Stanley Platt Lovell


Stanley Platt Lovell, who went by the nickname Professor Moriarty, was an American industrial biochemist and intelligence officer who headed the Research and Development Branch of the Office of Strategic Services during World War II, commonly referred to as the "Department of Dirty Tricks."
Before the war began, Lovell already held over 70 patents. At the onset of World War 2, Lovell moved to Washington, D.C. to work underneath Vannevar Bush at the National Defense Research Committee. In 1942, he acted as Bush's Liaison Officer to the Special Activities/Goodfellow unit within the Office of the Coordinator of Information, and SA/G Chief Millard Preston Goodfellow.
In the Summer of 1942, he was tapped by William J. Donovan to head the newly established R&D Branch. As head of R&D, he was in charge of many innovations developed by OSS, leading a team of scientists to create some of the most bizare inventions during the war. As head of R&D, he is often thought to be an inspiration for the fictional character Q from the James Bond series, sharing this title with Charles Fraser-Smith from the British Special Operations Executive. Smith and Lovell also collaborated on several devices. Lovell was the lead scientist in charge of the US Government's search for the "T-Drug," the first truth serum experiments undertaken by the US Intelligence Community, instructing George Hunter White to dose Americans with narcotics without their knowledge and to observe their behaviors.
He and his team experimented with a way to kick the Nazis out of North Africa with mounds of manure and infected flies placed in rural villages. The Hollywood actress Hedy Lamarr worked with Lovell for a time, inventing a distraction device that came to be known as "The Hedy." Lovell demonstrated The Hedy for the Joint Chiefs of Staff without advanced warning, and they never invited him back. He is credited with the discovery that the Nazis were using heavy water in the process to construct a nuclear bomb. He was one of the primary OSS chiefs responsible for the bat bomb experiments. In 1944, Lovell approved the use of Nerve gas to be deployed on Iwo Jima, but the President vetoed this operation. Lovell invented several devices for the potential assassination of Adolf Hitler, including a crushable tablet containing odorless mustard gas. Lovell and his team invented the time pencil and the Limpet mine. After the war, Lovell became President of the Lovell Chemical Company.

Written works

  • ''Of Spies and Stratagems''