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Star Trek Starfleet Technical Manual: Training Command Starfleet Academy

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Franz Joseph's STAR FLEET TECHNICAL MANUAL includes many design elements that might raise questions in fans' minds. Is the Enterprise's bridge really rotated 36 degrees off the ship's centerline? Does the Federation really have a starship with three warp nacelles? Is the Starfleet shuttlecraft really too small to allow its occupants to stand up and walk around?

If you watch the original Star Trek series and take its sets, props, and miniatures literally, then the answer to all the above questions is no. On the other hand, if you take Star Trek's sets, props, and miniatures literally, then the Enterprise has no bathrooms, Sulu and Chekov gain tactical information about enemy ships based entirely on flashing console buttons, and the Enterprise's warp nacelles spontaneously feature either large, colorful, flickering forward domes, or small, unlit, red spiked forward domes.

If you want a technical manual that is 100% faithful to the sets, props, and miniatures as seen in the original Star Trek television series, then the STAR FLEET TECHNICAL MANUAL is not for you. If, however, you want a book that takes the sets, props, and miniatures and extrapolates cohesive, realistic, and exciting technologies that enhance the believability of the Star Trek universe, then this is the book for you.

The STAR FLEET TECHNICAL MANUAL did far more than fuel the imaginations of countless fans. It also served as the model from which all subsequent Star Trek technical material is based. Gene Roddenberry himself was very impressed with the book and its counterpart, a set of hand-drawn, deck-by-deck plans to the original starship Enterprise. Although Roddenberry would later denounce the canonical status of the STAR FLEET TECHNICAL MANUAL, the book's influence on the Star Trek universe is widespread.

The very identity of the first two starships Enterprise is due in part to Franz Joseph's contributions. To my knowledge, it was Franz Joseph who first dubbed the Enterprise a Constitution-class starship, and that name made its way into indisputable Star Trek canon: witness Picard and Scotty's holodeck conversation in Star Trek: The Next Generation's "Relics."

The "real" Star Trek universe does not exist on the television or movie screens, in novels, official magazines, technical manuals, comic books, T-shirts, posters, porcelain plates, or fuzzy toy Tribbles. The "real" Star Trek universe exists in the mind of each of its fans. The STAR FLEET TECHNICAL MANUAL helps bring that universe to a tangible and fascinating life.

This book, in the 1970's, was the first
"technical" science fiction book, with
drawings made by a real aerospace engineer.
Due to its popularity--#1 trade paperback on
the New York Times bestseller list--it
spawned a host of imitators, both in the STAR
TREK and other universes.

This book was the "bible" for STAR TREK fans
in the '70's, who used it to build their own
props and uniforms because no mass-marketed
items were available the way they are today.
(We had to walk uphill 5 miles to achool
through the snow, too...)

This book was created with the full knowledge
and permission of Gene Roddenberry and
Paramount (I have documentation...). It was
published in 1975, in-between the end of the
first STAR TREK TV series (1969) and the
signing of the contracts for the first
motion picture (1976). At the time, Franz
Joseph, the artist/author, was told by GR to
"run with it" because the series was dead. So
the author made certain projections about the
STAR TREK universe that have since been
contradicted by later STAR TREK film and TV
projects.

A lot of time and thought went into this book,
and the reader should view it as STAR TREK in
its purest scientific form, before it became a
big-bucks Paramount franchise. The STAR TREK
portrayed in the TECH MANUAL is far less
Terracentric and far more Utopian than the
way the franchise has evolved through 3 series
and 8 movies. The original TECHNICAL MANUAL
was drawn entirely by hand (computer graphics
were in their infancy) and has now been
superceded by more slicky produced and
packaged STAR TREK "technical" books, CD-ROMs,
etc. But it is still the great-granddaddy of
'em all, and the definitive technical work on
the original STAR TREK TV series.

--Karen Dick, daughter of author Franz Joseph

This is the classic technical manual that inspired a whole generation of fans in the Trek-less time of the 1970's. It is hard to imagine how Franz Joseph could collect all the information and draw all the nifty schematics with ink only, without the help of a computer back in 1975. Showing phasers, communicators, tricorders, floor plans and even uniform patterns in such a great detail, this book is a treasure trove for any TOS fan. It is even more valuable considering that Franz Joseph had access to much of the actual blueprints and props which he transferred into drawings that are often more precise than those of the computer-age technical manuals. Only the quality of his starship drawings is lacking.

Being a true fan and knowing that the series wouldn't continue (at least not so soon), he carefully supplemented the information on screen with his own creations, such as the Articles of the Federation, flags and emblems of member worlds, a design for an orbital Starfleet Headquarters and his famous starships. This is where some sort of dispute is going on. Especially many older fans still regard the Star Fleet Technical Manual as canon, considering that Franz Joseph had Gene Roddenberry's support on it. Some time prior to TNG, they didn't get along with each other any longer, and it is said that Roddenberry intentionally laid out technical specs of TNG so as to devalue Franz Joseph's work - but this doesn't really belong here.

Well, while many of the ideas are very good, it is probably too late to regard this whole book as canon, because the speculation in it is already too detailed. Too much of it, such as the location of Starfleet Headquarters or the map of the galaxy, has been contradicted since. Some things, finally, are simply silly, like the electric circuit schematics or the emblem of the alien civilization of 61 Cygni that -what a coincidence- has a swan in it.

Anyway, The Star Fleet Technical Manual has more than only nostalgic merits. I was a bit skeptical and I waited a long time until I finally bought it only two years ago, but I wouldn't want to miss it.

Many, many moons ago, technical manuals and blueprints for Star Trek technology and ships were made solely by fans and found only at conventions or on the black market. This collection of material began as such a labor of love but ended up being published by Ballantine Books. Much of it (the Federation Constitution; the "offical" Starfleet color pallette; the Dreadnought, Scout, and Tug Class ships; the map of the Federation planets; the Starbase innards, etc.) is sheer speculation by Franz and nitpickers will remind you there are a number of errors in the canon material. But, in a day before there were 50 zillion Trek books and five different TV series on tape and DVD to use as reference, this book was fantastic. It made the TOS universe even more "real" and was the crowning glory of any Trek bookshelf. Fan models and props were built and painted based on the drawings and specs in this manual. Joseph's imagination and draftsmanship (remember, it's all drawn by hand) are impressive and this is a classic for Classic Trekkers.

I can just barely remember watching The Doomsday Machine on the television with my father in the late 1960s. When I became older, visions of Captain Kirk and the proud USS Enterprise filled my mind with adventure and derring-do. I wanted to know every detail about the program, and for a time, we had nothing but a few grainy photographs in books like The Making of Star Trek, The Trouble With Tribbles and The World of Star Trek. Of course, you could do as I did, buy TOS filmclips from Lincoln Enterprises and examine them under your junior high school science class microscopes!, but mostly there was precious little available to us.

Then came The Star Fleet Technical Manual and all that changed instantly. Around the same time, Franz Josef designs mass-marketed their Enterprise Blueprints, causing Lincoln (now Star Trek) Enterprises to begin selling spirit-duplicated versions of the original Paramount set blueprints, too!

What heady days! Back then, there were very few geeks as we know them today, and it was OK that every little detail did not match between the TV and the books. Hell, without video tape, let alone DVDs, who knew? Who cared?! Fans and their love of Star Trek were all that mattered and this book was the ne plus ultra, the Mother Lode of Trekker Trivia.

I am proud to say my original, first edition print, with plastic slip cover, is beat to the bones with dog ears, spilled turpentine, saw-dust and pencil notes from all the hours spent in the garage making phasers, communicators and more from plywood, elbow grease and imagination.

What glorious days! O to live them again!

Yes, this is definitely a paperback reprint of that legendary Tech Manual (note the "Star Trek 40" anniversary logo.) About the copy you own, I know you really don't mean "hard cover" as it was in a leatherette binder that, behind the sales rack card on the front, had STAR FLEET TECHNICAL MANUAL stamped in gold in that Microgramma font Franz Joseph established as part of the Trek universe to this day.

The binder and the red paper-bound manual inside were meant to simulate that this was a partial document that the Omaha Air Force base discovered it had intercepted in a data stream from the Enterprise when it slingshotted to 1969 Earth in "Tomorrow Is Yesterday." That also explains the very irksome tables of contents that refer to pages that aren't in the manual. Your vintage copy may have a letter Ballantine Books slipped into later printings to explain why there was this discrepancy. (I always assumed there would be a follow-up volume to fill in those gaps. As a kid I did a couple of pages of my own, such as a transporter control schematic.)

The Tech Manual takes me back to getting it new when I was 12 and eating it up. What it does -- and all good tech manuals since for any genre -- is adds to the appeal of wanting that universe to feel so real you'd step right into it if you could. It's not perfect -- the biggest for me being the communicator dimensions -- but for its day, long before CGI, when all Franz Joseph had was a draft pen, Zipatone screens, and rub-on lettering, plus a few stills and publicity photos, you have to admire the effort he put into making Trek more believable.

I have the original hardcover of this book and loved it when I got it.
However, Roddenberry had a fit when he saw the single and triple warp nacelle starships in it. He said there would never be a starship with 3 nacelles. He intended there to be an even number of engines. That is why when he was still alive you never saw odd numbered engined starships in Star Trek. You saw the regular 2 engine ships and Picards 4 engine Stargazer.

This book, one I remember from my younger days, when TNG was in its prime and TOS was considered rather dated (well, at least in the small part of Ireland I was in) is a very important one, not just for the effect it had on Trek fans when it was first published, or for the differences between it and the post-movie era Paramount Trek universe, but also for the universe of game systems it helped inspire and (for the Federation) provide a reference point: the Star Fleet Universe series of games from Amarillo Design Bureau.

Ships such as the Saladin or Federation class ships, which never saw the light of day on a movie or TV screen, were brought to life on tabletops in Europe and North America, where they found entire fleets of alien races to match up against. The map of the Trusteeship territories and the borders of the Romulan and Klingon empires evolved into the strategic map in Federation and Empire, where one can control an entire star empire or even alliance of empires through peace and war.

And over twenty years after the publishing of the Manual, elements from the games it helped produce found their way into the Starfleet Command series of PC games, bringing a whole new generation of gamers into the alternate - but equally legitimate - universe of Star Trek which may not have happened, or would at least have looked rather different, had the Manual not been published (though the SFC designs were from the movie era, the ship designs and campaigns owe far more to the SFU than the Paramount one).

This Manual helped open the door to the Star Fleet Universe, and for this at least should be remembered.

Gary

This is the one book that can help the true collector/fan get the "HISTORY" of the 23rd century space navy as if it were the U.S. navy of today.The ship classes and fleet lists make this great,but in addition you have the uniform codes and the flags as well as the Articles Of The Federation.This is still just a reprint of the early/original edition,but it is a MUST HAVE for any collector who can't afford the original printing.The "TV series era" is well represented here,a first class job.

I have read the Star Fleet Technical Manual and have a copy purchased the year of first printing (1975). While not having the glitz and glitter most people are used to today, it is an excellent source of information on the basics of Star Trek (TOS). The only failing I can see in this book is the lack of forsight by other media to pick up on the material presented. As an avid model builder as well as a Trek fan I think it would be great to be able to build commercially produced model kits of the Federation Class (Dreadnought), Hermes Class(Scout), Saladin Class (Destroyer), and Ptolemy Class (Transport/Tug) instead of trying to piece these ships together from the Constitution Class kits available on the market now (hint to AMT/ERTL and Monogram/Revell). Those who level the lack of detail criticism at this book should read the Federation Classification on the title page that tells the reader that this publication is for the use of Star Fleet Academy Cadets and therefo! ! re parts are classified as "need to know" or "eyes only" material and the fact that this was an accidentally downloaded document received in 1970, transmitted from Star Fleet Command on Star Date 3150.10. This cannot be expected to be a 100% complete and accurate document. Applause to Mr. Joseph and Ballantine Books for the glimpse of the future.