Herbert L. Strock was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 television producer and director, and a B-movie

B-movie

A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....

 director of titles such as I Was a Teenage Frankenstein

I Was a Teenage Frankenstein

I Was a Teenage Frankenstein is a film starring Whit Bissell, Phyllis Coates and Gary Conway released by American International Pictures in November 1957. It is the follow-up to AIP's box-office hit I Was a Teenage Werewolf released less than five months earlier...

(1957), How to Make a Monster

How to Make a Monster (1958 film)

How to Make a Monster is a 1958 American horror film released by American International Pictures. The film is a follow-up to both I Was a Teenage Werewolf and I Was a Teenage Frankenstein. Like Teenage Frankenstein, a black & white film that switched to color for the final moments, How to Make a...

(1958) and The Crawling Hand

The Crawling Hand

The Crawling Hand is a 1963 science fiction film directed by Herbert L. Strock, and starring Rod Lauren, Peter Breck, Allison Hayes, and Alan Hale, Jr...

(1963).

Strock was born in Boston, and moved with his family to Los Angeles when he was 13. By 17, while a student at Beverly Hills High School, Strock was director of gossip columnist Jimmy Fidler

Jimmy Fidler

Jimmie Fidler was an American columnist, journalist and radio and television personality. He wrote a Hollywood gossip column and was sometimes billed as Jimmy Fidler.Born in St...

's Hollywood segments for Fox Movietone News

Movietone News

Movietone News is a newsreel that ran from 1928 to 1963 in the United States, and from 1929 to 1979 in the United Kingdom.-History:It is known in the U.S. as Fox Movietone News, produced cinema, sound newsreels from 1928 to 1963 in the U.S., from 1929 to 1979 in the UK , and from 1929 to 1975 in...

. Strock graduated in 1941 from USC

University of Southern California

The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...

, where he studied journalism and film. During World War II, he served in the Army's Ordnance Motion Picture Division. He was assistant editor on the 1944 film Gaslight

Gaslight (1944 film)

Gaslight is a 1944 mystery-thriller film adapted from Patrick Hamilton's play, Gas Light, performed as Angel Street on Broadway in 1941. It was the second version to be filmed; the first, released in the United Kingdom, had been made a mere four years earlier...

for MGM

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...

.

In a "pioneering" television career that began in the 1940s, Strock was involved with many television series including Highway Patrol

Highway patrol

A highway patrol is either a police unit created primarily for the purpose of overseeing and enforcing traffic safety compliance on roads and highways, or a detail within an existing local or regional police agency that is primarily concerned with such duties.Duties of highway patrols or traffic...

, Sky King

Sky King

Sky King is a 1940s and 1950s American radio and television adventure series. The title character is Arizona rancher and aircraft pilot Schuyler "Sky" King...

, Sea Hunt

Sea Hunt

Sea Hunt was an American adventure television series that was aired in syndication by Ziv Television Programs from 1958 to 1961 and was popular in syndication for decades afterwards. The series originally aired for four seasons, with 155 episodes produced...

and Maverick

Maverick (TV series)

Maverick is a western television series with comedic overtones created by Roy Huggins. The show ran from September 22, 1957 to July 8, 1962 on ABC and stars James Garner as Bret Maverick, a cagey, articulate cardsharp. Eight episodes into the first season, he was joined by Jack Kelly as his brother...

.

Other directorial efforts included Blood of Dracula (a 1957 film in which a disturbed teenage girl at a boarding school becomes a vampire through hypnosis) and Ivan Tors

Ivan Tors

Ivan Tors was a Hungarian playwright, film director, screenwriter, and film and television producer with an emphasis on non-violent but exciting science fiction, underwater filmed television and films, and films about animals...

' "Office of Scientific Investigation" trilogy, which included The Magnetic Monster, Riders to the Stars and Gog

Gog (film)

Gog is a 1954 science fiction film directed by Herbert L. Strock and released in 1954 by United Artists. It is notable for having been shot in color, widescreen and 3-D...

, shot in 3-D.

In 2000, Strock published a memoir, Picture Perfect.

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