Saturday, February 27, 2010

3-2-1 Contact article on ST:TMP

The collection cabinets yield up another article on "Star Trek: The Motion Picture," this time from the January 1980 edition of the youth educational magazine "3-2-1 Contact," available for students to order much like the Scholastic publications. There are two parts to the material from this issue; first, a write-up on the movie, (which does manage to get a few facts wrong) and a more educational article featuring the film's science advisor, Jesco von Puttkamer of NASA.
(Click on images to enlarge.)







Bonus: Below is an ad from the second issue of "The Monster Times," published in 1972, for a color Spock poster. I'm sure this poster hung in a lot of young people's bedrooms. Did you have it?



Bonus #2: Below is another in the set of greeting cards put out in 1976 by Random House. Inside, the text says "With any luck at all your gift should arrive in 7 light years! Happy Birthday!" Of course, making the common error of confusing a measure of distance with time.

4 comments:

Pineapples101 said...

Absolutely loving the ST-TMP articles, my favorite of all the ST films :)

Anonymous said...

I had that vintage Spock holding the Enterprise poster. But what I really wanted in 1980 was a poster of the V'ger "nerve center" set.

By far, TMP is my favorite ST film as well (followed by Generations). The only ST film that possesses a real "sense of wonder" ... thanks be to The Great Bird.

CMX

Anonymous said...

I first saw the Spock poster in late '67 in a fitting room of the teens' area in a local department store. (Remember local department stores?) I expressed my appreciation and they ended up giving it to me. It was on my wall for years, paternal objections be damned. I believe my youngest cousin ended up with it.

I hunted for a replacement for decades. I had two friends looking for it, and one of them found it in a local shop that sold "retro" posters and other items. I still have it.

Like the Blish and "Making Of/ World Of" books, the film clips, "Music from Outer Space", and the Idic (yeah, I know what Nimoy said) that poster was, and still is, a connection to something it's hard to express in words. This blog brings it all back. Star Trek lives.

Frederick said...

Anon,

Thanks for the comment, good to know you are reading and enjoying!

Although I was pretty much a loner in my younger teen years, due to the fact that I had to change schools about every three or fours months, (my stepdad couldn't settle down), whenever I found someone that was also a trekker it was an instant friendship. We shared a common love for Trek and it made a connection right away. It's nice now to hear others share similar memories of what ST meant to them in their youth, and it connects us all now.

I have that Nimoy album also, I almost wore it out back then. The poster that I most have nostalga for is, believe it or not, one of the Trek crew from the middle of The Monster Times, which I secretly hung in the inside door of the closet in my Grandma's room where I stayed on the weekends. I couldn't hang them up at home, so I had to make do with that.

Come back and comment often!