Alan Hathway

Alan Hathway, noted executive editor at Newsday, wrote four Doc Savage novels: The Devil’s Playground, The Headless Men, The Mindless Monsters, and The Rustling Death.

Will Murray in his collection Writings in Bronze wrote, “Alan Hathway had only been writing pulp fiction for five years, and all of that short stories; so Street & Smith, remembering the method of training given Laurence Donovan prior to his writing of the earlier Whisperer, decided to apprentice him on Doc Savage first. If he could handle Doc Savage, he could handle The Whisperer, they may have reasoned. If not, Lester Dent could salvage the Doc novels and a new Whisperer writer could be found elsewhere. Hathway’s introduction into the series worked in Lester Dent’s favor, as well. Hathway stepped in just as Harold Davis was stepping out…”
Hathway’s most notable work was in journalism. His career included stints in Chicago and New York, but his tenure at Newsday helped turned the small newspaper into a Pulitzer prize winning concern. Hathway was a close friend of Doc Savage author Harold Davis and stepped into Davis’s position when Davis left Newsday.

Alan Brown Hathway (1906–April 15, 1977) wrote four Doc Savage novels:
The Devil’s Playground
The Headless Men
The Mindless Monsters
The Rustling Death