1976 Deforest Kelley Interview

I've posted items before from the great 70's fanzine "Enterprise Incidents," and today I'm revisiting it again with material from issue #2, published in July of 1976. This time we open it up for some items on Deforest Kelley, everyone's favorite sneaky-bad-guy- turned-irascible-humanitarian (as far as roles are concerned).

First up below, a reprint from the Archives page of a TV/Movie Life article on De, probably published in 1967 or early '68.

Below, another TV/Movie magazine clipping on De, from 1968.

And below we begin the magazine's actual interview with De, conducted in 1976.

Bonus: Below is another of the Random House Star Trek greeting cards, put out in 1976. Since McCoy was the focus of this entry, I thought it was a good time to post the card that featured him. The inside text says "...you can't keep a good man down!"

All of the above items were bought by me in the late 70's at the (sadly, now defunct) store in Ft. Lauderdale called "Starship Enterprises." Below you will see the younger, and much skinnier Fred inside the store during one of my visits. I was about 19 at the time; please don't hold this picture against me. I'll be posting more pictures that I took there in future entries.

I still have my copy of the life-size Spock poster behind me, and the black and white ST:TMP promotional stills on the wall in the background. And yes, I even have the U.F.P. badge I was wearing. I would look back and laugh at myself as a geek, except for the fact I still have all that stuff and really haven't changed much except put on some weight.

Enterprise Crew Stands By For Lift-off Into Movie History

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Saved from "The Star" tabloid, November 13, 1979.

Bonus: Nice publicity shot of Kirk and Spock scanned in from another of my photo scrapbooks.

Bonus #2: A 1976 Random House Star Trek Greeting card!

To say Kirk looks insufferably pleased with himself would be an understatement. Mugging for the camera was a true talent of Bill's, and this shot from "I, Mudd" puts it to great use. There were about a dozen or so different cards for various occasions in this first set of Trek-themed cards ever put out. I was fortunate enough to get most of them, and I'll share them with you here every so often. This one opened up into an award, and was really my favorite card.

I bought all of these cards at my favorite comic book/memorablilia store ever, the afore-mentioned "Starship Enterprises" in Ft. Lauderdale. I took this 1979 photo of the display in the store where I got the cards. Neat, huh? Kind of funny to see Artoo and Threepio hawking merchandise for the competition.

Kingdom Of The Spiders poster

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The miracle of nuclear radiation caused Bill's body to grow as large as his ego, till he towered over the town, straddling it with his awesome awesomeness.

The poster for the 1977 "Kingdom of the Spiders" captures the essence of Bill's dramatic portrayal of horror, doesn't it? This was a fun film from the 70's, made all the better by our man Bill.

Bonus: Below, a high-rez image of a great Kirk and Spock publicity pose. And don't anyone dare say they make a cute couple! They're just close friends, okay?

If Kirk and Spock were to get any closer, they'd both be wearing the same shirt.

Spock's pokerface came in extremely handy in such touchy situations.
"Spock, what do you think... am I looking a bit fat in this tunic? Come on, be honest."

Below, the Flight Deck certificate that I ordered from Lincoln Enterprises in April of 1975. I remember getting the package when I went to stay the weekend with my Grandma, where I had any packages delivered that I wanted to keep secret (and protected) from my stepdad. I had ordered a number of other items, which I'll post as time goes by on this blog. The yellowing on the right side comes from the sticky-backed photo album I foolishly put things in back then.

Below you will see something only three people in the world have; an original piece of shell art by me, depicting the Enterprise made entirely of seashells. I made the one in the photos about 15 years ago when living in Florida, where shell shops were abundant. One day I was browsing around in one and marveling at all the kitschy knick-knacks made from shells, and it occurred to me that the Enterprise would lend itself very nicely to being recreated using shells. It does have an organic flow to it, so I picked out some individual shells from the baskets, took them home and hot-glued together my original idea. It worked! There was no mistaking it for anything else.

I made another one for a friend, who still has his on his computer desk, and another for someone at work who wanted it as a gift for a Trekker friend. Whether that one still exists is unknown. If it were ever located, it could be worth some real money... a couple of dollars, even.

It's funny, but it actually resembles the ship design used in the new Star Trek movie; considering the warp nacelles that are so matronly huge at the front.

I propped it up a little so you can see the sand dollar used for the bottom half of the main saucer section.

And the view from straight on. Hope you enjoyed seeing my little artistic creation! I've thought about making and selling these, but who has the time?

1974 article by Shatner: "Why I Believe In UFOs."

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"The National Enquirer" tabloid was one my Grandma always got when we took her shopping, and there was very often some kind of Star Trek article in it, which I immediately harvested upon having them passed along to me. These articles came from the 1974 to 1975 time frame, but I didn't make a note of the dates so I'm not sure.

Apparently after writing the above article, Shatner went from second-hand sightings to a personal experience with a UFO, as told in the story below.

Below, a retelling of the ESP/UFO incident, this time from "The Star."

Next time: Nimoy on why he believes in both UFO's and ESP!

And above we have a photo of my picture display wall. I went to my thick binder ST photo notebook and picked out some of my favorites to display around the beautiful VHS video-release promotional poster from 1986. On the right are some autographed photos, on the bottom are three cast portraits from Andrew Probert. I ordered those prints from Roddenberry's Lincoln Enterprises in the mid-70's. Probert worked on Star Trek: The Motion Picture later on, actually designing the new upgraded Enterprise and the other ships seen in the movie. He went on to design the new Enterprise-D for The Next Generation, and much more. These paintings represent some of his early work, done when he was in his mid 20's.

And on the left you can see some pictures from another love of mine, the Apes movies.