Fact-Checking Inside Star Trek: The Real Story

[Ssosmcin]

Not really. Kirk and Khan talk about it being 200 years since the Botany Bay was launched. And while the line in Tomorrow is Yesterday is played for a laugh, the exchange doesn't make sense if it's wrong.

The late 22nd or early 23rd century, going by dialog used in more than one episode. Of course, 23rd has been used by later productions.

 

[Christopher]

Not really. Kirk and Khan talk about it being 200 years since the Botany Bay was launched.

Kirk explicitly says they estimate it's been two centuries, so there's some wiggle room.

And while the line in Tomorrow is Yesterday is played for a laugh, the exchange doesn't make sense if it's wrong.

Of course it does, since Kirk is making a wry observation rather than attempting to provide information. Col. Fellini says "I'm gonna lock you up for 200 years," and Kirk jokes to himself, "That oughtta be... just about right." For the purposes of a joke, even being a century off could be "just about." Really, it would've made less sense if Fellini had hit on the exact time interval by chance. That would've been a rather absurd coincidence.

The late 22nd or early 23rd century, going by dialog used in more than one episode. Of course, 23rd has been used by later productions.

And "The Squire of Gothos" put it 700 years in the future. They were making it up as they went and things changed along the way. It happens. (Heck, the term "mind meld" was never used until season 3 and didn't become the default term until the movies.)

The 23rd century was first pegged as the setting by James Blish in, ironically enough, his "Space Seed" adaptation (although he doesn't change the "200 years" references). It was strongly implied by "Metamorphosis," since it had to be c. 235 years after Zefram Cochrane's birth, and it seems unlikely that Cochrane would've been born in the 1960s-70s. And it was explicitly stated in The Making of Star Trek, which indicates that the show's producers had settled on that time frame by the end of season 2. (The mention in TMoST is probably the reason the 23rd-century setting, as well as the term "mind meld," became standardized later on, since TMoST was the authoritative text for the first generation of fans.)

 

[Nerys Myk]

Not much of one. Kirk and Khan talk about it being 200 years since the Botany Bay was launched. And while the line in Tomorrow is Yesterday is played for a laugh, the exchange doesn't make sense if it's wrong.

The late 22nd or early 23rd century, going by dialog used in more than one episode. Of course, 23rd has been used by later productions.

The gag in TIYdoesn't depend on accuracy.
Kirk gave a Khan an estimate based on when the ship was built. Khan is cagey on confirming Kirk's speculations. The launch had to happen after Khan's overthrow in 1996 not the early 1990's as Kirk said.

 

[Ssosmcin]

They only say the ship was built sometime in the 1990's, they surmised Khan was exiled after the Eugenics wars in the mid-90's. Either way, Kirk is the one who says it's been 200 years since then, and Khan doesn't need to confirm or deny anything. They know who he is and when he vanished. So...200 years. Again, the late 22nd or early 23rd century.

The gag in Tomorrow is Yesterday is worthless if Star Trek takes place in the 27th century. So, yeah, for the gag to work, it does kinda rely on 200 years being "just about right." I never said it was exact, because 2167 is probably too early, which works really well with what Kirk tells Khan.

So, yup, they "nail down" that Star Trek takes place around 200 years in the future.

 

[Christopher]

So, yup, they "nail down" that Star Trek takes place around 200 years in the future.

Except they don't, because those references were ignored later on. "Nail down" means it becomes fixed in place afterward. Obviously that didn't happen here, any more than season 1's multiple uses of "Vulcanian" nailed down that usage or season 2's three uses of "mind probe" for Vulcan telepathy nailed that down. They didn't nail it down, they just laid it loosely in place so it was easily shoved aside.

 

[Nerys Myk]

They only say the ship was built sometime in the 1990's, they surmised Khan was exiled after the Eugenics wars in the mid-90's. Either way, Kirk is the one who says it's been 200 years since then, and Khan doesn't need to confirm or deny anything. They know who he is and when he vanished. So...200 years. Again, the late 22nd or early 23rd century.

The gag in Tomorrow is Yesterday is worthless if Star Trek takes place in the 27th century. So, yeah, for the gag to work, it does kinda rely on 200 years being "just about right." I never said it was exact, because 2167 is probably too early, which works really well with what Kirk tells Khan.

So, yup, they "nail down" that Star Trek takes place around 200 years in the future.

They don't nail anything down until the 80's.
There are no records of the Botany Bay. So they've no idea when it was launched.

SPOCK: No such vessel listed. Records of that period are fragmentary, however. The mid=1990s was the era of your last so-called World War.

SPOCK: A strange, violent period in your history. I find no record what so ever of an SS Botany Bay.

All they know is Khan and several of his followers vanished. There is no record of him being captured and exiled

SPOCK: I have collected some names and made some counts. By my estimate, there were some eighty or ninety of these young supermen unaccounted for when they were finally defeated.
KIRK: That fact isn't in the history texts.
SPOCK: Would you reveal to war-weary populations that some eighty Napoleons might still be alive?

I'd surmise Khan and his followers went underground for a while and eventually got hold of the Botany Bay and left Earth. Possibly through some Eugenics sympathizers. How long he was on the run is anyone's guess.
Kirk confirms Khan's identity well after the speculation of his time of origin. Up to that point Khan is short on confirming or denying anything.

KHAN: Khan is my name.
KIRK: Khan. Nothing else?
KHAN: Khan.
KIRK: What was the exact date of your lift off? We know it was sometime in the early 1990s, but
KHAN: I find myself growing fatigued, Doctor. May we continue this questioning at some other time?
KIRK: The facts I need, Mister Khan, will take very little time. For example, the nature of your expedition.
MCCOY: Jim. A little later might be better.
KHAN: Captain, I wonder if I could have something to read during my convalescence. I was once an engineer of sorts. I would be most interested in studying the technical manuals on your vessel.
KIRK: Yes, I understand. You have two hundred years of catching up to do.
KHAN: Precisely.
KIRK: They're available to any patient on the viewing screen. Doctor McCoy will show you how to tie into the library tapes.
KHAN: Thank you, Captain. You are very co-operative.

The gag in TIY relies on Fellini using a large amount of jail time not the exact number of Centuries.

 

[Ssosmcin]

Sorry, Christopher, I missed your post replying to mine up a bit. Yeah, I agree the "estimate" gives them some space to maneuver, but it's pretty clear they pulled away from the time difference in Square of Gothos and made it closer to our time going forward. As for Zephram Cochrane, we don't know when he was born as far as the original series is concerned, just that he died "150 years" before that episode (and I'll even allow that Bones was rounding). Space Seed stated that sleeper ships weren't necessary after 2018 (oooo just missed that deadline). You can take from that 2018 is the year we broke the light barrier (obviously ,you can also decide not to). If so, that's when Cochrane "discovered the space warp." Not knowing how long he lived after that, he could have died 50 years after Khan left Earth. Again, just as far as the original series was concerned. Naturally, in the later shows and movies, they adjusted the years as we were living past those dates.

So, fine, they didn't strictly nail it down, I'll back off from that, but they did settle on "about" 200 years in the future. Back from the 700 years previously.

As for the joke in Tomorrow is Yesterday, I really don't think they'd have Fellini say "200" years and set up the gag if they didn't want us to think that's around when the series takes place. If it's Gothos' 700, then it's meaningless. I get that it wasn't meant to be accurate, but "just about right" means "around 200 years." Not 300 or 100. If it's a century off, then it wouldn't be just about right, It wouldn't be right at all. His response would be "well, that's closer." Or something infinitely more clever. I know he wasn't providing information to Fellini, and it's a joke, but for a joke to land, it has to at least make sense if it's not a random non-sequitur. It's an ironic quip. Homer Simpson: "It's funny because it's true."

 

[ZapBrannigan]

If TNG is part of your canon (and I'd say it's up to us at this point), it says Dr. McCoy is 137 in 2364, ruling out a TOS time frame earlier than 2260s.

Also, 1966 plus only 200 years seems, as Spock would say, "all too brief a time" for so much history and technology to occur. Look at data points in WNMHGB (S.S. Valiant was over two centuries ago), A Piece of the Action, etc.

I side with the Okuda Chronology, meaning 1966 plus 300 on the dot. But again, everybody has their own Star Trek.

 

[Christopher]

As for Zephram Cochrane, we don't know when he was born as far as the original series is concerned, just that he died "150 years" before that episode

He died 150 years earlier at the age of 85. Simple addition.

pace Seed stated that sleeper ships weren't necessary after 2018 (oooo just missed that deadline). You can take from that 2018 is the year we broke the light barrier (obviously ,you can also decide not to).

That may have been the intended implication, but it doesn't hold up. Spock said the DY-100 ships were meant for interplanetary travel only, so they must've been quite slow, taking years to get from Earth to Mars, say. You don't need to get anywhere remotely near the speed of light to reduce interplanetary travel times to weeks or days.

So, fine, they didn't strictly nail it down, I'll back off from that, but they did settle on "about" 200 years in the future.

I don't accept a 2-time usage that they subsequently dropped as fitting any reasonable definition of the word "settled." Settled means resolved, answered, no longer up for debate. It implies permanence. They mentioned UESPA/the United Earth Space Probe Agency twice, but they didn't settle on that. They used "Vulcanian" in five episodes of season 1, but they sure didn't settle on that. Hardly anything was settled in season 1. It was tried and later rethought.

As for the joke in Tomorrow is Yesterday, I really don't think they'd have Fellini say "200" years and set up the gag if they didn't want us to think that's around when the series takes place.

Yes, obviously they did when they wrote that particular episode, and when they wrote "Space Seed." The point is, it didn't last beyond those two episodes, any more than UESPA or Vulcanians or mind probes. In the long term, they settled on the 23rd century as the time frame of TOS. So nobody here except you is talking about what was intended within those two episodes. We're talking about how to reconcile the dating in those two episodes with what was later established as the "correct" dating. We're saying that, fortunately, those two early mentions are inexact enough that we can fudge them to fit the final version -- which is more than can be said of "Gothos"'s extreme outlier date.

 

[Ssosmcin]

This was really all i was trying to reply to originally:

What makes that clear? Given the various nuggets of Earth and Federation history, I've always been happier with the 700-900 year range

My point was it’s “around 200” years into the future. But if it’s more like 300 all said and done, okey dokey. It’s still not 700. My “nailed down” use was unfortunate. Mea culpa.

And yeah, I forgot Cochrane specified his age as 87.

Good night.

 

[johnnybear]

Let's not forget that Trek maintains the new stardate chronology and the old calender was a hard bit of addition for the simple crew of the Enterprise in a future age of computers that do everything for you! A bit like the kids and nerds today walking around holding a phone to their ear and keeping their nose and eyes set on read! I used to think that stardates were only for the ship's crew but what about people back on earth or on other planets? That or humanity changed their calender to coincide with the alien ways of measuring time as to not be awkward?
JB

 

[Myko]

And I honestly don't know much about the people who would regularly work on the original series as BG - aside from one man named Roger Holloway, who worked as a standin and extra on the show. I only know him because my father worked with him a bunch of times in the 1970s and introduced him to me on set as an actor from Star Trek, telling me "He played Mr. Lemli". (I was cast as one of Roger's kids in a sci-fi comedy pilot called "Space Force", where they were doing a gag that alien families were being transported aboard that were completely identical. Roger's family unit of mom-dad-brother-sister was given Roger's look at the time - a mop of dark hair and a bushy 70s moustache - something that was applied to me, to the mom and to my "sister" for the shot.) I did meet a few of the regular SI's and BG from Next Gen when I worked on Voyager, but I haven't seen those guys in eons at this point.

That's a fun anecdote about Halloway, thank you for sharing! I've never been able to find out anything about him aside from being in Star Trek, I almost assumed Star Trek was his only foray into TV. A fun tidbit about Lemli is that in "The Changeling" where he's an extra in engineering, James Doohan calls him by his real name ("Roger"), so Lemli's full name is Roger Lemli. Of course the creators didn't really intend any continuity between bit parts so it's just a happy coincidence.

I agree with your assessment about Steele and Foster, unless some lost footage/film trims turns up we'll most likely never know.

 

[Mytran]

There's an additional "2 centuries" reference that often gets overlooked, from Shore Leave:

SULU: I found it. I know it's a crazy coincidence, but I've always wanted one like this. Found it lying right over there. An old-time police special, and in beautiful condition. Hasn't been one like this made in a couple of centuries.

Granted it's a little vaguer than the others, but Sulu's comment does match the other two "200 years IN THE FUTURE!!!" references in season 1.

As for Khan, his request (as Kirk understood it) was to know how long they had been sleeping for.
Throw in a little time dilation for a vessel accelerating at a constant 1G for decades and 200 years might not be too far off the mark.

 

[Christopher]

Granted it's a little vaguer than the others, but Sulu's comment does match the other two "200 years IN THE FUTURE!!!" references in season 1.

Which stands to reason given that they were written close together. But as it turns out, Sulu's line is actually more consistent with a later dating, because the particular kind of revolver used in the episode is still being made today, so they might go on making them for another 50 years for all we know. (And apparently the episode got the terminology wrong, because ".38 special" is the name of the cartridge used in the revolver, not the revolver itself. Maybe Sulu's not the expert he thought he was.)

 

[Tallguy]

We seem to have gotten off the thread.

The fact of the matter is that the official line until the movies was "we don't want to pin it down to a date" (even though the writers were doing otherwise in an inconsistent fashion). The posters for TMP were the first place that The 23rd Century was even kind of official. The Spaceflight Chronology and the novels through the 80's (based on the SFC) put TOS in the late 22nd (200 years) and TMP in the early 23rd. TWOK had the "In the 23rd century" title card and Romulan ale that MAY have had Terran dates. And then TNG gave us the first honest to goodness year of 2364.

We good?

(Yeah, "Vulcanian" is used exclusively in season 1. Five times is the number? That's WAY more than "Vulcan has no moon.")

 

[Christopher]

The fact of the matter is that the official line until the movies was "we don't want to pin it down to a date" (even though the writers were doing otherwise in an inconsistent fashion). The posters for TMP were the first place that The 23rd Century was even kind of official.

I wouldn't say that. The Making of Star Trek was co-authored by Roddenberry and had the participation of the show's creative staff, and its middle section was even titled "An Official Biography of a Ship and Its Crew." So it was as least presented as official at the time, and it did establish the 23rd century as the show's setting. Heck, that's where the movie posters got it from. Everyone treated TMoST's claims as gospel back then, at least until TWOK gave Scotty a nephew after TMoST claimed he was an only child (and even that got cut out).

The Spaceflight Chronology and the novels through the 80's (based on the SFC) put TOS in the late 22nd (200 years) and TMP in the early 23rd.

No, they put TOS in the first decade of the 23rd century, roughly 2206-9, because that was the best compromise they could come up with between the first-season date references and the subsequent 23rd-century references.

Also, only a few of the '80s novels used the SFC scheme. There were other novels and reference works that used the 2260s timeframe that was eventually made official, or something close to it (I think Shane Johnson's works used the later dating scheme). The two schools of thought coexisted for well over a decade until "The Neutral Zone" pinned the date down for TNG.

 

[Tallguy]

Scott's Guide, FASA, Spock's World, The Final Reflection, Strangers from the Sky. Those are the ones off the top of my head (and all dealing with Star Trek history). I don't recall a single Paramount licensed product other than the Star Trek Maps that used the later dating (which was my preferred system).

If you can name some more I'd appreciate it. I was always annoyed with the earlier dating and it always ticked me off when my favorite books used it.

 

[Christopher]

Scott's Guide, FASA, Spock's World, The Final Reflection, Strangers from the Sky. Those are the ones off the top of my head (and all dealing with Star Trek history). I don't recall a single Paramount licensed product other than the Star Trek Maps that used the later dating (which was my preferred system).

If you can name some more I'd appreciate it. I was always annoyed with the earlier dating and it always ticked me off when my favorite books used it.

Quoting myself from an older thread:

Many fan reference works put TOS in the 2260s, including the 1980 Star Trek Maps -- the Introduction to Navigation booklet that accompanied the maps said that Cochrane invented warp drive in 2050, that the Romulan War and the "Archon class" were in the 2160s, and that the "time barrier" was broken in 2243. And all its references to TOS episodes place them in 2261-63. The fan-made Federation Reference Series, by TrekBBS member aridas sofia, also used this scheme, putting the Organian conflict in 2261 and the change to TMP uniforms in '66. The '77 Star Fleet Medical Reference Manual from Eileen Palestine, Geoffrey Mandel, and Doug Drexler puts the destruction of Ingraham B and the discovery of the Horta somewhere around 2260 in its rough medical timeline chart. Drexler and Mandel's 1980 Enterprise Officer's Manual puts Kirk's birth in 2229 (which would put "The Deadly Years" in 2263, a slight discrepancy), "Where No Man" just after 2260, and Kirk's promotion to admiral in 2265. (It puts the loss of the Valiant in 2071, by the way.) The '87 Ships of the Star Fleet Volume 1 puts ST:TMP in 2267... and ST III in 2287, which I guess is their attempt to reconcile with Morrow's "20 years old" line, but makes no sense otherwise.

Indeed, other than the Spaceflight Chronology, the only pre-TNG tech manual/reference-type works I can find that use the earlier dating scheme are the ones by Lora Johnson (known as Shane Johnson at the time -- she's recently transitioned). Both Johnson's 1985 Uniform Recognition Manual and the '87 Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise put the end of the 5-year mission in 2212 and TMP in 2217, oddly enough -- and even more oddly, the latter puts TVH in 2222, which doesn't add up at all.

So if anything, the general consensus of fan tech authors (including Drexler and Mandel) was apparently that TOS happened in 2261-63, give or take. The earlier dating scheme seemed to be used mainly by the SFC, Johnson (roughly), and the occasional novel like Final Frontier (which put Jim Kirk's 10th birthday in 2183, corresponding to a 2207 date for "The Deadly Years").

 

[Tallguy]

Quoting myself from an older thread:

Well... Other than the Maps (which I also referenced) none of those were licensed works. I'm well aware of the fan works that used the earlier dating. Those are all the material that shaped my preference for late 23rd.

I named a handful of licensed works that used the SFC dating. (Many of them either best sellers or high profile projects or both.) My experience with 80's Trek novels and tie-ins is thorough but hardly exhaustive. So I would be delighted to hear of any licensed works from pre-TNG that used the late 23rd dating. I am unaware of any.

That's why it was almost shocking when TNG committed to late 23rd. The tide was so heavily in favor of the SFC for almost ten years. Even on the fan side, FRS and Mastercom followed the Mandell / Drexler / etc. dating but there were many fan sources that didn't.

Heck, I think even FASA's TNG Officer's Manual (for the six and a half minutes it was on the shelf) used the SFC.

 

[Christopher]

My experience with 80's Trek novels and tie-ins is thorough but hardly exhaustive. So I would be delighted to hear of any licensed works from pre-TNG that used the late 23rd dating. I am unaware of any.

That's why it was almost shocking when TNG committed to late 23rd. The tide was so heavily in favor of the SFC for almost ten years.

I wouldn't say it was anywhere near "heavily," which is really the point I'm making. Even if there were no official works that used the 2260s scheme, there were really only a few that alluded to the 2200s scheme. It's not like the books were constantly referencing the date. There were only a few at most that referenced the SFC at all. The Final Reflection and Strangers from the Sky drew continuity from the SFC but didn't mention specific calendar dates for the TOS era. Final Frontier is the only Pocket novel I can think of that did give calendar dates.

I was a proponent of the earlier dating scheme myself at the time, and I had to redo my whole chronology after TNG: "The Neutral Zone" aired, but I didn't find it shocking that TNG went that way. My impression had been that neither scheme was anywhere close to official, that it was purely a matter of individual authors' opinions and there was no consensus either way.