The Dark Goddess

Richard Sharpe Shaver (October 8, 1907 Berwick, Pennsylvania – November 5, 1975 Summit, Arkansas) was an American writer and artist.  Shaver’s stories continued to appear in Amazing after Howard Browne replaced Ray Palmer as editor. Even after his work fell out of favor with Amazing readers, Ray Palmer continued to publish Shaver in other genre magazines. A special issue of Fantastic devoted to the “Shaver Mystery” was published in 1958 He achieved notoriety in the years following World War II as the author of controversial stories which were printed in science fiction magazines (primarily Amazing Stories), in which he claimed that he had had personal experience of a sinister, ancient civilization that harbored fantastic technology in caverns under the earth. The controversy stemmed from the claim by Shaver, and his editor and publisher Ray Palmer, that Shaver’s writings, while presented in the guise of fiction, were fundamentally true. Shaver’s stories were promoted by Ray Palmer as “The Shaver Mystery”.