Wung is escaping a lighted fuse, he is trapped below with the fire approaching gunpowder. Though he has been angry with Sing Wung, Kirke climbs down the rope and stamps out the fuse, saving him. Kirke faints after the rescue, then discovers that Shot is alive: Mateo, an Indian worker, had kept the dog tied up. Kirke feels remorse for having judged Sing Wung, whose gratitude is shown by his happiness that Kirke has recovered Shot. The party leaves Silver Gate City by train for New York, where Kirke’s clothes are stolen from his sleeping berth. He must arrive dressed in borrowed overalls, Molly’s ulster, Mrs. Rowe’s overshoes, and Captain Bradstreet’s smoking-cap. From New York, the travellers sail for Havre on La Bretagne with Jane Leonard, who is to care for Donald. On board they meet Miss Evans, a shy young woman in mourning whose father has recently died. She is travelling alone to Paris with his precious biological manuscript in a conspicuous alligator-skin reticule. Mrs. Rowe and Weezy draw her into their party. The voyage includes calm seas, fog, porpoises, a whale, shipboard games, the stokers’ furnaces, and a storm that makes most of the party ill except Pauline, Kirke, and Captain Bradstreet. Weezy recovers with help from Miss Evans, who reads her stories, and the children are fascinated by a cheerful one-legged cyclist. Near the end of the voyage they sight Land’s End, take aboard a pilot, celebrate the Fourth of July with a grand banquet, and land at Havre. In France, the party travels through Normandy, Rouen, Mantes, Versailles, Paris, Switzerland, Germany, Baden Baden, Cologne, and along the Rhine. They see ruins, old castles, churches, palaces, markets, and landscapes, while their conversations are filled with jokes, misunderstandings, and observations about unfamiliar customs. In Normandy, Donald disobeys his sisters and secretly bathes behind a rock. When his clothes are found beside a pool, Weezy believes he has drowned, but he suddenly reappears, having hidden because he was ashamed to be seen without clothes. Miss Evans continues with the travellers after Paris. In Germany, she becomes so happy while visiting an ivy-covered castle that she forgets her reticule. When its loss is discovered, everyone searches desperately. Miss Evans reveals that it contains the only copy of her father’s manuscript, which she is taking to publishers in London. She fears it has fallen into the moat and been ruined. Kirke eventually notices its clasp beneath ivy near the park entrance and recovers it unharmed. Miss Evans is overwhelmed with gratitude, and The Happy Six celebrate with cheers. The account closes by leaving the children amid their travels, as joyfully united as when their club was first renamed.
By Penn Shirley · First published 1916 · Genre: Children's Fiction, Adventure Fiction, Travel Fiction · 12 chapters · 28,264 words
First lines
"The Happy Six" grew out of "The Merry Five," and this was the way of it: --
The Merry Five, as you may remember, were Molly, Kirke, and Weezy Rowe, and their twin neighbors, Paul and Pauline Bradstreet; and they lived in Silver Gate City, in sunny California.
Similar titles
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- Eight Girls And A Dog by Carolyn Wells
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Genres
- Children's Fiction — The novel centers on a close-knit group of children, their family relationships, humor, mishaps, and age-appropriate adventures.
- Adventure Fiction — Kirke's rescue of Sing Wung from the well explosion, the missing-dog episode, railway travel, and the Atlantic crossing give the story an adventure-driven structure.
- Travel Fiction — A major portion follows the Happy Six as they travel from California across the United States and by steamship toward France, emphasizing new places, customs, and experiences.
- Family Fiction — The narrative is grounded in the Rowe and Bradstreet families, with parental guidance, sibling dynamics, and affectionate domestic life shaping the children's journey.
Tags
children's fiction · juvenile literature · friendship · school life · family · adventure · coming of age · girls' stories · group of friends · humor · everyday life · mischief
What this Textopian page supports
The Happy Six is listed on Textopian as a novel by Penn Shirley, dated 1916 CE.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Novel
- Author: Penn Shirley
- Date: 1916 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Children's Fiction, Adventure Fiction, Travel Fiction, Family Fiction, Juvenile Series Fiction
- Length: 28,264 words
- Structure: 12 chapters, 817 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Fairly Easy (7th Grade)
Good citation fit
- Work identity for The Happy Six by Penn Shirley
- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
- Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
- Readability and classroom-planning context
- Passage-specific claims should cite the exact /read/ URL for the relevant chapter or paragraph
Contents
- Five and One
- Shot and Sing Wung
- Who was the Thief?
- Kirke's Brave Deed
- Off for New York
- Off for Europe
- Ten and One
- Eleven in France
- The Mysterious Bag
- Where is Number Six?
- What Strange Countries!
- The very Happy Six