"Doctor Who: The Vault" is proving to be a fine read.
It's quite fascinating to realise what the prevailing attitude of the people behind Doctor Who was like in the 1960s, the decade when it first broadcast and when the Daleks appeared. We know that a lot of older episodes have been lost. The BBC of earlier decades needed to conserve storage space and viewed some of their productions as mere disposable entertainment.
Even though Sydney Newman (Head of Drama at the time) wanted something that was more than just pulp fiction with bug eyed monsters on TV, I doubt he was looking at Doctor Who with longevity in mind. It was probably just another project for him.
Even more alarming for today's Doctor Who fans like myself, the vibe from "Doctor Who: The Vault" seems to be that Dalek creator Terry Nation (no, not Davros, try to separate reality from fiction...) wasn't really creating something for posterity. "I wanted to produce entertainment with no moral or sociological values. There are very fine writers who will move the theatre forward, but I'm not one of them." I guess few writers at the time had posterity in mind. Nevertheless, his creation made him rich overnight.
It was also a stroke of luck that the Daleks reached audiences. Newman didn't have a chance to keep in touch with the directors and producers, his first true exposure to the Daleks was when he saw them on TV. His fury at the "bug eyed monsters" was quenched once he learned there was more to them. In a big way, the Daleks made Doctor Who what it is today.
I also discovered the Chumblies, an attempt to cash in on the Dalek mania of the time. Now I know we've all had a laugh at the Daleks and how they look like salt shakers, but the Chumblies look really s**t in comparison.
So, let's be thankful for all we've got.
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