The truth is, I can’t make fun of this. This is my America.
Within a few years of Star Trek going off the air, Star Trek Conventions were already popping up in scattered locations around the country. This is footage of an early convention at the Northglenn Mall in Colorado, 1976.
It’s so horrible, it’s fantastic. These are the true Trekkies, willing to put it all out there on the line when there was no history of anyone being a Star Trek loon in public to fall back on. These are the pioneers. Freakish, nerd, Aspergery pioneers.
Today, if we see a Klingon shopping at the Winn-Dixie, we don’t miss a beat loading our Nutella onto the little conveyor belt. It’s a yawner, thanks to these nutballs. And I mean that lovingly.
The “reporter” has a hard time saying paraphernalia, but don’t judge him. This isn’t video. This is Super 8, baby. No second take. One take is all you had, unless you want to pay double at the Fotomat. And does it look like this guy can afford to pay double at the Fotomat?
And just when you thought it couldn’t get any cheesier, you realize Leonard Nimoy and James Doohan ARE THERE!
Must see footage after the jump—>
Thank you Star Trek for providing a way for Kirsti Alley to achieve antimatter reaction hotness
This is the first explanation of what a Trekkies is I have heard of. Now
I get it. Star Trek
But had no idea where they came from.
Is this a form of mental illness. They don’t want to grow up?
the “reporter” was a bigger nerd than the trekkies!
Yay, 70’s roller rink music
These conventions put food on the table for some of the actors when they found themselves type-cast and out of work. Arguably these types of conventions, which only grew in frequency, sophistication and attendance kept Star Trek alive in the heads of Paramount Execs and helped quite a bit in the creation of the movies and the other series based in the ST universe. So, yes they seem funny and goofy at first but compare that footage with a convention like Creation Entertainments 2016 convention. I know, it’s tough not to laugh at some of the people but I wouldn’t have had the guts to dress up and go to the local shopping mall for that event. By the by, they say it was Jimmy Doohan who was one of the prime supporters of these conventions from the early years and help keep Trek alive. Finally, yes I guess I’m a Trekkie.
That’s nothing, you should see the Dr. Who convention.
And give a big hand to Kenny Jackson on organ…
Galaxy Quest had the important dual role of telling the story of the actors and the convention circuit as well as providing Sigourney Weaver with some much needed cleavage.
I was 8 in ’76. Had I know such a thing was going on I would have been there with a Captain Kirk hair do.
These are the kids I used to beat up and later felt bad about it.
Only kidding; I never felt bad
I think I saw Mr. Pinko in that footage.
Crikey makes me want to throw an 8 track in the player and go for a cruise in my Gremlin.
My ’66 Dodge Polara had an anti-matter shield. Really.
I bought it (the car) used at Green’s Auto Sales in Roswell, NM for $375 cash. It had belonged to an anchorman at KSWS-TV (“The tallest tower with the maximum power!”), and I suspect that somehow, some way, alien technology from The Crash got mixed in with the parts bin at the Dodge dealership there. I narrowed it down to the 8 Track or the power steering pump. One day, men in black suits came and took it (the car) away.
…three weeks later I woke up in the A Shau Valley, RVN, unsure how I got there, got in the Crotch!
I’ve been to a few sci fi conventions-when I was a kid and once as an adult. The last one was GateCon in Vancouver BC- when Stargate SG1 and Battlestar Galactica were going strong. It was kind of fun but I didn’t have the detachment from reality needed to truly enjoy the experience. I was interested in the behind the scenes stuff. I sat in on a panel about special fx and production design on BSG- that was terrific. The girls I was with couldn’t care less about that stuff but were totally fan girl squeeing on the actors from the shows.
I saw Boomer from the original BSG- he definitely wished he was somewhere else. I got an autograph pic from Dirk Benedict (Starbuck, original BG). The best thing about the show was I got to talk politics with him in the bar later. I think he was relieved that not everyone at those things were completely obsessed.
Weirdest discovery- slash fan fiction. There are booths to buy things-artists who made show themes posters and props and writers who write fan fiction. Slash fan fiction is a reimagined gay universe where Kirk/Spock or Apollo/Starbuck exist as a couple-and generally it’s written kind of porny.
Great.
Great find, BFH !!
Don’t know what I like better…the ray gun that shoots ink splotches, or the cheesy organ music.
A Shau? Gesundheidt!
Illustr8r must be in her 40’s. I was 35 in 76. So I don’t have a clue.
I would rather watch 10 hours of STAR TREK or STAR WARS than 10 minutes of football. For some of us, material such as this stirs the imagination in a way that cannot be understood by “regular folks.”
To answer one if the questions above, no, we have never “grown up,” nor do we untend to.
@ Professor:
I can’t grow up
I’m much too old now
I guess I really did it this time, Ma
(James McMurtry)
was that Happy Kine & the Mirth Makers?
.. I have this strange desire to go watch ‘Galaxy Quest’
Wonderfest, Louisville KY. Been a few times. Never sought autographs but I saw Dirk Benedict (very aged now after surviving prostate cancer and I think is a vegetarian… looked almost withered), Yvonne Craig, Gary Lockwood, someone from Lost in Space, can’t recall who else. Only person I spoke to was Basil Gogos.
SCR_NORTH: I understand William Shatner was so hard up after the show was canceled and he went through a disastrous divorce that he was actually living in his car for a while.
Colorado was very nice back in 76. While not a Star trek fan, I hold nothing against the bizarre weirdos who …. ah, whatever it is they do.
I’d be out fishing for trout or panning for gold in mountains. 76?, or chasing girls in Denver. Wasn’t all progged up, yet, back then.
“had the guts to dress up ”
okay, call it guts, if you want to.