It was on September 8th 1966 that Star Trek debuted on NBC in the U.S.A.
The episode chosen to be broadcast first was actually the fifth produced – “The Man Trap“.
Also, as commenters have pointed out, happy 40th anniversary to Star Trek: The Animated Series, serendipitously, it too debuted on September 8th in 1973
So fire up Netflix, Amazon Instant, Hulu Plus, Star Trek.com, or your DVD or Blu-ray copy of TOS and celebrate!
Happy Birthday Star Trek!!!!!!!!!!!!
TO BOLDLY GO!
I grew up on TOS in the 70s, and that episode haunted my dreams for weeks. Still loving that series all these years later, how many of us did it inspire to study space or engineering and so forth?
Egad! It is the return of the number 47! It has come to merge with its creator, S’trek! X-D
Matt, you may not have heard the news, but in an earlier thread, Curious Cadet made some rather astounding calculations and claims that make your article here invalid?
Yes, it is hard to believe, I realize, but using “Curious Cadet Math,” this year is actually the 49th birthday for Star Trek, and the 50th Anniversary Celebration will begin next year.
Sorry to inform you that you might be wrong with your dates, here. ;-)
I’m going to celebrate by watching the streaming video of STiD…again! Yay!
Sad to see my comment was deleted from when this article was taken down a bit ago after being posted a few mins before midnight :(
Oh well it was a nice birthday message.
yah who is the decider…on when treks anniv. starts? first aired date should count or what about when the first pilot was completed…or even when forbidden planet was released haha….
i remember we called that creature the salt vampire….really good startlingly scary costume….there was an awesome full size statue of that monster downstairs outside entrance to quarks bar at trek exp. in vegas….still havent been back to vegas since two weeks before they closed…there was a full size gorn statue right next to the salt monster too…hah we called the aliens in menagerie butt brains….talosians right? i forget…
still love TOS! This is Star Trek! Happy 47th aniverssary
Reading a couple of comments above, it’s like deja vu all over again ;-)
I’m reminded of all the ‘discussions’ at the time over whether 1 January 2000 or 1 January 2001 was the start of the 21st century…
Anyway, I’m happy to go with first US air date – Happy 47th birthday Star Trek!
Happy bday trek….however…our fans seem to be the most divisive, rude, self centered, yes even hateful we have ever seen at this moment which does not bode well for future trek success imho….we must heal…..idic enjoy our differences…delight in them…after all that broken trek thread is quite entertaining hahhh…still gotta wonder wheres Anthony as his website is at the center of a gathering storm….
I remember growing up exploring the final frontier on ‘black & white’ telly. Yeah, those were the days…
Happy B, Star Trek. Live long and prosper!
Fired up my BluRay copy of The Man Trap at 12:30 AM…… with the original FX.
So to many fans including the people that write articles on the site, Star Trek got a broken gift for its birthday with Into Darkness.
Just Kidding….
Happy 47th birthday star trek. may this franchise continue to live long and prosper.
Now if only we can get an original non revenge story for star trek 3 filled with humour, action, drama, romance, bromance, the enterprise crew been a family, good science, friendships, life, space exploring all in Star Trek 3 that will be the best gift to give Trek on its 50th birthday in 2016.
“[…] that will be the best gift to give Trek on its 50th birthday in 2016.”
Hey, what about a bold new television series or rollercoaster 50th Anniversary DVD/BR ;-)
Happy Birthday Star Trek. May you Live long and prosper.
Happy Birthday Star Trek!
May we see yet another 47 years of Trekkin…we just have to get pass the 50th Anniversary vomit drop that Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzman will be regurgitating and live thru more of Orci telling us to f^ck off.
Oh and I am sure Simple Peg will be chiming in, but hell he can easily be replaced as Scotty. That guy from the Futurama episode “Where No Fan Has Gone Before” would be great!
What’s his name, Welshie?
LOL LOL LOL
My first memory was in 1984-85, i was Five. I couldnt make out much. Just some Fellas with weird looking costumes..(thank God, Star Trek Re – runs hit the Greek TV at the time). That picture stays in my mind and in my heart ever since.. I may have to thank Star Wars for my entry to Sci – Fi world but Star Trek will always be the sensitive Child i will always adore!!
Oh my God.
I’m listening to ST:TMP’s main fanfare and introduction, and all of a sudden, a moment ago, I decide to go to TrekMovie dot com, and here it is: A tribute.
There is a God — or at least, a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful serendity.
I cannot tell you how happy I feel …. This is Star Trek — as close to a religious experience I’ve had for months.
Thank the universe for such a thing.
Bob Orci, if reading this — forget the crap you get from a few fans here and there. And those fans who don’t like ST (2009) or STID — Live Long and Prosper to you as well. We’re all one family — the family of Star Trek fans.
To Star Trek and all its adherents — and to all the rest of humanity, the good, the bad, and indifferent: May you, somehow, some time, at some point in your lives, LL&P.
My best to all of you.
^^ “Serendipity.” As corrected. ;-)
I celebrated last night by watching “Errand of Mercy.” I needed to wind down after a grueling drive through the Bronx…Star Trek always puts me in a better mood.
Thanks, Star Trek! Here’s to 47 more!
A Happy Birthday to a show I’ll always love, even if I don’t love all of its offspring equally (or in the case of VGR or STID? Not at all).
Live long and prosper, Star Trek. May you weather your current storms and recapture your truer self someday….
I am six weeks older than Trek. Turned 47 in July. Happy Birthday Star Trek!
47 years! Wow! I was there. Not for that very first broadcast but there that first season. ‘Charlie X’ was my introduction to this nearly five decade love. I was instantly hooked. None of the silliness of Lost in Space (which to, to be honest, I was a fan of) but science fiction with a seriousness I’d never seen before. I will never forget the thrill of discovering the show. Thank you Mr. Roddenberry.
And Happy Birthday Star Trek. I gotta admit you look pretty good for your age.
I’m a child of the 80’s, so I grew up with The Next Generation, but by the mid 90’s I had seen everything back to “The Cage” and I watched the new shows almost every week until the end of Enterprise. Star Trek is the closest thing I have to a religion besides my actual religion, and it has undeniably shaped me into the person I am today thanks to its inspiring ideals and its characters.
Which is exactly why, although I put it on a tall pedestal, I haven’t been terribly upset by the bad movies or the reboots. It’s a shame there are bad Trek movies, yes, but one important thing Trek taught me when I was very young was to see past the bad things. At the heart of every Trek movie and series (yes, even “The Final Frontier”) there is a positive message, and that message is all I need to know that something is “true” Star Trek.
Today I celebrate Gene Roddenberry’s accomplishments, and I celebrate Rick Berman’s and JJ Abrams’ accomplishments too, because thanks to all three of them the words “Star” and “Trek” are still on peoples’ lips and in fans’ hearts almost a half-century later, and have touched an incalculable number of lives in amazing ways.
So cheers to Star Trek and whatever form it may take in the years to come.
IDIC
Happy Birthday, Salt Vampire!
Happy Birthday Star Trek! <3
It’s interesting that this episode was chosen to be broadcast first.
It features McCoy who in the first season wasn’t even given title billing. Was this to put Spock, a character NBC tried to eliminate from the first pilot, out of the initial spotlight? Nevertheless the episode focuses on McCoy and Kirk rather than Kirk and Spock. And Scotty is visibly absent.
It also features the alleged flirtation between Uhura and Spock that many suggest is the canon precedent for their relationship in the Abrams films.
Appropriately for the divisiveness STID has allegedly caused in the fan base, the premeire episode received negative reviews by the critics, notably Variety and TV Guide.
Happy Birthday Star Trek :)
Happy 47th Anniversary to Star Trek! Almost half a decade of fun, meaningful, intelligent entertainment, a hopeful view of humanities future, not something dark and grim or in a galaxy far far away. Thank you Gene Roddenberry for giving us a hopeful and optimistic view of the future. “The human adventure is just beginning.”
Im 30, so I could not be there from the beginning, but at 4 years old I was there for the beginning of TNG. I remember watching new episodes of TNG and reruns of TOS with my father since I was young, i’ve been hooked for 26 years.
I have been celebrating with a movie marathon for the anniversary as well as anticipation of the release of Into Darkness on Tuesday.
I missed it when she first launched – however quickly watching the re-runs and being able to see every incarnation from TOS – I have thought of ST as a fundamental part of my life.
Also as my birthday is 3 days later I have always had a great 3 day birthday celebration.
LLAP and let’s get rid of this silly arguing
Have a Happy, Star Trek!
I am of the “first” generation Star Trek watchers. I enjoyed the first airing of the series while sitting on my father’s lap. I am not sure if my first memories of the show are from that time, or from the later re-broadcasts, but I do know my love of Trek was something I built with my father. Sometimes, when I was very good, I got to be the one to hold the television antenna in just the right spot to insure good reception – a slightly less grainy black and white image! Dad and I have attended every Trek film together since TMP. He is in his late 70’s now, and we have had a few health scares…but we still set a date for every Trek movie. We have dragged my mom to a few, and sometimes the rest of the family, but it is really “our” thing… Dad instilled in me a love of science fiction and space exploration. Thanks to him, I was a sci-fi buff from childhood. While my friends were reading Harlequin, I was reading Heinlein. I can recall attending some science-fiction conventions during my teen years, and being one of the only girls there –they guys weren’t always sure what to make of me. “Chicks” weren’t supposed to be into that stuff. Thankfully, things have changed and there are a lot more women into sci-fi these days so I no longer feel quite so exotic… LOL!
I remember the first time I laid eyes on you. It was love at first sight.
:)
Happy Birthday, Star Trek!
@ 34. Aurore – September 8, 2013
“I remember the first time I laid eyes on you. It was love at first sight.
:)”
LOL, that is sweet :)
I was 8 months and 4 days old on September 8th, 1966!
It’s been a Trekkieful life!
Happy Birthday Star Trek!
And thanks to all who continue to keep Gene’s vision alive.
LLaP
Always thought it a bit unfortunate that this episode was the one to lead. It’s not an ideal introduction. The overall tone is uncharacteristically morose, and the first scene of the film is of the crew beaming down, but we’ve had no introduction to them, the ship, or the concept of the transporter itself. Nothing has been established. The episode plays as if we’re supposed to be familiar with all that already. Little wonder that the reviewers were unimpressed, or that a large part of the potential audience failed to be hooked at this stage.”The Corbomite Maneuver’, which would have led if the visual effects had been ready, was designed as an introductory episode and works much better as one – defining the ship and its crew very well, along with the whole ethos of nonaggression and peaceful exploration under which it operates. It would have been a much stronger hook, which might have brought in better ratings and reviews from day one, leaving the show with fewer battles to fight later and perhaps even a full five year mission as originally planned. To quote the series’ final spoken line, ‘if only…’.
Let’s not forget a happy 40th bday to the animated series. Wwow 40 years…..born in ’58 Im a TOS kinda guy.
47 is a good number for Trek, and in particular the TNG version of it, so maybe we will soon hear of a new Trek TV series. Or at least the official announcement of the third JJ Trek movie.
Can you imagine the excitement if CBS does announce a new Trek TV series?
TrekMovie might even have to change its name. Dibs on TrekTV.com! ;-)
EXCELLENT! =D
@26. Temple Fugate –
“Today I celebrate Gene Roddenberry’s accomplishments, and I celebrate Rick Berman’s and JJ Abrams’ accomplishments too,…”
I’d have to add Mr. Harvey Bennett that list as well.
Same old Nancy!
STAAAAR TREK!!! <3
Let’s not forget the contributions of Fred Frieberger and Brannon Braga.
Happy Birthday TOS!
Love Man Trap, it’s great Trek, but also has an almost weird “Outer Limits” vibe to it. In fact, I think I’ll watch it tonight.
I also would like to throw down some love for The Animated Series, which also premiered on this day, Sep. 8, 1973. Happy Birthday TAS!!
47! I won’t even point out the irony. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TREK!!!!
@ 34. Trek Lady
That is a great story, sounds very much like mine. I was 4 years old when TNG was released and would watch it and TOS reruns with my father. He got me hooked on Star Trek and its kinda been ‘our thing’ ever since. We have seen every movie in theatres together since Generations. We watched Star Trek so often my mother and sister developed an appreciation and respect for it, I wouldn’t go so far as to say they are fans but they watched it. I was surprised when my mother and sister both said that they wanted to see the 2009 movie as well as Into Darkness, they love my love for Star Trek lol.
3 more years and its the 50th blow out! Can’t wait!
Yawn…this hasn’t aged well