The vast majority of the stories were written by author Charles Hamilton, although substitute writers were sometimes used when he could not supply copy.

So-called because of the colour of its cover in this period, The Magnet was created by an Amalgamated Press staff editor named Percy Griffiths, building on the success of the earlier boys' paper The Gem.

Blue and Orange covers were introduced, and a growing proportion of stories were written by Hamilton, as he came to see The Magnet as the main focus of his attention.

Duffy, appeared in issue No.1220, published in July 1931; from then until the paper's end in 1940, Hamilton wrote every Greyfriars story.

The idea of a series of several linked stories appearing in consecutive issues started to dominate and become the key ingredient of this period, allowing increased complexity of plotting and often stimulating finer writing.

Some Hamilton enthusiasts and scholars have suggested that the central years of this era represent a 'Golden Age', a sustained period that saw a consistently high standard in the quality of stories and series, occurring from the late 1920s to the early 1930s.

As described by author Jeffrey Richard: "This became particularly serious in 1933 with the launch of The Hotspur and the appearance of Red Circle, a tougher, more rambunctious and more up-to-date public school than Greyfriars .