Some of you seem a little uncertain about the chronology, so I guess that once again I should point out the various statements.
In "Menagerie Part 1"
MENDEZ: You ever met Chris Pike?
KIRK: When he was promoted to Fleet Captain.
MENDEZ: About your age. Big, handsome man, vital, active.
KIRK: I took over the Enterprise from him. Spock served with him for several years.
SPOCK: Eleven years, four months, five days.
Four months is about 0.3333 of a year, and a day is about 0.0027376 of a year, so Spock served with Pike for about 11.347 years.
Later in both parts of "Menagerie" there are statements about the time since the incident on Talos IV:
SPOCK: This is thirteen years ago. The Enterprise and its commander, Captain Christopher Pike.
SPOCK: As I stated, gentlemen, this was thirteen years ago. We were on routine patrol when the ship's sensors detected something ahead. At first we were not certain what it was.
"Thirteen years" should be between 13.000 and 13.999 years. If Spock began serving with Pike right before the Talos IV incident, Spock would stop serviving with Pike betweeen 1.653 and 2.652 years earlier. If Spock started serviing with pike X years before the Talos IV incident Spock stopped seving with Pke X plus 1.353 to X plus 2.652 years before "Menagerie".
"The Conscience of the KIng" states that the Tarsus IV massacre happened 20 years earlier. The script says that Kirk was already a midshipman then, but those scenes were not filmed, making it possible for Kirk to have been a young civilian child on Tarsus IV for some reason.
In "Shore Leave":
KIRK: What's the matter, Bones, you getting a persecution complex?
MCCOY: Well, yeah, I'm beginning to feel a little bit picked on, if that's what you mean.
KIRK: I know the feeling very well. I had it at the Academy. An upper classman there. One practical joke after another, and always on me. My own personal devil. A guy by the name of Finnegan.
MCCOY: And you being the very serious young
KIRK: Serious? I'll make a confession, Bones. I was absolutely grim, which delighted Finnegan no end. He's the kind of guy to put a bowl of cold soup in your bed or a bucket of water propped on a half-open door. You never knew where he'd strike next. More tracks. Looks like your rabbit came from over there.
Later Kirks meets Ruth:
KIRK: Ruth? Ruth.
RUTH: Jim, darling, it is me. It is Ruth.
(She kisses him)
Captain's log. Stardate 3025.8. Investigation of this increasingly unusual planet continues, and we are seeing things that cannot possibly exist, yet they are undeniably real.
[Rocky outcrop]
KIRK: (into communicator) McCoy, do you read me? Ruth. Ruth, how can it be you? How could you possibly be here? You haven't aged. It's been fifteen years.
Later:
SPOCK: There is one slight possibility, very slim, but nevertheless. Captain, what were your thoughts just before you encountered the people you described?
KIRK: I was, I was thinking about the Academy. My days
FINNEGAN: Hey, Jim baby! I see you brought out reinforcements. Ha! Well, I'm waiting for you, Jimmy boy.
So Kirk saw both Ruth and Finnigan at the Academy 15 years earlier.
FINNEGAN: Get up. Get up. Get up. Always fight fair, don't you? True officer and gentleman, you. You stupid underclassman. I've got the edge. I'm still twenty years old. Look at you. You're an old man.
KIRK: A lot of things. What's been happening to my people?
FINNEGAN: I never answer questions from plebes, Jimmy boy.
KIRK: I'm not a plebe. This is today, fifteen years later. What are you doing here?
So Kirk was a "plebe" in his first year at the Academy 15 years earlier. So Kirk's 1st year at theAcademy began or ended 15.000 to 15.999 years earlier. And if Kirk had a usual four years at the Academy he would have graduated 4 years after his first year began and 3 years after it ended. So Kirk should have graduated from Starfleet academy and been commissioned an ensign in Starfeet about 9.000 to 12.999 years before "Shore Leave".
Kirk apparently went on a historic deep space mission while an academy cadet, and possibly during his first year there, perhaps separating him from Finnegan. In "Whom Gods Destroy":
KIRK: I agree there was a time when war was necessary, and you were our greatest warrior. I studied your victory at Axanar when I was a cadet. In fact it's still required reading at the Academy.
GARTH: As well it should be.
KIRK: Very well. But my first visit to Axanar was as a new fledged cadet on a peace mission.
Kirk should have met Gary Mitchell for the first time about the same time as Kirk's first year year in Starfleet Academy, depending on the time relationship Between "Where No Man Has Gone Before" and "Shore Leave". Possibly they met while studying at a special school preparing them for entering Starfleet Academy.
In "Where No Man Has Gone Before";
Star date 1313.1. We're now approaching Delta Vega. Course set for a standard orbit. This planet, completely uninhabited, is slightly smaller than Earth. Desolate, but rich in crystal and minerals. Kelso's task, transport down with a repair party, try to regenerate the main engines, save the ship. Our task, transport down a man I've known for fifteen years, and if we're successful, maroon him there.
KIrk does not say that he became a close friend with Gary Mitchell as soon as they met. His words make it possible that they didn't become friends until years after they met. And that is a very important chronological consideration.
So Kirk probably graduated from Starfleet academy and was commissioned an ensign in Starfeet about 9.000 to 12.999 years before "Shore Leave". There is evidence that new ensigns in Starfleet usually remained at the Academy as instructors for some time after graduation, and and also evidence that Kirk did not do so.
Kirk probably ment and became friends with Ben Finney duiring his first year, and Finney and Kirk were probably assigned to the same ship when Kirk graduated from the Academy.
In "Court Martial":
STONE: Let us begin with your relationship with Commander Finney. You knew him for a long time, didn't you?
KIRK: Yes. He was an instructor at the Academy when I was a midshipman, but that didn't stand in the way of our beginning a close friendship. His daughter Jamie, who was here last night, was named after me.
STONE: It's common knowledge that something happened to your friendship.
KIRK: It's no secret. We were assigned to the same ship some years later. I relieved him on watch once and found a circuit open to the atomic matter piles that should've been closed. Another five minutes, it could have blown up the ship.
COMPUTER: Ship nomenclature. Specify.
KIRK: United Starship Republic, number 1371.
STONE: Continue.
KIRK: I closed the switch and logged the incident. He drew a reprimand and was sent to the bottom of the promotion list.
STONE: And he blamed you for that?
KIRK: Yes. He had been at the Academy for an unusually long time as an instructor. As a result, he was late in being assigned to a starship. The delay, he felt, looked bad on his record. My action, he believed, made things worse.
And kirk was an ensign on the
Republic when he reported Finney's error.:
SHAW: With reference to Records Officer Finney, was there in his service record a reported disciplinary action for failure to close a circuit?
ENSIGN: Yes, ma'am.
SHAW: Was the charge in that instance based upon a log entry by the officer who relieved him?
ENSIGN: Yes, ma'am.
SHAW: And who was that officer?
ENSIGN: Ensign James T. Kirk.
SHAW: Louder, please, for the court.
ENSIGN: Ensign James T. Kirk.
SHAW: Now the Captain Kirk who sits in this courtroom?
ENSIGN: Yes, ma'am.
SHAW: You have just heard the testimony of your own personnel officer, that it was an action of the then Ensign Kirk, which placed an unerasable blot on the record of the then Lieutenant Finney. Psychologically, Doctor, is it possible that Lieutenant Finney blamed Kirk for the incident?
In "a Private Little War" Kirk had been to Tyree's planet before:
SPOCK: Aside from that, you say it's a Garden of Eden?
KIRK: Or so it seemed to the brash young Lieutenant Kirk on his first planet survey.
KIRK: When I left there thirteen years ago, those villagers had barely learned to forge iron. Spock was shot with a flintlock. How many centuries between those two developments?
So Kirk was a lieutenant "thirteen years" before "A Private little War", and presumably Jamie Finney was born and named sometime before then when Finney was still friendly with Kirk.
In "Obsession" Kirk was a lieutenant on the starship
Farragut 11 years earlier:
KIRK: I suggest you look at the record tapes of past similar occurrences. You'll find the USS Farragut lists casualties eleven years ago from exactly the same impossible causes.
MCCOY: Am I? I was speaking of Lieutenant James T. Kirk of the starship Farragut. Eleven years ago, you were the young officer at the phaser station when something attacked. According to the tapes, this young Lieutenant Kirk insisted upon blaming himself.
KIRK: Because I delayed in firing at it.
MCCOY: You had a normal emotion. You were startled. You delayed firing for a grand total of perhaps two seconds.
KIRK: If I hadn't delayed, it would have been killed.
MCCOY: The ship's exec didn't seem to think so. His log entry was quite clear on the subject. Lieutenant Kirk is a fine young officer who performed with uncommon bravery.
KIRK: Don't you understand? It killed two hundred crewmen.
MCCOY: Captain Garrovick was very important to you, wasn't he, Jim?
KIRK: Yes. He was my commanding officer from the day I left the Academy. One of the finest men I ever knew. I could have killed that thing if I'd fired soon enough the first time.
So apparently Captain Garrovik commanded the
Republic when Kirk and Finney were on it, and Kirk went with Garrovik when Garrovkik transfered to command of the
Farragut.
And it is my deduction that after the
Farragut disaster Kirk returned to Starfleet academy and was an instructor there.
And after Kirk taught a class there for at least one year, Gary Mitchell entered the Academy as a plebe, a 1st year student.
In "Where No Man Has Gone Before":
MITCHELL: Well, I'm getting a chance to read some of that longhair stuff you like. Hey man, I remember you back at the Academy. A stack of books with legs. The first thing I ever heard from an upperclassman was, watch out for Lieutenant Kirk. In his class, you either think or sink.
KIRK: I wasn't that bad, was I?
MITCHELL: If I hadn't aimed that little blonde lab technician at you
KIRK: You what? You planned that?
MITCHELL: Well, you wanted me to think, didn't you? I outlined her whole campaign for her.
KIRK: I almost married her!
SPOCK: Our subject is not Gary Mitchell. Our concern is, rather, what he is mutating into.
DEHNER: I know those from your planet aren't suppose to have feelings like we do, Mister Spock, but to talk that way about a man you've worked next to for years is worse than
KIRK: That's enough, Doctor.DEHNER: I don't think so. I understand you least of all. Gary told me that you've been friends since he joined the service, that you asked for him aboard your first command.
KIRK: It is my duty, whether pleasant or unpleasant, to listen to the reports, observations, even speculations, on any subject that might affect the safety of this vessel, and it's my science officer's duty to see I'm provided with that. Go ahead, Mister Spock.
So it is my deduction that Gary Mitchell became a friend of Kirk during Mitchell's first year at Starfleet Academy and Lieutenant Kirk's second year (or later) teaching there, and that could be no more than 10 years before "Obsession" and at least 5 years after they first met in unspecified circumstances.
Later Kirk returned to starship duty in deep space, and gained a reputation as a great commander in some space war or wars, perhaps with Klingons:
GARTH: Upon the firmest of foundations, Mister Spock. Enlightened self interest. You, Captain, are second only to me as the finest military commander in the galaxy.
KIRK: That's very flattering. I am primarily an explorer now, Captain Garth.
GARTH: And so have I been. I have charted more new worlds than any man in history.
So after some years of service in deep space, Kirk was given his first command, presumably a smaller ship than a starship, and requested that Gary serve with him.
DEHNER: I don't think so. I understand you least of all. Gary told me that you've been friends since he joined the service, that you asked for him aboard your first command.
I don't know if Gary was assigned to Krk's first command, but they did serve together for some time previous to "Where No Man Has Gone Before":
MITCHELL: My friend James Kirk. remember those rodent things on Dimorus? The poisoned darts they threw? I took one meant for you.
KIRK: And almost died. I remember.
MITCHELL: So why be afraid of me now?
Gary Mitchell also served with Spock for at least two years, presumably on the
Enterprise,. Some of that time might have been when Pike commanded the
Enterpise, and at least some of it was after Kirk took command.
Kirk apparently became a starship captain at an unusually young age. I presume that Kirk's career was otherwise a rather normal one, going steadily from promotion to promotion - differing from the normal career path of a starship capatin only inhaving had having unusually rapid promotion.
And that allows gives the simpliest reconstruction of Kirk's career up to TOS.
However, someone could rearrange the orde rof events in their reconstruction of Kirk's career,perhaps having him be promoted, demoted, and then promoted again, making his career progression more complicated and less natural. By doing so they can make events in Kirk's life happen sooner or later than in my reconstruction of his career.
Also see my post number 38 for a couple of other biographical details about Kirk.
Before the guidelines debacle, I always wished a fanfilm outfit would tackle something along these lines. Good stuff.
