Reviewing classified film footage from 1945 dating back to the discovery of the stargate, Daniel discovers something disturbing: the government researchers trying to activate the gate managed to not only activate it, but to send a man through – after which a power overload traps that man at his destination. Daniel pays a visit to Catherine Langford, the woman who originally brought him in on the secret of the stargate project, and lets her in on a secret of his own – by examining the 1945 film, he’s figured out where the man, Catherine’s fiancee, was sent. Daniel infuriates General Hammond by not only bringing Catherine to the SGC, but by drawing up a mission plan to save Ernest Littlefield – a mission on which Catherine insists on joining SG-1. Once through the gate, they find Ernest quickly, in a crumbling tower where he’s been trapped for 50 years thanks to a broken dial-home device. But Ernest has spent that half-century studying a device containing knowledge of undiscovered elements and secrets of the Ancients, the race who built the stargate network. When an approaching storm completely destroys the DHD, the team must devise a way to power the gate for a one-shot trip back home, and the only power source left is being used by the Ancient device – something which Daniel refuses to allow to be shut down.
written by Robert C. Cooper
directed by Jonathan Glassner
music by Kevin KinerGuest Cast: Elizabeth Hoffman (Catherine Langford), Keene Curtis (Ernest Littlefield), Gary Jones (Technician), Duncan Fraser (Professor Langford), Nancy McClure (young Catherine), Paul McGillion (young Ernest), Sheelah Megill (Martha – Maid)
Notes: Paul McGillion would later join the regular cast of the spinoff series Stargate: Atlantis as Dr. Carson Beckett.
LogBook entry by Earl Green with notes by Dave Thomer