Doc Savage's mysterious institution for the rehabilitation of criminals was first mentioned in the adventure, "The Land Of Terror". The institution was the invention of Doc Savage.

Doc's father had always held the conviction that criminal tendencies were a psychological manifestation of some underlying physiological condition. This idea was instilled in Doc. It was in this way that Doc Savage came to focus his medical studies on the surgery and chemistry of the brain. After receiving a M.D. from Johns Hopkins University in 1926, he spent the following year studying in Europe under the greatest neurosurgeons and psychiatrists. In the fall of 1927 he returned to New York and began his experiments in brain surgery. After six months of intensive work he discovered what he called the "Crime Gland".

The animal brain developed in stages. The human brain is basically a high reasoning Cerebrum wraped around and over a more primative brain stem. This lower part of our brain controls the primal instincts such as aggression, territorialism and the ability to follow leaders blindly. This is where Doc found the "Crime Gland."

The events of "The Annihilist" reveal that this gland of the human brain can, in some people,become chemically imbalanced, causing the individual to lose his sense of right and wrong. This is caused by the overactive "Crime Gland" creating an unusually high level of aggressive instinctual behavior.  Such an imbalanced person displays anti-social and criminal behavior.

By the fall of 1928, Doc had developed a method to counter-act the imbalance. Treatment
involved both a delicate brain operation to remove a portion of the "Crime Gland" and
treating the patient with certain drugs to gradually adjust the brain to the reduction in
the gland's aggression causing hormone.

The higher reasoning portion of the brain is never affected and so neither is the ability to reason or make choices. Even though the Crime College "graduate" is no longer ruled by the imbalanced gland, he can still choose to return to his criminal trade. It is because of this ability to reason and make choices that Doc felt that in order to insure rehabilitation it was necessary to eliminate the graduate's memory of their past life of crime, and to instruct him in a new and productive method of making a living.

In early spring of 1929, Johnny Littlejohn performed geotechnical surveys at several candidate locations for the criminal treatment facility. After careful consideration of all the locations, the final site was selected. A purchase was made on a considerable amount of acreage in upstate New York in and around a small valley. Ham Brooks handled the land procurement and construction contracts using "dummy" corporations. By summer, final design of the secret facility could go forward. Doc had devloped the conceptual design for the institution. He also worked closely with Renny Renwick, who oversaw its final design and construction.

Most of the remainder of 1929 was spent on excavation. Due to its remoteness, it was difficult to get large excavation equipment to the site, and all the dirt spoils had to be hauled out. By the end of 1930, the majority of the institution was completed. It lay underground, built into the side of a hill and concealed with a facade of greyish stone. The result was, it looked like a large outcropping of grey bassalt on a hillside.

A small log lodge was the only structure that would remain visible. This was the early detection security system and defense lookout post. The early detection system consited of a listening station inside the log cabin. A sentry sat at a switchboard with groups of amplifiers. He wore an ordinary telephone headset. From this location all of the listening devices surrounding the facility could be monitored.

The first time the defense system was used was in "The Annhilist" against the villain Boke-
    "At numerous points, what looked like ordinary stretches of damp woodland loam slid back, uncovering neatly whitewashed concrete gun pits. The weapons these housed were not large, nor were they toys, either. The gun muzzles lifted and began to follow the planes. This was uncanny, because there was no hand guiding the weapons in the pits. Aiming was done by a blue-clad man at a concealed station. He simply sighted at one of the planes through a telescope which was attached to slides and cogs, and when he had crossed hairs on the craft, he pressed a lever."

Doc has invested heavily in the construction and operation of this facility, and as always, he is prepared for trouble.