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- September 1, 1914: Robert Wise, director of "The Day the
Earth Stood Still" and the first
Star Trek movie, was born.
- September 1, 1979: Saturn received its first man-made visitor as Pioneer 11
passed within 21,000 miles of the planet's outer rings; originally it had been
proposed that Pioneer dive through the Cassini division, an apparent gap in
the rings visible from Earth. Not a good idea, since the "division" is
actually composed of dense, very dark chunks of rock and ice; the Voyagers
figured this out in 1981...from a safe distance! Pioneer toox six years to
travel from Jupiter to Saturn, whereas Voyagers 1 and 2, approaching Jupiter
at this time in 1979, used that planet's immense gravity to slingshot their
way to Saturn in only two years.
- September 2, 1951: Mik Kaminski, virtuoso violinist who played
with ELO, was born.
- September 3, 1976: Viking 2 landed in the Utopia Planitia region of Mars, a
relative flatland area often mentioned as the future construction site of the
Enterprise in Star Trek: The Next
Generation.
- September 4, 1957: In-demand stuntwoman and actress Patricia
Tallman (best known as Babylon 5's telepath
Lyta Alexander) was born.
- September 5, 1954: Versatile actor Jeffrey Combs, who may be
known best in SF circles for his portrayal of the calmly vicious Weyoun on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, was born.
- September 5, 1977: Voyager 1 was launched on its way to Jupiter and Saturn,
trailing behind sister probe Voyager 2 but reaching Jupiter first. Original
plans called for Voyager 1 to make an unusual slingshot around Saturn to arc
into a trajectory that would allow a rendezvous with Pluto, the only planet we
have not seen up close, but Congressional trimming of NASA's budget denied us
perhaps the only opportunity for such an exploration in most of our lifetimes.
Yet another reason to thank the guys in the capitol building.
- September 7, 1955: Yugoslavia actress Mira Furlan, who later
emigrated to America and played Babylon 5's
Ambassador Delenn, was born.
- September 8, 1966: NBC premiered a science fiction series called
Star Trek with an episode called
The Man Trap. Rumor has it
that Star Trek is still running in some form
somewhere.
- September 9, 1975: Viking 2 was launched from Earth to Mars; it arrived in just
under a year, but you've probably already figured that out.
- September 11, 1964: Roxann Dawson, B'Elanna Torres of Star Trek: Voyager fame, was born.
- September 12, 1959: Man reached the moon...well, sort of. The Luna 2 probe
launched by the Soviets achieved more bragging rights than scientific facts.
It slammed into the moon's surface, the first man-made object to "land" there.
- September 12, 1966: the next-to-last Gemini mission, Gemini 11 was launched,
practicing maneuvers in Earth orbit that would be necessary to get live people
to the moon without slamming them into its surface.
- September 14: Bruce Hyde, also known as Lt. Kevin Riley from the
original Star Trek, was born.
- September 14, 1936: Walter Koenig,
Star Trek's Chekov and later a popular guest
star on Babylon 5 as Psi-Cop Bester, was
born.
- September 16: Danny John-Jules,
Red Dwarf's Cat, was born.
- September 17, 1857: Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, grandfather of the Russian space
program, was born. He was a rocket pioneer of his time, along with
contemporaries Oberth and Goddard.
- September 17, 1930: Ed Mitchell, Apollo 14 lunar module pilot, was born.
- September 17, 1930: Tom Stafford, veteran of the Gemini 6, Gemini 9 and Apollo
10 flights, was born. He was also in command of the Apollo half of the
Apollo-Soyuz Test Project in 1975.
- September 20, 1956: Gary Cole, star of such cult series as
American Gothic and Crusade, was
born.
- September 22, 1944: Frazer Hines,
Doctor Who's popular Scottish sidekick Jamie
through all but a couple of Patrick Troughton's stories, was born.
- September 23, 1949: Rosalind Chao,
Star Trek's Keiko O'Brien, was born.
- September 24, 1930: John Young, co-pilot of the first Gemini mission, was born.
He commanded the Gemini 10 and Apollo 16 missions, flew on Apollo 10, and was
commander of the first space shuttle flight in 1981. His final spaceflight
was the ninth shuttle mission with the international Spacelab research
facility in tow. He held a high-ranking position in NASA until he expressed
very public concerns for shuttle safety measures following the 1986 Challenger
disaster.
- September 25, 1952: Mark Hamill, Luke Skywalker of
Star Wars fame and more
recently an actor in several CD-ROM games, was born.
- September 28, 1945: Kelly Groucutt, bass player with
ELO from 1975 through
1983, was born. After the completion of the
Secret Messages album in 1983, Kelly was released from the band and had
to file a lawsuit in an attempt to collect any royalties when other members of
ELO claimed he was a session player and not a full-time member, despite eight
years of touring with ELO as well as recording.
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Information
originally compiled for use in LogBook: The
'Zine
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