A look at the people associated with Doc Savage throughout Street & Smith, Conde Nast, Bantam Books, and Fandom.

Relating to Doc Savage, the two most important people at Street & Smith were Henry Ralston and John Nanovic.  Henry William Ralston  was a Street & Smith executive and was the father of Doc Savage.  He came up with the idea.  John L. Nanovic was a recent Notre Dame graduate and editor of The Shadow. 

Henry Ralston and John Nanovic worked out many details over a series of meetings.  Nanovic recollected decades later that Ralston had all the characters worked out in his mind.  Finally Lester Dent was called to the Street & Smith offices for a meeting.  After that initial meeting, John Nanovic sat down and wrote “Doc Savage, Supreme Adventurer.”  This was the outline given to Dent which he fleshed out into “The Man of Bronze.”  John Nanovic was the first editor of Doc Savage magazine.

Martin Edward Baker – Lester Dent secretary aboard The Albatross

Paul Hyde Bonner, Jr – The man at Conde Nast who picked the reprint stories.

Evelyn Eloise Coulson – Lester Dent secretary who went to Europe.

Norman Daniels – Daniels’ work appeared in Doc Savage but never as the lead story.

Harold Arvine Davis – Fellow telegrapher and one of Dent’s ghost writers.

William DeGrouchy – Doc Savage editor in 1948

Laurence Louis Donovan –  The second Kenneth Robeson hired by Street & Smith

Joseph Allan Dunn – The man who got Lester Dent into the Explorers Club

Harry Felsenstein – Perhaps the most important man you probably never heard of

Alan Bonnel Hathway – The third Kenneth Robeson hired by Street & Smith

Steve Holland – The man whose image launched a million paperbacks

Morris Ogden Jones – Assistant editor at Street & Smith

John Leonid Nanovic – Author of “Doc Savage, Supreme Adventurer” and editor

Henry William Ralston – The Street & Smith executive who created Doc Savage