That is the case. We had a thread called the "description thread" where one person would say something like "John Stalwart's Flying Boot" or something, and the next poster would come up with an explanation of the thing. I forget exactly what it started as, but Isaac Phillips turned out to be this madman inventor guy who did a bunch of stuff with airships and rockets when combined together, and also invented a massively buffed version of the squid, and was, like a proper gentleman, never to be found without a teacup, even when in a coma in the blast crater from a failed... experiment.
I'll see if I can dig up some history on him.