The Making Of Star Trek....

[Warped9]

I wonder if it is still in print, being published?

Amazon shows a few new copies still floating around, but I don't believe it's still in print. So these must be new copies of out of print editions. Additionally there are "fair" to "very good" copies of various editions available through Amazon.

 

[Galileo7]

^Thanks.

 

[mb22]

TMOST was the first Star Trek book I ever had. It's hard to overstate this volume's importance to the masculine side of fandom: it was the trailblazing book for future Making Of's, as well as the whole Technical Manual genre. Franz Joseph obviously devoured TMOST as his major source of research.

Incidentally, there was a time in my childhood when the cover photos on TMOST were my only glimpse of the show in color. That was tantalizing, especially the eight pictures on the back.

Some of which are printed in reverse.

 

[Tim Walker]

I still have my first copy of The Making Of Star Trek (by Stephen E. Whitfield) that I purchased as a young boy in my elementary school book fair in 1975. That book and The Making Of Space:1999 book that I purchased in 1976 at a book store were among my favorite possessions in the '70s as a boy.

I recall reading these books many years ago.

One thing I recall from the Star Trek book was discussion of the very beginnings, before the first pilot was completed.

There were different concepts for the design of the Enterprise, for example.

 

[BillJ]

Wish this would make it to e-book.

 

[Redfern]

I have a few copies of the book, purchasing my first around 1973 (a newly made friend "introduced" me to the show in August 72). I read and reread that retrospective along with Gerrold's two "behind the scenes" volumes until the spines were so cracked that some of the pages were in danger of dislodging. It's funny how that book resulted in who knows how many misproportioned phaser pistol props. For those who have not examined the paperback and wondering, one of the pages had a "collage" of photos depicting the "type 2" phaser pistol prop. There was even a tape measure revealing it's overall length. However, whoever snapped the photos must have used a single, instense, directional light source. This cast a shadow so stark and "solid" that many fans (like myself) as well as professionals (like Franz Joseph and various toy companies) to mistake as part of the casing. Thus when Joseph compiled the "StarFleet Technical Manual", he drew the phaser as having a rather simple "wedge" shape, missing certain angles and undercurves the original prop had. Many fans (again, like me) just accepted the designs as authoritative and recreated the mistakes. This continued for nearly 20 years when the grand internet expansion of the 90s allowed fans to finally see other photographs revealing the true shape of the iconic props.

On a related note, does anyone have any information about a couple of the Matt Jefferies illustrations? Again, for those not having seen the book, there are a couple of pages showing early, declined designs for the Enterprise. Among them are two showing the familiar configuration, but with a spherical primary hull instead of a saucer. These would inspire a fanon concept eventually christened the Daedalus (sp). But there are two or three that are quite baffling. Rather than the modular components (discs, cylinders and connecting ""blocks"), these were compact, centralized shapes, looking a bit like, well, more like communications satellites. I've personally never seen these images in another publication (though that does not mean squat). Given their sparse detail, it's hard to get a sense of scale. Has there been any discussion about these objects that look like second cousins of "Nomad"? Were they meant as something else entirely and placed by the ship concepts by mistake?

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Warped9]

The two collections of Matt's sketches I'm familiar with are those from TMoST and those found in the Star Trek Sketchbook. Anything else I've seen was from the occaional sketch showing up online somewhere over the years.

I can't help but feel, though, that there are sketches of MJ's for TOS that we've never seen. I figured he must have made sketches developing his concepts not only for the Enterprise and certain props, but also for things like the Command chair, the Bridge, the Transporter Room and many other things. It's hard to imagine he conjured those things in his imagination in almost finalized form from the get-go.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I have one copy from 1974. It's broken into five pieces, including two loose pages. One break is at the Stage 9 plan.

 

[Tim Walker]

I recall mention in "Making..." that an early concept was hand held projectile weapons for the crew. By the time they completed "The Cage" this had been changed to hand held beam weapons, which graduated to the phaser rifle in the second pilot.

 

[Warped9]

I recall mention in "Making..." that an early concept was hand held projectile weapons for the crew. By the time they completed "The Cage" this had been changed to hand held beam weapons, which graduated to the phaser rifle in the second pilot.

I've started my reread and at present I'm only up to Page 31. But I've just read GR's early description for the hand-held weapons where he does make mention of the weapon being able to fire projectiles as well as darts to tranqualize or stun someone.

What's interesting about that is that if you look at the design of the lasers from "The Cage" and WNMHGB you can see different nozzles on the fore part of the gun as if GR's intial concept description carried over into the actual design and prop even though later it became strictly a beam weapon.


The other telling thing that strikes me presently is Whitfield's references to Roddenberry in terms of a man evidently in his prime and with all his faculties. This stands in contrast to the Roddenberry who would helm the early seasons of TNG, a man in ill health, dealing with substance abuse and clearly experiencing certain emotional/pschological issues. His own personal frailties were really coming to the fore in later years.

 

[Warped9]

I'm up to NBC agreeing to contract Roddenberry to produce "The Cage" as a potential pilot for Star Trek.

What's interesting, though, are two things (both of which I was unaware of when I read this book way back in the early '70s): te first is that statement that prior to Star Trek science fiction on television did not have recurring characters. I don't believe that's actually true. Both Lost In Space and Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea debuted a year or two before Star Trek and both had a cast of recirring characters. I also believe a few short lived series produced in the 1950s had recurring characters.

The second thing I noticed was that there is no mention whatsoever of Herb Solow while GR was fleshing out his ideas and pitching the series to studios and networks. On these pages it's made to look like it's all Roddenberry with no mention of anyone else or their input. That's quite in contrast to how the events are reccounted in Inside Star Trek: The Real Story by Herb Solow and Robert Justman.

 

[Christopher]

What's interesting, though, are two things (both of which I was unaware of when I read this book way back in the early '70s): te first is that statement that prior to Star Trek science fiction on television did not have recurring characters. I don't believe that's actually true. Both Lost In Space and Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea debuted a year or two before Star Trek and both had a cast of recirring characters. I also believe a few short lived series produced in the 1950s had recurring characters.

What page and passage are you referring to? As I've understood it, the idea was that TOS was the first adult science fiction drama with continuing characters -- that the only previous SF shows that had been done as adult dramas had been anthologies such as Science Fiction Theater, The Twilight Zone, and The Outer Limits. There had certainly been kids' SF/fantasy shows with continuing characters, like Adventures of Superman and Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, but none aimed at adults, as far as I can recall.

 

[Harvey]

There was Men Into Space, although based on IMDB, there really was only one recurring character.

 

[Maurice]

Also bear in mind that when NBC gave the go-ahead to film the 1st pilot there was no Lost In Space (its pilot was shot near the same time as "The Cage"), and the first season of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea was less far out and sci-fi than later seasons ended up.

 

[Warped9]

What's interesting, though, are two things (both of which I was unaware of when I read this book way back in the early '70s): the first is the statement that prior to Star Trek science fiction on television did not have recurring characters. I don't believe that's actually true. Both Lost In Space and Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea debuted a year or two before Star Trek and both had a cast of recirring characters. I also believe a few short lived series produced in the 1950s had recurring characters.

What page and passage are you referring to? As I've understood it, the idea was that TOS was the first adult science fiction drama with continuing characters -- that the only previous SF shows that had been done as adult dramas had been anthologies such as Science Fiction Theater, The Twilight Zone, and The Outer Limits. There had certainly been kids' SF/fantasy shows with continuing characters, like Adventures of Superman and Tom Corbett, Space Cadet, but none aimed at adults, as far as I can recall.

Page 36:

"The third myth involved the belief that it was impossible to weave continuing characters into television science fiction. Until Star Trek, all television's science fiction had been anthologies."

Passage emboldened by me. No mention of adult science fiction. And remember TMoST was published in the summer of 1968 and so reading the passage quoted above (or by anyone over the decades since) the statement is asserting something that is not stictly true simply because they don't qualify the statement.

Captain Video and His Video Rangers (1949)
Commando Cody: Sky Marshal of the Universe (1953)
Space Patrol (1950)
Tom Corbett, Space Cadet (1950)
Commando Cody: Sky Marshal of the Universe (1953)
Flash Gordon (1954)
Rocky Jones, Space Ranger (1954)
Captain Video and His Video Rangers (1949)
My Favorite Martian (1963)
Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea (1964)
Lost In Space (1965)

There are probably a few others.

 

[Christopher]

^Okay, then I'd call the passage a misstatement, but an understandable one. Most of the shows you list there are from the previous decade, an era when shows were rarely preserved, so they might've been mostly forgotten. And My Favorite Martian might've been overlooked because it was a sitcom. (My Living Doll would also fit on the list -- although it debuted in September '64, while "The Cage" was in preproduction.)

 

[Warped9]

While VTTBOTS and LIS were in development when Star Trek was beginning to be developed there's some room for interpretation. But by the time TMoST is published both VTTBOTS and LIS were established and on the air so that makes the statement inaccurate.

Perhaps it's being overly picky, but there it is.

 

[The Old Mixer]

As I recall, passages in TMOST where Gene was "speaking" were printed in all-uppercase, and I always imagined that he was shouting when I read them.

This! I've recently been picking through this book hither and yon, and that's a very annoying feature.

EVEN IN THE LATE 60S THEY MUST HAVE HAD THE MEANS TO SET APART EXTRACTED QUOTES WITHOUT MAKING IT SEEM LIKE THE GREAT BIRD OF THE GALAXY IS YELLING AT ME FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE!

The parts that I've reread also strike me as a bit shoddily organized...especially devoting a chapter early in the book to the story outline for "The Cage". Seems like that would have been better in an appendix where it wouldn't interrupt what narrative flow the book has. Whitfield wasn't a professional author and it shows in how the book is put together. The question is, where was his editor?

 

[Warped9]

As I recall, passages in TMOST where Gene was "speaking" were printed in all-uppercase, and I always imagined that he was shouting when I read them.

This! I've recently been picking through this book hither and yon, and that's a very annoying feature.

EVEN IN THE LATE 60S THEY MUST HAVE HAD THE MEANS TO SET APART EXTRACTED QUOTES WITHOUT MAKING IT SEEM LIKE THE GREAT BIRD OF THE GALAXY IS YELLING AT ME FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE!

I never interpreted it that way reading the book for the first time forty some years ago.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

His words were meant to be IMPORTANT. We were supposed to be hanging off every one of them!