David Gerrold is ill. The author of The Trouble with Tribbles, uncredited polisher of many scripts, writer of the animated episodes More Tribbles, More Troubles and BEM, story editor early in the production of The Next Generation, and prolific fiction writer outside of Star Trek reluctantly launched a GoFundMe to help with medical bills. 

I am sad to say I have never met David, but from all I have heard he is a great guy. For example, he is a regular tour guide and presenter at the Star Trek Original Series Set Tours in Ticonderoga, and my friend Robert J. Sawyer (his site, my site) likes him a lot. I asked Rob to tell me just a little about David.  

David Gerrold and I have been friends for thirty years — a fact that astonishes me. Not, I hasten to add, because it’s hard to be David’s friend. It isn’t; he’s a warm, wise, caring man. But because, way back in 1972, the very first adult science-fiction novel I ever read was David’s own first novel, Space Skimmer. The notion that someday I’d meet this man, let alone visit him in his home, or travel with him to Turkey, or co-edit with him the essay collection Boarding the Enterprise, or write the introduction to the latest edition of his masterpiece The Man Who Folded Himself, would have been inconceivable to twelve-year-old me.

But it’s a friendship I cherish. David has made the world a better place through his heartfelt and moving writing, through his nurturing of other writers, through his fundraising for AIDS Project Los Angeles, through his advocacy, and through his devotion to his wonderful son Sean. If anyone deserves to live long and prosper, it’s David.

So he’s a good guy and a Star Trek luminary. Send him some money, if you are able.

I have not met David, as I said, but I have a few collecting stories to share.

A bookstore find

I own about 150 TOS autographs, and my first was David’s. He had signed a first edition of his book The World of Star Trek and it ended up on the shelf in Toronto’s Bakka book store. It was published in 1973; I bought it about six years later. It was amazing to me that a person so important to Star Trek had held the same book I now owned, and it started my collecting journey. 

An eBay find

My second David autograph is on a seri-cel. (What’s a seri-cel?) I spotted it on eBay in 2013. It’s a great scene from his More Tribbles, More Troubles episode, but I did not know if the signature was real. So I emailed him through his site, and he got back to me quickly: “Yes, I did sign those. Thanks for checking.”

That brings up a good collecting tip: if a person related to a collectible is still with us, reach out with any questions about authenticity. They are often happy to be asked. That has also worked for me with Noel Sturgeon, Susan Sackett, Howard Weinstein, and others.

A surprise find

I also have David’s autograph on The Concordance Color Book but I did not know it was there. The signatures of DC Fontana and Gene Roddenberry were also big surprises. 

And I have three more: a Tribbles script, purchased from his site; a convention program; and an Escape From The Planet Of The Tribbles script, bought at the Star Trek Tours last year.

I shared some collecting stories, because that’s what this site is about, but my goal here is to encourage people to send David some help, if they are able. We don’t often have the chance to give tangible thanks to the people who helped build this world for us.

I will give David the last words here. This is from his GoFundMe, where he has posted some fiction to thank people for visiting the page, whether they donate or not:

…there are people in much more serious circumstances. If you can afford to donate, donate to them first. If you want to help me finish the book, and if you can afford it, then I thank you in advance. And if you can’t, then just download the files as a thank you for reading this far.