Lyon Sprague de Camp was born on November 27, 1907, in New York City to Lyon and E. Beatrice (nee Sprague) de Camp. As a young man, de Camp seemed destined for a career in the applied sciences. In 1930, he received his bachelor's degree in aeronautical engineering from the California Institute of Technology, and in 1933, he received his master's degree in engineering from the Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey. During World War II, he was an assistant mechanical engineer at an aircraft factory, and he served as a Lieutenant Commander in the United States Naval Reserve. Even his first book was a technical one,Inventions and Their Management (1937; coauthored with Alf K. Berle; revised as Inventions, Patents, and Their Management, 1959).

Yet, in 1937 came a hint of the career to come. He published his first short story "The Isolinguals" and began his relationship with the...