In 1966, the world was an uncertain place.  A thin veneer of fancy clothes and rock and roll covered a deep, roiling pot, ready to boil over.  Racial tension divided us, the specter of nuclear armageddon scared us, the harsh realities of war in foreign jungles drove men to anger.  There were signs and protests and rioting in the street, as young men burned their draft cards and dropped acid to silence the screams of foreign children.  America’s youth marched for peace and were gunned down by soldiers.  Leaders pleaded for understanding.  Good men died.  

It was hard, through all of this chaos and fear, to see how things could ever get better.  How our nation would heal, how our species would survive.

And yet…

On September 8, 1966, on a Thursday night, one man invited us into his world.  It was strange…almost silly.  It was overly dramatic, with women in thigh-high dresses and high-heeled boots, men with pointed ears, all clad in red, blue, and gold shirts, bright to the point of being garish.  It was outrageous, with cardboard sets, green body paint, and alien costumes on which the zippers were clearly visible.  Rocks made of styrofoam fell from paper mache mountains as high overheard, plastic models shot post-production lasers at one another.  

It was corny.

It was hokey.

It was a b-movie gone wrong…on the surface…

And yet…

Beneath all of that was one man’s vision.  This was not a man who watched the news; this was a man who saw past it.  Amidst the fear and anxiety of a fearful time, he let America’s televisions serve as a window into the future, and through his eyes we saw a very different world.  In his future, we saw a world of pioneers and peacemakers, of scientists, of scholars, of Martin Luther Kings and John F. Kennedys.  Clad in their silly shirts, the crew of his U.S.S. Enterprise was multiethnic, multinational, and for all appearances colorblind.  This was a future in which, as he himself had put it, mankind had “matured”.  Humanity had grown up, and faced the future hand in hand.  This was a future in which humanity had ceased its fighting, its pettiness, its hopelessness.  Poverty, war, disease, suffering had all been eradicated, and Earth was a paradise unrivaled in the galaxy.  Humans stood boldly as brave explorers at the helm of great starships build by a masterpiece society that held knowledge as invaluable, and money as worthless.  

In the end, the world just wasn’t ready.  The show was cancelled, the sets struck.  A man who had worked so hard to bring hope to the world watched in tears as burly men tore down his cardboard sets.  They mothballed the silly suits, packed up the plastic toys, and carted them off to gather dust in a closet somewhere.  After only a few beautiful years, the journey was over.

And yet…

While the show may have ended, the dream wasn’t over.  Dreams endure, and as the civil rights movement brought real change, as the war in Asia ended, as man took his first steps on the moon, the dream survived.  Through it all, great men were inspired by one man’s vision of a better tomorrow, and they joined hands to make it happen.  Soon, renewed interest led to a rebirth.  Feature films, new television series, and the dream continued.  New writers pushed the envelope, and challenged our perceptions of the world around us by forcing us to consider how future generations would judge our prejudices.  Years after Kirk had kissed and brawled, Picard lectured and judged.  Sisko wept and fought.  Janeway smiled and hoped.  Archer tinkered and dreamed.  For half a century, one of the greatest ideas any man ever had marked the time, providing us with a goal, with something to reach for, by never failing to believe that somehow, some way, everything will turn out for the best.

This whole thing started in 1966, on an early autumn Thursday, with silly shirts and cardboard sets, and props that were plastic toys.  It began with bad acting, with bad camera work, with a flimsy model set in front of a painted starfield.  It began with painted stars and a lot of imagination.  

Now, here we are.  What began as camp and silliness has become a dream held by generations of smiling men and women, who wear their silly shirts with pride and see inspiration where others saw only rubber monsters and theremin sound effects.  They gather far and wide, because they don’t just watch.  They believe.

They believe that this world can be better.  That we, the human race, can work together to be stronger than the sum of our parts.  They believe that knowledge is more valuable than money, that exploration is an end, not a means, and that in the end, despite our worst efforts, humanity can be saved.

Just as he did.

On October 24, 1991, Gene Roddenberry left this world for new adventures, his life here cut short by congestive heart failure.  Those who knew him remembered him for his smile, for his optimism, and his stalwart refusal to give up on mankind, even as the world around him tore itself apart.  Now, twenty-five years after his passing, his dream continues on, gaining speed even now, careening like a comet, driven onward by the hopes and belief of generations of Americans who learned their lessons well.  He may be gone, but his trek through the stars continues, because dreams refuse to die.

Through the years, through shifting tides, changing ideals, and countless attempts to kill it, Star Trek has withstood the test of time.  It has guided our development, inspiring scientists and spurring technological innovations as we continue to take our first wobbly steps out into the greater cosmic dark.  Amidst that cold and darkness, Star Trek is the idea that lights the way, that provides meaning for all we do in the pursuit of scientific achievement and exploration.  For fifty years, this idea has defined our future, and what it truly means to be human.

And it all started on a fall evening, with chintzy props, a shoestring budget, and one man’s cardboard dream.