Star Trek: 10 Things You Didn't Know About The Doctor

8. Zimmerman's Man

We're not talking about Leonard, the holographic iguana (also part parrot), or poor Roy, squashed too soon. We're talking about Reginald 'Reg' Barclay, possible acolyte of Doctor Lewis Zimmerman, himself the "father of modern holography," creator of the EMH. For its entry on him, The Star Trek Encyclopedia (3rd ed.) states that,

[Barclay] […] left the Enterprise-D and transferred to the Holoprogramming Center at Starfleet's Jupiter Station. He worked with Dr. Lewis Zimmerman on the engineering team that designed Starfleet's Emergency Medical Hologram.

Outside of the malfunctions in Projections, we don't really know whether Barclay was involved in the creation of the EMH.

Early in the development process for Star Trek: Voyager, writers/producers had considered Barclay not only for designer of the EMH, but also as the face of the program. In her notes from 1993, Jeri Taylor wrote:

A possibility is to consider Dwight Schultz: Barclay would have been working on this program and finally takes a leave to put on the polishing touches (on a TNG episode). He creates the character in his own image.

Had they gone with that option, and if the Ferengi co-opted Holo-Barclay from Inside Man was anything to go by, we'd have got as many impressions, but a lot less golf!