Star Trek Chronology Notes

The Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual


This latest source is packed with information on TNG. While there is no conflict with 24th Century dates, there are some glitches in 23rd Century dates. These are to be found on page 3 of the manual. It begins by saying that in 2277 the "Enterprise emblem" was adopted in place of individual insignia for each starship... There's Hot debate here: Did each and every starship in Star Fleet have an individual uniform insignia? FASA and the old Concordance went along with this, Tech Fandom did not. Why not? In "Court Martial" Kirk meets several Academy buddies on Starbase 11. They are all wearing the familiar arrowhead uniform insignias. In "The Tholian Web" if careful observation is made of one of the deceased officers in sickbay aboard the "Defiant" the same insignia can be seen on his uniform. In "The Eye of the Beholder" all members of the spacecraft "Ariel" are wearing the arrowhead uniform insignia (despite the Concordance's and Shane Johnson's attempt to distort it). The old Star Fleet Technical Manual describes the arrowhead as the division insignia of Star Fleet Armed Forces and makes no distinction between ships, likewise the Medical Manual, and other pre-ST-TMP Tech Fandom books and prints. The original U.S.S. "Enterprise" Officers Manual and the Federation Reference Series describe it as a function of both placement and rank. Commodores wore a stylish "I"-shaped insignia ("The Doomsday Machine"), Fleet Commodores--those assigned to Star Fleet/Starbase shore facilities--wore star-shaped insignia ("Trouble With Tribbles," "Court Martial" etc.), Fleet Captains wore rectangular insignia (Captain Tracey and the CMO in "Omega Glory"), Academy midshipmen wore miniature star insignia ("Shore Leave"), Monitor station (ST-TMP) and Earth Outpost station ("Balance of Terror") personnel wore circular insignias, Merchant Marines wore arrowhead insignias with two additional points ("Pirates of Orion"), Penal/Rehab Colony personnel wore the unique hand/bird insignia ("Dagger of the Mind" & "Whom Gods Destroy"), and Science Probe/Survey vessel personnel wore another circular insignia variant ("Charlie X"). FASA went along with the idea of individual ship insignias and cooked up the idea that the "Enterprise" was the only surviving "Constitution" class ship to return, thus Star Fleet decided to honor her by adopting her insignia and making it standard throughout the Fleet--in order to justify the changeover to standard arrowhead insignias in the films. So how about this 2277 date? It is possible that ALL insignia above were dropped by 2277, and this one standard insignia was adopted. In any case I don't think it's a big deal and I don't know why I'm typing up all this and making such a fuss... Still quite up in the air to this very day, I've decided to at least acknowledge Shane Johnson's individual starship emblem system from the Uniform Recognition Manual and slightly "updated" Enterprise Officers Manual (in the interests of providing readers with the most information available in a timeline, whether it's right or wrong!).

The manual then states that the first starship "Enterprise" was commissioned in 2245. As stated above, there is an abundance of information working against this date. However, considering that it comes right after Captain April's service aboard the "Enterprise," it is not too far fetched to assume that the ship was REcommissioned following some minor refitting in this year. Following this, three other dates are mentioned. 2284: the ship was reassigned to training duty at the Academy--this date is right on the ball, and comes straight out of the Federation Reference Series (TO:01:04:01:09.41). The remaining two dates (2285: the destruction of the "Enterprise" in ST III, and the commissioning of NCC-1701-A in 2286) are a couple years off and should be dismissed as poor research on the part of the writers. Further research reveals that they got these two dates from Starfleet Prototype, a relatively new manual which incorporates elements of both the Officers Requirements Manuals and Ships Of The Star Fleet. Page 8 states that heavy cruisers began to be decommissioned in 2285--this was misinterpreted to mean that ST III was set in this year. While the ship designs in this manual are sound and are logical developments from Ships Of The Star Fleet and other "mainstream" Tech Fandom works, Starfleet Prototype has some inconsistencies: Transwarp is considered to be a success and ships are scheduled to be retrofitted with the new drive, certain starship classes consist of hundreds of ships, and the first paragraph on page 8 says the "Constitution" class was launched in 2260.

Sternbach and Okuda are, after all, technical designers and are not necessarily historians--at least not of the 23rd Century. Their realm is the 24th Century...

The TNG manual does give us some problems with starship classes. Beginning on page 3, it says that NCC-1701-A was a "Constitution" class starship (despite Tech Fandom, FASA, the novels, and everyone else being in agreement that the movie "Enterprise" was "Enterprise" class and bore little similarity to her original configuration!). I would guess that this was done for simplification, and to avoid confusing the readers. Even more disturbing is the statement that she was going to be christened the "Yorktown" as opposed to "Levant" (or originally "Ti Ho" if you like Shane Johnson's stuff)... I suppose it might have been one of many projected names chosen--but then what of the original "Yorktown"? The manual makes little distinction as to whether NCC-1701-A was in name the "Yorktown" or the actual ship upgraded. I go with the former. In any case she is now the "Enterprise." Too bad the problems didn't end here. Scotty views an outboard blueprint of the "Enterprise" in ST VI, titled "Constitution Class," the 1701-D cutaway poster doesn't acknowledge the "Enterprise" as anything other than an "Uprated Constitution Class" starship, and the new novels "Probe" and "Best Destiny" refer to 1701-A as "Constitution" class. My guess is that "Constitution Class" has become a general classification for all original "Constitution" class starships, their spinoffs, and other heavy cruisers of like design. "Bonhomme Richard," "Achernar," Tikopai" etal would be sub-classes. With the influx of new hull designs in the early 2290s, this simplification seems sound. Recently, Ships of the Star Fleet Volume 2 tackled this problem, proving me right, with the "Akyazi" perimeter action ships: "The terms 'class,' 'sub-class,' and 'group' are used somewhat loosely in Star Fleet parlance. For the purposes of this reference work, 'class' refers to the 'Akyazi' class as a whole, i.e. including the 'Arbiter' and 'Akula' designs. 'Sub-class' or 'group' refers to one of the three design-types individually, as in the 'Arbiter' sub-class or 'Akula' group."

Other instances of this oversimplification of starship classes are evident on page 32. The "Reliant," "Saratoga," "Lantree," and "Brittain" are all lumped together as "Miranda" class starships, despite the first two ships having been in service over 80 years ago--100 years or more ago going by their initial launching and commissioning. The "Reliant" was an "Avenger" class heavy frigate and the "Saratoga" was a "Cyane" class heavy frigate--incorporating newer systems and an improvement on the "Avenger" class, utilizing the same basic hull design. The "Miranda" class was constructed decades later, again utilizing the same general form as the "Avenger" class, and includes the "Lantree" and "Brittain." It may even be possible that the "Saratoga" was upgraded to the "Miranda" class. Yet we're talking about different classes. From the information in "Unnatural Selection" and "Night Terrors" the "Miranda" class has a ship's complement in the vicinity of 25 to 35, and is used as either a supply ship or as a research ship. A far cry from the "Avenger" and "Cyane" classes with complements in the range of 360.

I have become so disturbed by this manual in recent years that I had to put my thoughts down. The file TECHMAN.ZIP is a page by page analysis of the TNG manual and of how it's contradicted established Treknology and TNG, DSN, and V episodes. It is by far The most contradicted, non-role playing game Trek manual ever published. Another excellent idea poorly executed since it didn't need to be excellently researched to sell to a huge audience of fans.


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