The first Star Trek convention

A three-day event called Star Trek Lives! gets underway at the Statler Hilton in New York City, organized by a group of fans including Joan Winston and future Star Trek Compendium author Allan Asherman. A gathering of fans in the low hundreds is expected, but instead a crowd of thousands turn up to hear presentations by guest speakers such as Gene and Majel Roddenberry, Isaac Asimov, former Desilu executive Oscar Katz, and Star Trek writer and script editor D.C. Fontana, as well as presentations by guests representing NASA. (Roddenberry will later claim that NBC executives were present as well, though he claims they declined to identify themselves to fans since there was a fair amount of anti-NBC sentiment expressed in the wake of Star Trek’s cancellation.) Though science fiction conventions have been held prior to this event, this is the first dedicated Star Trek convention, and indeed the first such gathering devoted to a single property.

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