James Lewis Thomas Chalmers Spence was born in Forfarshire, Scotland, in 1874. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute and became Vice-President of the Scottish Anthropological and Folklore Society. His first book about Plato's island was The Problem of Atlantis (1924), followed by Atlantis in America (1925), and then The History of Atlantis (1926). He is also the author of The Myths of Mexico and Peru (1913), The Ancient Egyptian Myths and Legends (1915), and The Myths of the North American Indians (1914). Spence was awarded a Royal pension in 1951 for Services to Literature, and died in 1955.