Wealthy millionaire by day, at night Jimmie Dale put on a costume and becomes „The Grey Seal,” daredevil safe cracker and footpad – he never takes a thing, but leaves behind his mark, a grey seal of paper to mark his conquest. He was just doing it for „the sheer deviltry of it” at first, but when a woman catches him she blackmails him to war on certain crime organizations. Frank Packard’s Gray Seal character first appeared in print in 1914. In some ways he was inspired by earlier Edwardian adventurers like A.J Raffles, the Scarlet Pimpernel, and Arsene Lupin, but Packard blended those borrowed elements into an entirely new concept. Dale’s adventures first appeared in „People’s Magazine” and then were collected into several novels.