Відео

Hi Chris, nice to meet you! Yeah... my style is very "animated", so the dramatic interpretations and presentations are all part of the package. And I hate to disagree on making it a bit more complicated.... I've made it a bit more detailed... Which is necessary in today's world when trying to establish an acceptance of a new opinion. But I realize that it makes a five word premise into a 30 word thesis. However, I can tell you that I've mapped the entire story from who it was that had it in the 70s and how it made it's way into a storage unit to be discovered over 40 years later is very close to being demonstrably illustrated. I'm still trying to get verbal confirmation from several key players; but I expect to be able to lay the whole thing out within the next month or so along with the supporting information and the people who contributed. Then it will be up to the viewers to decide. But the names and people will be a bit of a surprise to people. - Jim

I run the audio through a filter that isolates the vocal track from all other sounds. It makes the voices loud and clear. Interestingly enough, I've done this to the bloopers as well. And it's like hearing them for the first time because of how bad the audio tracks we have were. I'll be putting up a video package soon laying out the before and after for each of the clips in the classic blooper reels.

LOL. Ironically, during the Patron call this evening, we were discussing a late night interview done by Tom Snyder on NBC with the cast in the mid 70s. His show was the "Tomorrow" show; and it made me realize that at that time in the 70s, there was a "Today" show, a "Tonight" show, and a "Tomorrow" show on NBC every weekday. go figure!

Hi Ross. Yes, I've actually been in contact with the family that lost the unit for non-payment. They also confirmed the story. I'm working on verifying everything that everyone is saying... But I will be able to lay it out in detail in the next few videos on the subject. Each will go into a specific step on the journey and explain all the evidence and people who were involved. It's going to be a wild ride!

Glad you enjoyed it!

We do a livestream every two weeks where we all watch and episode of Star Trek together and chat with each other interactively while we watch.

As I dig more and more into this; the stuff I am finding is very unexpected. I can definitely tell you that as of 1979, Gene's letter had been written. But I'm finding something that supposedly happed in the early 1980s that is completely crazy. I have some details to track down, but the story is definitely a suspenseful page-turner.

@@TREK-WORLD You are the MVP of Star Trek right now. Thanks for the sleuthing.

Any time!

and...the question is... are you a lawyer? Jim says in the video that he encourages people to check his logic, as he wants detailed clarification if he's wrong.. Jim has cited laws in his argument. Simply saying "Wrong" without proof.. puts you in the same position you are claiming.

Actually, I did leave it to professionals. How else did you think I get the detailed citations and doctrines? From an LA based law firm who specializes in these kind of lawsuits. And it’s research like *that* that no one else in fandom is doing. However, if you feel that your professional legal knowledge contradicts that, I would love assistance in vetting why these codes wouldn’t be defensible. We need people who want to roll their sleeves up and assist with the work . Not people shout “idiot” over their shoulder as they walk away.

Yeah, the situation is muddy. But the scenarios is common with Star Trek Props... Someone finds one, takes it to the auction house and then sells it. The real issue here is that Heritage contacted Rod *after* they signed paperwork committing to the July auction. And then they negotiated a finders fee for much less than the value of the model. Then they asked the sellers to give them the ownership of the model in exchange for $500K out of the $600K finders fee. Then Heritage would transfer ownership to Rod. This scenario is wrong in 100 different ways as Heritage shouldn't have contacted anyone to arrange for a transfer of ownership prior to the auction. They've never done that before with any of the Trek items up for auction.

@@TREK-WORLD It makes Heritage look pretty bad. Taking advantage of those guys, it also looked like they believed the stolen story. Somebody wasn't thinking things through. But how common is that. Watch the model not break $100k(that's a joke, but not without some basis in fact. The Refit did get less than the D). At least most of these props have a paper trail. I would be curious where the Little E has been. I would like to think is was on someone's shelf. But a lot of guys in the industry would just stash it in a closet.

I think you are closer to the truth than you knew. I've managed to trace the model back to when it was put in the storage unit. But I still have to figure out whose hands it went through before it was locked away. Stay tuned!

@@TREK-WORLD How long ago was it put in storage? It's only in very recent times did any of these props have any real value. An old friend of mine had all sorts of screen used props in his possession(he worked in the industry). He would give them away, or trade them for something else. He had no idea that what he had would ever have any real value. He had them for the cool factor or I worked on that.

It's been in that unit for longer than I expected. There's a whole backstory and side story I am documenting. It's almost like Curse of Oak Island - the treasure is nice, but the real goal is the whole story of who, when, and why.

Thank you! It saves me from future embarrassment. I had mistakenly assumed it was related to the word "Codex". Oops!

If they had done that, then yes. But what they actually did was give it to Heritage on consignment for auction. So that means that the paperwork they signed when given the unit to Heritage clearly indicates that they retain the ownership until after the auction - when it would be given to the winner in exchange for payment.

Thank you kindly!

The plan right now is to only do a conservation restoration. Meaning that they do not intent to make it look like it did in the 60s. They imply want to correct any structural damage so that it will not get any worse than it currently is. This is also what Paul Allen did with the AMT screen used Enterprise when he bought it from Matt’s auction.

Unfortunately, it’s not quite that easy. LOL. If you borrow money from a bank; they make you sign a legally binding contract not only for the amount; but for the interest. However, if the bank were literally take money out of their cash drawer, then give it to you without requiring any paperwork… Well, then you would own the money. Since they would be giving it to you voluntarily with no strings attached.

Hi there! I’m sorry about that. I believe you 100% percent that you were the first. Much of that night is still a blur for me as it all happened However! I will make a final full length documentary style chronicalling all the events as they happened. What’s your full name? You’ve mentioned this to me before, but I have a terrible time associating UA-cam handles with names as time goes along. Jim

@@TREK-WORLD Darell Phillips. I think I also sent you the photos of the model, as I wasn’t certain that the listing would still be up. Also, it was a long time friend and Trekkie (Greg Saum) that alerted me to the listing. I had remembered your video and thus found your email. I wanted you to know ASAP of course as this was very important news. As a bit of side trivia, the daughter of Richard C. Datin lives in my community. I purchased her book about her growing up and her father building the model and the K-7 space station and also the shuttle craft hanger bay filming model. As you know, he was given the job to build the 11’ model but because he was working on models for Petticoat Junction he delegated it. He still supervised and did work on it and delivered it. A year later, he added the lighting and did other modifications. It’s a great book. It’s called The Enterprise NCC 1701 and The Model Maker by N Datin McDonald and Richard C. Datin Jr.

As it happens, I have my own personal connection to Star Trek. Back in 1986-87, I was the master model maker for part of the tabletop figures line for Star Fleet Battles. Back then, the game was published by Task Force Games. My first two figures were the Federation Starbase (Really Star Feet Headquarters) and the Klingon D-5. The game is now sold by the designer Stephen V. Cole.

The issue with that approach is that Gene shared ownership with Paramount jointly. So he still wouldn’t have been able to lay claim to any ownership rights on his own. When Trek was cancelled, Paramount offered to sell him their part of the ownership - but did not take them up on his offer. I believe they want somewhere between $100K-$150K at the time. So it was a lot of money.

@@TREK-WORLD Did Gene's attitude toward the models suddenly change at a particular point in your research? Or has he always felt a sense of guardianship towards them despite their legal status?

The 33" model was the only one that he ever really laid claim on. He was also given the 18" Refit model that they used in TMP. I'm not sure where that is right now.

From what i understand, the reason Paramount gave the big 11' model to the Smithsonian was to explicitly keep it out of Gene's hands, as he'd been pretty vocal at the time about wanting that one for himself as well.

@@TREK-WORLD I was just curious because a change in Gene's attitude towards the model would have implied that some legal stuff did take place that we just don't have any record of. But it sounds like that despite Gene acting like he was the owner of the model he never exclusively was. I guess the only hope we have, short of someone who worked on TMP who saw something or admitted to something, would be if an audit occurs. But I don't think there could ever be grounds for such a thing, and even if there were the general public still wouldn't know anything.

Hi Pete! One of the things that I’ve come o understand since becoming a content creator is that the whole “6 degrees of separation” scenario is absolutely true. And because of that, I see the kind of coincidences that you are talking about almost every day. It almost seems like magic.

Those two posts were mine. Never said Trek world had inside knowledge. I said the guys who HAD the model may have watched his videos and promptly put it up for fear they had stolen property. It was only a theory and we now know the two guys were almost completely ignorant of what they had. Never said Trek-World knew someone had the model. Anyhow we now all know it was now just pure coincidence .

Hi there! Good to see you! You did the first post that I showed; but the second post was Dar70. I made sure to display them each on the screen so that folks could read them for themselves. But both of the posts came right out and said that my video had somehow incentivised the sellars to put the model up after seeing my video. But if they had, they most certainly would have done things differently. At the end of the day, it really was a coincidence that the model showed up after I did the video. And I only did the video because no one else had done a video that centered only on the disappearance of the model up to that point.

@@TREK-WORLD Haha. Yeah. That's me at Trek today also. 😂 That's why both posts were similar. A lot of us were going between both sites that week. (It was an exciting week for us Trek Fans. 😀) But I was in no way suggesting you had inside knowledge as Pete Suggested. At the time I was not convinced this guy had known what he had till he saw your video. But as I said it really was just a coincidence as we all know now and he was kinda ignorant of what he had. Although he put a starting price of $1000 for a beat looking up old model. So I guess he wasn't that ignorant.. 😉

You're right. The whole story that Gene put in the letter has always struck me as odd. I too do not think that Jon would have simply said he didn't remember who he gave it to or when.

Ahhhhh, the late 60s, early 70s, very, very different times, there's a lot of folks who can't remember a lot of things, including what they did and when they did it.

One other thing to consider, props like this model were not considered all that important. The film was in the can, that's what had value back in those days. Today it's a very different case. The studios eventually learned props have value, when guys were dumpster diving around the studios(I know a guy that did this back in the day).

@@earth2006 Roddenberry being among them. He was a heavy drinker and did quite a few drugs himself... It's not just age that destroys the memory. A lot of people still don't want to admit to themselves that their recreational drug use is fuzzying up their memory. In the quest to forget their pain or relax with self-medicating, they're killing off brain cells at a faster than normal rate.

@@earth2006 Like...Dennis Hopper, perhaps?

Either the next video, or the one after that will go over that. I have verified the previous owner, and the circumstances that resulted in the auction sale. But there are more pieces that have to fall into place for me to lay out the scenario.

I know right? I have been waiting for this simple piece of info for the longest time: who owned the storage unit .. this is much more of a priority to talk about ..

I'm working on that piece now. But, as you can imagine, there's all sorts of reasons for people to not want to talk while this is stirring. So I'm collecting what I can, but will respect the timelines of the individuals concerning any statements I can make. I can tell you I'm really close - but there are still things for me to confirm. And I will post as I go along to keep people up to date as I can.

My pleasure!

Yes. If you had seen it, and bid, you would have had title claim on the object. But it was an auction and not a buy it now; so they probably would have cancelled the auction anyway if it had bids on it.

Which is why us three should have bid on it and kept our mouths closed. One of us would have gotten it cheap...and we could donate it if we wanted to.

We need to keep that plan in mind when the next item shows up! LOL

I never cease to be amazed at how people now reach out to me instead of others when they have information or need confirmation. Sometimes I feel like Alice in Wonderland. LOL

It's not quite that simple. Paramount has never attempted to lay claim on any of the items that have been auctioned off over the years. For them to even think about attempting to do so in this case, they would have to come up with a legal reason why the particular item is the only item in what is literally a total of well over $10M in auction sales over the past 50 years.

@@TREK-WORLD You're doing great work, Jim! The complexities are so frustrating; seems something just isn't right.

Thanks! I suspect that the family that owned the unit wasn't the same family that the model had been loaned to. But I can't be certain until more research. Nothing ever ends up being as simple as it seems when searching for Trek history. lol.

@@TREK-WORLD We'll all be standing by for updates; hopefully, the mystery unfolds in a favorable manner. BTW ... Thank you for your efforts!

Nichelle was in Gold in her first episodes because they weren't originally sure how she would be assigned on the bridge. In the Corbomite Maneuver, the communications part was split between her and Bailey. Which is why he had the earpiece in his ear. But they decided she would be the communications officer going forward. They put her in Red at that point; but never really documented why. There are a lot of theories - but no one ever asked the right question to Gene, Bob, and Herb while they were still alive. A simple question they could have answered in seconds. argg.... I get frustrated when I look back and wonder where all the "Trek Historians" were when Trek history was being made?

Thank you so much. I appreciate your friendship! Happy July 4th!