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From: percus@acf4.UUCP (Allon G. Percus)
Newsgroups: net.tv.drwho
Subject: Re: The orgin of the name DALEKS - the answer ...
Message-ID: <5020027@acf4.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 25-Sep-85 20:06:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: acf4.5020027
Posted: Wed Sep 25 20:06:00 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 30-Sep-85 01:52:46 EDT
References: <122@ulose.UUCP>
Organization: New York University
Lines: 41

> The leading theories were:
> 
> 1.   Terry Nation owned an encyclopedia set on which two adjacent volumes
>      were labled DAL and LEK, and,
> 
> 2.   He invented the name without any "real world" prompting.
> 
> Holders of #1 opinion report Terry Nation saying this in an interview
> and holders of #2 comment that while at one time he said this, he later
> denied it and claimed total fictious invention.
> 
> What I remember is similar to #1...

As other people have no doubt pointed out, in the book "Celebration,"
it says otherwise.  From an article about the daleks:

===========================================================================
          (Reprinted without permission of W. H. Allen)

.
.
.
     Terry [Nation], of course, helped generate the very beginnings
of the Dalek legend when he told writers and journalists seeking
for a profound reason for the success of the machines and the
singularly appropriate name he had given them -- that he had
actually seen it on the spine of an encyclopedia volume covering
the words DAL to LEK.  It was a piece of sheer invention to satisfy
the insistent demands of the press, he now readily admits:  'And
in fact anyone checking the encyclopedias would have found that
there has never been one covering those particular letters!'
.
.
.
===========================================================================

So long for that argument. (I hope...)
                                         A. G. Percus
                                  (ARPA) percus@acf4
                                   (NYU) percus.acf4
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