 Trendle didn't want to lose his sponsors, so he reluctantly hired Stryker back at the higher salary. About this time in the 1940s, Trendle started claiming in interviews and in articles that he was the creator, not just the owner of the rights, but he was the creator. It was his idea of the Lone Ranger, not Stryker's. And like anything else, if you repeat a lie long enough, people believe it.