Malevolent Mental Manipulators Menace Men

Psychiatrist Steve Dayton was among the richest men on Earth-One. A professional psychiatrist and highly skilled inventor, his passion was actress Rita Farr, aka Elasti-Girl. However, an area of friction between Steve and Rita was her desire to adopt the orphan Garfield Logan, although he eventually agreed that this. In order to secure her attention and affection, as she had been recruited into the crime-fighting team known as the Doom Patrol of Midway City, Dayton became a part time costumed crusader himself.

As Mento, Dayton utilized the awesome energies of his mind amplified by his specially designed helmet to become Midway's other resident hero, after the Patrol as well as the Winged Warriors, Earth-One's Hawkman and Hawkgirl, whom he never had occasion to meet. Eventually, Dayton wed the object of his affection, yet sadly shortly thereafter Rita and her teammates perished protecting a small community. Steve would revive his Mento alter ego in order to hunt down the villains who killed his wife, and briefly turned insane before his step-son Garfield aka the Changeling helped him recover his senses.

Hartford Jackson of Earth-Two was a more benevolent cyberneticist than his cosmic twin, created a revolutionary thinking cap which greatly amplified the human brain's power. This device would outlive it's creator, as it would be instrumental in various adventures for decades to come, presumably while storing his own mental impulses from its interaction with his brain.

Discovering the devices ability to materialize and dematerialize objects he trained his mind upon, Jackson accidentally brought to his laboratory a fleeing felon known as Tricky O'Rickey, who stole the device and briefly led his gang. This drew the attention of the Flash, who had been pursuing Tricky previously. Despite having the speed of thought which was faster than his foes' speed of light abilities, O'Rickey was defeated by the fleet footed Flash, who gave the helmet back to Jackson asking the scientist to destroy this helmet.

Instead, through untold means, Clifford "the Thinker" Devoe would later acquire this helmet for his illegal purposes which would oppose Flash and the Justice Society of America multiple times.