IN MEMORIAM: Nichelle Nichols (1935-2022)

I met Nichelle Nichols once, 20 years ago, for a brief moment. 

The biggest comic convention in Michigan is Motor City Comic-Con, held annually twice a year in Novi. William Shatner was among many that attended this past spring, and countless Star Trek actors have had tables there over the years. 

I’ve been to Motor City Comic-Con twice, the first time being May 2002. Multiple Trek actors were there. Keegan de Lancie(John’s son that played Q’s son in Voyager) and Vaughn Armstrong, who’s played just about every primary alien race in the franchise in multiple shows, were both in attendance.

I could talk to both of them for more extended periods because the line for Nichelle Nichols was impossible…and expensive. It was my first lesson on how heavy Comic-Con can hit you in the wallet. I was 19 and broke, so there was no way my buddy Ryan and I could afford that time or money. 

But I HAD to meet her. Even if just for a second. Otherwise, I’d regret it for the rest of my life. 

So when she was leaving and saying her goodbyes to everyone on her way out, I walked up to her and shook her hand as respectfully as possible. 

“Thank you so much; I just had to shake your hand,” I said. The smile Nichelle had on her face all day never left, even as she briefly made eye contact with this random black nerd treating her like royalty even though he had never met her. 

Because she WAS royalty, and I had known it since I was 9 years old. 

That’s why I had to meet her. I wanted to give her the respect and reverence she rightfully commanded and deserved from a generational representative whose life had been forever changed by her actions. 

When I first saw Nichelle Nichols in “The Enterprise Incident,” my first episode of Star Trek: The Original Series, I didn’t fully appreciate or understand the effect of her presence on me, a young black boy watching an incredible future that included someone who looked like him and his family. I loved the whole crew and still do, but she was the one that felt like “home.” 

There were times when I watched Uhura in the show and the movies, and I could hear my mother in her voice, see my grandmother in her eyes, and feel my aunties in her actions. As much as the show focused on Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, as much as it gave the spotlight to Scotty, Sulu, and Chekov, in my world, there was no original crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise without Lieutenant Uhura. MY family belonged on that bridge as much as anyone else’s, and she was a part of it. Period. 

Is that why this one hits me so much harder than other celebrity passings have? Is that why I left work feeling down and then found myself wiping my eyes more than a few times as I drove home, wondering how I would write this tribute? Did I lose a member of my extended family, even if I only met them once for a few seconds when I was younger? 

I’d be lying if I said that wasn’t part of why I’m tearing up again as I write this. Still, the legacy that Nichelle Nichols built from her time as Uhura hits me the hardest today. Her strength, poise, and intelligence paved the way for Levar Burton’s Geordi LaForge and Michael Dorn’s Worf in Star Trek: The Next Generation. She inspired Whoopi Goldberg to give life to Guinan in the same series. She inspired black women in real life to pursue science and space exploration, like Dr. Mae Jemison, who played a guest role in the sixth season of T.N.G. as a transporter chief.  

Tim Russ’ Tuvok in Star Trek Voyager. Anthony Montgomery’s Travis Mayweather in Enterprise. Just the tip of the iceberg for black actors in the franchise that sprang from Nichelle’s example.

That natural evolution of a black female communications officer aboard the Enterprise was Avery Brooks’ Captain Benjamin Sisko in Star Trek: Deep Space, a black man in charge of an entire space station, and furthermore, Sonequa Martin-Green’s Captain Michael Burnham, the black woman currently leading Starfleet aboard the flagship U.S.S. Discovery in the 32nd century, after saving the universe in the 23rd century. 

Even the 22 episodes of Star Trek: The Animated Series, which prominently featured Nichelle as Uhura in animated Filmation form, planted the seeds for her animated descendants, Ensign Beckett Mariner and Captain Carol Freeman of the U.S.S. Cerritos, voiced by Tawny Newsome and Dawnn Lewis respectively in Star Trek Lower Decks.

All of this in the midst of Nichelle passing her character’s torch to Zoe Saldana in the Kelvin Timeline films, and most recently Celia Rose Gooding in Star Trek Strange New Worlds, further immortalizing Uhura through more than 5 decades of her existence in franchise lore, and promising more to come from her legacy moving forward. 

Do you want to know why Star Trek has been my favorite franchise for 30 years? Because it’s always felt like I belong there, as my family belongs there, in a world where for once, we would genuinely be judged not by the color of our skin but by the content of our character, and it started with Nichelle Nichols, especially since Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. himself told her to stay on the show when she thought about quitting it. As many times as she revealed that story over the years, it continued to prove how vital her role on Star Trek indeed was, not just to him, me, or my family, but to every black person that dares to dream bigger than this world ever allows us to be. 

Lieutenant Uhura is proof that we have a future. Proof that we are strong. Proof that we belong. 

That’s why this one hits harder for me than other celebrity passings have because Nichelle Nichols didn’t just change MY life. She gave me AND my culture a future that we can aspire to thrive in, no matter how crazy, unforgiving, or inhuman the world we live in can indeed be at times. She belonged on the bridge of that starship, and so do WE. 

Rest in power, my queen. Your legacy will live on through space and the stars forever. Thank you so much for letting me shake your hand.