"The Shadow, who aids the forces of law and order, is in reality Lamont Cranston, wealthy young man about town."
Lamont Cranston spent some time in the Orient, where he learned some strange psychic abilities and a method of hypnotism with which he can make himself invisible to people around him. Returning to the American city he lived in (it was seldom identified, but most set it as New York), he took on the alter-ego of the Shadow to fight crime, aided by his 'aid and companion', the lovely Margo Lane.
Amateur criminologist, playboy, and self-appointed do-gooder, Lamont Cranston as the Shadow appeared first in print, then radio and even some matinee B-movies, spanning roughly 1935 to the mid-late 1950's. He was one of those pulp heroes to whom crime was black and white, and who tried to make the American Dream feasible to 8-year-old boys everywhere (in the lower 48, that is).