Because of cheap paper and cheap bindings, copies of the original editions of Ragged Dick and Struggling Upward that can be reproduced to-day without damage are practically impossible to secure. Moved by that fact, plus considerations of economy, the publishers of the present volume have availed themselves of permission to reprint the texts used in Struggling Upward and Other Works by Horatio Alger, Jr., which was issued by Crown in 1945 with an introduction by Russel Crouse.