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Even before people got a taste of “Star Trek” technobabble, they were having a hard time wrapping their minds around Gene Roddenberry’s creative vision, so he pitched it as “Wagon Train to the stars.” These days, that phrase might conjure up a bizarre image of canvas-covered wagons floating in space. Back in the ’60s, however, everyone knew it was a reference to the TV Western “Wagon Train.” It was actually Leonard Nimoy, not Gene Roddenberry, who had firsthand knowledge of the series, as he guest-starred on the show multiple times.
In his first episode, 1959’s “The Estaban Zamora Story,” Nimoy played sheep-herder Bernabe Zamora. For him, this appearance was the most memorable of the lot, since Ernest Borgnine was playing his father. “He kind of guided me along in a couple of spots where I didn’t quite know how to deal with it, with the character in the plot,” Nimoy explained to The Television Academy decades later. The script called for heavy drama with Nimoy killing his brother during a confrontation, so it’s understandable that he wanted to get some advice from the Academy Award-winning Borgnine.
That same season, Nimoy played a Cherokee named Ned (during the early years of his career, Nimoy played numerous Native American roles in shows like “Gunsmoke” and the hit historical drama “Daniel Boone”). This episode also featured Susan Oliver, who later played SS Columbia crew member Vina in the “Star Trek” pilot “The Cage.” For his third “Wagon Train” appearance, Nimoy stepped out as bandit Joaquin Delgado, complete with bandoliers and a Stetson. He made his final appearance in the long-running Western series during its fifth season as Emeterio Vasquez.
Roddenberry’s Wagon Train comparison fell short with the first Star Trek pilot
As he explained to The Television Academy, landing his first role on “Wagon Train” was a “very important event” in Leonard Nimoy’s career, because he got to flex his acting muscles more than ever before. It was early roles like this that got him ready to play his most famous character: Mr. Spock in “Star Trek.” In theory, his experience on “Wagon Train” made him perfect for the job considering that Gene Roddenberry had pitched his new sci-fi show was “Wagon Train to the stars,” but the “Star Trek” pilot actually failed to deliver on this.
“Looking back, they probably felt that I had broken my word. In the series format I had promised to deliver a ‘Wagon Train to the stars,’… action-adventure, science fiction style,” Roddenberry declared in “The Making of Star Trek,” which he co-wrote with Stephen Whitfield. “But it wasn’t action-adventure. It wasn’t what I had promised it would be.” Luckily, NBC allowed Roddenberry a do-over, and, after the pilot was completely reshot, “Star Trek” moved forward. Much of the footage from the original pilot, which featured Jeffrey Hunter as Captain Christopher Pike as opposed to William Shatner’s James T. Kirk, was recycled for the two-part episode “The Menagerie.”