I may have been better served if I followed that by saying "some of the other players" instead, as I was only referring to Uhura and Sulu.
That speaks to the larger, missed point--the long-in-the-tooth point or complaint about the use of minority characters on TOS, which even a basic understanding of the very nature of 1960s TV leads to only one motive/conclusion: productions used a hierarchy that reduced
all except the featured leads in a subordinate position.
Some--under the dreamy "spell" of
Star Trek being some glorious, fireworks-in-the-sky rallying cry for
all things equality have convinced themselves (along with self-serving statements from supporting players) that some "wrong" had been committed (the BS aimed at Shatner), or that they were not as developed as they should have been, since in their minds, the series was some level playing field for the "Enterprise family."
So, part of my statement was obvious in the diversity they brought to the cast and the other was accurate in the sense of the time that they and Trek went on the air. I have no argument that the examples you provided did give those characters a greater stake in the proceedings. I would point out though, despite their disproportionate relevance, only two of the shows you mentioned, debuted prior to or during the same season as Trek. A difference of a year or two might seem insignificant, but I would argue that any such advantage was important given the widespread cultural ferment occurring at the time and that any program's relevance, however tepidly received at the time, had an exaggerated status as being good enough to at least get its shot on one of the networks, which probably carried as large an imprimatur then as during any period of TV's history.
The move to add minority characters as prominent players was in motion as either bought scripts or in production before
Star Trek aired, or even a season old. For example, the
Ironside pilot was in production in 1966, with a March 1967 airdate; Irwin Allen was developing
Land of the Giants two years before its 1968 debut.
The Mod Squad creator Bud Ruskin wrote the pilot for that series in 1960, though it would be another six years before it sold, etc.
The point being that behind the scenes, writers & producers were already in the process of thinking about or actually adding significant minority characters that were the true breakthrough examples, given the character's
intended status, far beyond the limits (seemingly self imposed) by
Star Trek. That's illuminating, since Roddenberry--for all of his "fight for equality" speeches used to sell himself as the TV messiah--could have fought to elevate at least one racial minority character to the featured lead position, instead of being locked in the inherently limited supporting player role.
Again, other producers were already doing that (or were in the production stages of doing so) the same year TOS premiered. What stopped Roddenberry--the
Great Crusader of All Things Equal (or so he spent the last 2 1/2 decades of his life telling us) from say, breaking the "country doctor" archetype, and make that featured lead in the form of Dr. McCoy African American, or Japanese?
Or was it just that Spelling, Allen, and others were more forward thinking than Roddenberry?
Oh, and the thought of Irwin Allen as a forward thinker? Well he was notorious as a producer who found it very difficult to edit the multitude of production ideas that were always running through his mind, of having as a trademark the reuse of just about every set design element, often multiple times, and of having as paramount the entertainment quotient of his projects, scientific reality, he felt, not really being any of the audience's true concern. But a social ground breaker, I don't think I see the evidence for that. Maybe he just liked Marshall's assertive performance in Galileo Seven and thought he would be a good fit as the pot stirrer of the command crew.
