The 11th episode of The Adventures Of Superman airs in syndication, starring George Reeves, Phyllis Coates, and Jack Larson.
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The 11th episode of The Adventures Of Superman airs in syndication, starring George Reeves, Phyllis Coates, and Jack Larson.
More about The Adventures Of Superman in the LogBook and theLogBook.com Store
The 58th episode of the science fiction anthology series Tales Of Tomorrow airs on ABC. Much of the second season is missing, including this episode.
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The 37th episode of The Adventures Of Superman airs in syndication, starring George Reeves, Noel Neill, and Jack Larson. Frank Scannell guest stars.
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The ninth episode of the syndicated series Highway Patrol, starring Broderick Crawford, is broadcast in the United States. This story, titled Reformed Criminal, is an early TV script written by future Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry. Roddenberry, still on active duty with the Los Angeles Police Department, is also the show’s “technical advisor” on police procedure. Due to Roddenberry’s current police employment, the episode is credited to his pseudonym, Robert Wesley. 
NASA attempts a second unmanned launch to Mars, successfully putting Mariner 4 on course for its nine-month cruise to the red planet. Intended to take the first-ever close-up pictures from the vicinity of another planet, Mariner 4’s main engineering objective is to simply survive the trip. The main problem encountered en route is a flaky star tracker (intended to lock onto specific stars and keep Mariner 4 in the correct orientation).
The 47th episode of Doctor Who airs on the BBC. This is part two of the story now collectively known as The Dalek Invasion Of Earth, although the title of this individual episode makes it easily confused with the first season serial of the same (collective) name.
This timeline entry leads to an entry covering this entire Doctor Who serial; there are plans to write new episodic entries in the future. You can support this effort!
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ABC airs the 43rd episode of Leslie Stevens’ anthology series The Outer Limits. Robert Duvall and Steve Ihnat star in the second part of the original series’ only two-part episode.
This series is not fully chronicled in the LogBook. You could join theLogBook team and write this guide or support the webmaster’s efforts to expand the site. More about The Outer Limits in the LogBook and theLogBook.com Store
The 42nd episode of Irwin Allen’s adventure series Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea airs on ABC, starring Richard Basehart and David Hedison. Pilar Seurat and George Takei guest star.
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The 30th episode of Larry Cohen’s science fiction series The Invaders, starring Roy Thinnes and produced by Quinn Martin’s QM Productions, is broadcast on ABC. Dana Wynter (Invasion Of The Body Snatchers) guest stars.
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ABC premieres the two-hour TV movie Earth II, starring Gary Lockwood (2001: a space odyssey) and Mariette Hartley. The movie is intended to serve as a pilot for a potential series, but despite making a powerful impression on science fiction fans, Earth II doesn’t draw a large enough audience to merit a series pickup.
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The 66th episode of The Six Million Dollar Man is broadcast on ABC, starring Lee Majors and Richard Anderson.
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A series of story conferences begin between Star Wars writer/director George Lucas and science fiction writer Leigh Brackett, the first work toward shaping the storyline for an anticipated (but still untitled) Star Wars sequel film. Lucas has brought Brackett on board to contribute new ideas, but she will only submit a first draft before succumbing to cancer. The conferences continue through early December; the eventual product of these early story meetings will be 1980’s The Empire Strikes Back.
Caught completely off-guard by the seemingly unstoppable runaway success of Star Wars, whose toy license it signed on for earlier in the year, toy manufacturer Kenner does something desperate and unprecedented: it sells a mostly-empty box (contents: the Force?) called the Star Wars Early Bird Kit, containing stickers, pictures, and a card to mail off to receive four figures – Luke, Princess Leia, R2-D2 and Chewbacca – by mail sometime between “February and May 1978.” The delay is needed to ramp up production on the figures, which will also be available at retail in 1978. To the surprise of everyone, including Kenner executive Bernard Loomis, who devised the Early Bird Kit, the result is a runaway sales success story.
Air New Zealand Flight 901, a sightseeing flight making a round trip to Antarctica and then back to Auckland without landing, is lost with all hands when it crashes into the slopes of Mt. Erebus in Antarctica. Later investigations reveal that the flight crew and passengers were doomed by a typo made during autopilot data entry, switching the plane’s course from a low-altitude flyover of MacMurdo Sound to a low-altitude collision course with the mountain. (Also uncovered are the great lengths taken by Air New Zealand to accuse the crew of incompetence.) The steps taken to uncover the truth mark the birth of modern air disaster investigation, and the end of Antarctic sightseeing flights for at least a decade.
NBC airs the 12th episode of the Marvel animated series Spider-Man And His Amazing Friends, starring the voices of Dan Gilvezan (Transformers), Kathy Garver (Family Affair), and Frank Welker (Scooby-Doo, Transformers, The Smurfs).
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NBC airs the eighth episode of James D. Parriott’s time travel series Voyagers!, starring Jon-Erik Hexum and Meeno Peluce. Lance LeGault guest stars as Andrew Jackson.
Returning to space after nearly a year of refits, Space Shuttle Columbia lifts off on the long-delayed first manned mission of the Spacelab laboratory module, which is installed in the cargo bay. (The nearly month-long delay was the result of a solid rocket booster issue that led to the first-ever return of the shuttle from the launch pad to the Vehicle Assembly Building.) The ten-day mission also boasts the first six-person shuttle crew, featuring the first Spacelab scientists from the European Space Agency, who have been training for this mission since the 1970s. Columbia’s crew includes Commander John Young, Pilot Brewster Shaw, mission specialists Owen Garriott and Robert Parker, and ESA payload specialists Byron Lichtenberg and Ulf Merbold.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the ninth episode of Friday the 13th: The Series, starring John D. LeMay, Wendy Robie and Chris Wiggins. Barclay Hope (Doctor Who, Stargate SG-1) guest stars.
The week-long national syndication window opens for the 27th episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
The 15th episode of the science fiction comedy Red Dwarf airs on BBC 2. Frances Barber guest stars.
The third episode of Dark Season premieres on CBBC (the BBC’s children’s programming block). This is the first drama series created and written by future Doctor Who showrunner Russell T. Davies, and is one of the earliest acting jobs in Kate Winslet’s career.
The tenth episode of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures Of Superman airs on ABC, starring Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher. Tracy Scoggins (Babylon 5) and Morgan Fairchild guest star.
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The week-long national syndication window opens for the 55th episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Majel Barrett Roddenberry guest stars as Lwaxana Troi.
The tenth episode of Highlander: The Raven, starring Amanda Gracen and Paul Johannson, airs in syndication; the series is a spinoff from Highlander: The Series. Polly Shannon guest stars.
The 143rd episode of Chris Carter’s modern-day science fiction series The X-Files airs on Fox, starring Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny. Lance Henriksen guest stars as his character from the cancelled X-Files spinoff Millennium; this episode effectively serves as the finale for that show.
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The 87th episode of Joss Whedon’s supernatural series Buffy The Vampire Slayer, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar, airs on the WB network. James Marsters, Anthony Stewart Head, and Alyson Hannigan also star. Amber Benson guest stars.
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The seventh episode of James Cameron & Charles H. Eglee’s cyberpunk series Dark Angel, starring Jessica Alba and Michael Weatherly, airs on Fox. John Savage guest stars.
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UPN broadcasts the 14th episode of the supernatural crime comedy series Special Unit 2, starring Michael Landes (Lois & Clark: The New Adventures Of Superman) and Alexondra Lee (Party Of Five). Kirby Morrow (Dragon Ball Z, Inuyasha) guest stars.
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The tenth episode of the Star Trek prequel spinoff Enterprise premieres on UPN. Matt Wintson guest stars as Crewman Daniels.