Edward Masters

Edward Masters
Species:	Human
Place of origin:	Earth
Appearance:	Doctor Who and the Silurians
Main actor:	Geoffrey Palmer

Edward Masters (or Frederick Masters) was the Permanent Under-Secretary to the Minister of Science in the 1970s.

Biography

Masters, whose first name was either Edward (TV: Doctor Who and the Silurians) or Frederick, attended prep school with Charles Lawrence. (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Cave-Monsters) He became the Permanent Under-Secretary to the Minister of Science at the Ministry of Defence. (PROSE: Doctor Who and the Cave-Monsters, Who Killed Kennedy)

Before Masters died, he received a letter from the Apocalypse Clock which predicted the exact date and time of his death. (AUDIO: The Last Post) The day before his death, Masters had been scheduled to give an interview to the journalist James Stevens of the Daily Chronicle, but had to cancel when he was called to Wenley Moor nuclear research facility. (PROSE: Who Killed Kennedy)

Masters visited the facility when a series of power drains and mental breakdowns were caused by the Silurians, who had recently been awakened from their hibernation units. During his visit, the station security chief, Major Baker, was infected with the Silurian virus. Masters left before the base was quarantined, unaware of being infected himself. He reached London, eluding search parties looking for him, and was caught by two police officers on a pedestrian walkway, where he then collapsed and died from the virus. (TV: Doctor Who and the Silurians, PROSE: Doctor Who and the Cave-Monsters)

Behind the scenes

• In the novel Who Killed Kennedy, Edward Masters, as he is known from his first appearance in the TV story Doctor Who and the Silurians, is called Frederick Masters (he is also called Frederick in the novelisation of the TV story). Although in the novelisation, Masters retains his role of Permanent Under-Secretary, he is somewhat confusingly called a Member of Parliament and not a civil servant.