<P> Literature professor Shoshana Milgram traces the origins of the character to adventure stories that Rand read as a child, including the French novels La Vallée Mystérieuse and Le Petit Roi d'Ys . Rand also owned a copy of a 1940 novel with characters named Jed and John Peter Galt . There was a 19th - century Scottish novelist of the same name, but Milgram says that any connection to the character is "highly unlikely". Milgram also notes that the name Rand originally picked for her character was Iles Galt . </P> <P> At least two real people of Rand's acquaintance have been suggested as partial inspirations for Galt . Rand denied any connection to her friend John Gall, a conservative attorney, but did claim some inspiration came from her husband, Frank O'Connor . </P> <P> Author Justin Raimondo has found parallels between Atlas Shrugged and The Driver, a 1922 novel by Garet Garrett . Garrett's novel has a main character named Henry M. Galt . This Galt is an entrepreneur who takes over a failing railway, turning it into a productive and profitable asset for the benefit of himself and the rest of the nation . The general population and government turn against him instead of celebrating his success . Raimondo also notes that in The Driver, some characters ask, "Who is Henry M. Galt?", similar to the question "Who is John Galt?" that plays an important role in Atlas Shrugged . </P> <P> Rand is not the only famous author to invent a character with this name . Pulp fiction author Robert E. Howard, creator of heroes such as Conan the Barbarian, used a villain named John Galt--also a man of mystery missing for a long time and possessed of great wealth, trying to manipulate his world from the background--in the tale "Black Talons" in 1933, more than twenty years before Atlas Shrugged was published . </P>

One man can stop the motor of the world