SEPTEMBER 11, 2022 - Last month we brought you word that a Star Trek Props and Costumes exhibit was set to open at the American Helicopter Museum and Education Center (AHMEC) in West Chester, Pennsylvania. DSTN was invited to attend the exhibit’s members-only opening and Managing Editor T. Rick Jones had the chance to talk to its owner.

Garrett Derr has appointed himself an ambassador, of sorts. Upon attending a number of conventions, he discovered that Star Trek had a minimal presence, at best. “I just noted that the Star Trek stuff was just not there,” he tells me. “It was mostly like, you know, a couple of fan groups, whatever ships, and that was it. There were some [Star Trek] actors, but they had a huge 501st [Legion, from that other Star franchise] and you had all this stuff from everything else, but nothing Star Trek. And the costuming wasn't there."

Derr is very interested in costumes. He was once involved in what’s known as “living history,” teaching himself how to sew costumes and repair boots for battle reenactors. “I like things to be perfect, so I learned to sew so they could be my way,” he says. In fact, part of why he started collecting costumes built for the Star Trek franchise was so he could examine them to figure out how they were made.

Rather than being discouraged by the absence of Trek at the conventions he attended, Derr was inspired by it. He created Project Stardate, an effort to “help promote and grow Star Trek fandom” by creating “a traveling showcase of production and screen-used props, costumes, and set pieces." The goal is to give fans an up-close-and-personal look at items made for and used by the various series in the franchise.

Up-close-and-personal is no exaggeration. Frequent museum-goers are used to viewing items through clear cases and also restrictions on photography, but the costumes in this collection are standing proudly on dress dummies, free from the constraints of a case, available for the public to examine, photograph, and even touch.

“That’s one of the things I found at conventions,” Derr says. “People were very surprised, I think. They’d come in and say, ‘Can we take pictures?’ And I’d say, take all the pictures you want…I have seen stuff at conventions and other places where people are like, ‘No pictures!’ and I’m like, ‘Then why share it?’”

The collection includes Rom’s baseball shirt from the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode “Take Me Out to the Holosuite” and a four-armed costume for the piano player in Star Trek: The Next Generation’s “Unification II,” among others. A favorite costume of museum Executive Director Paul Kahan’s is Riker’s casual outfit from TNG’s “Ménage à Troi.”

Derr owns some really cool props, as well, including a phaser rifle from Star Trek: Nemesis, the Phoenix pre-flight checklist from Star Trek: First Contact, an abundance of control panels, pieces of the Enterprise-J wall from Star Trek: Enterprise, and a piece of gold-pressed latinum.

But the current collection of props and costumes is only the beginning. “I was like, 'Wow, I could build a really cool set-up to go to conventions,'" Derr says, "'and really take something that's a traveling museum that nobody's seen before.'"

As Derr finds more screen-used items to purchase or trade for, the collection will grow. But he’s also workig on something really unique to add to the collection: a full-scale Type-15 shuttlepod from TNG. “As close as I can get to it,” Derr amends, “‘cause I only have Rick Sternbach’s design drawing, it’s not the actual blueprint. I don’t know who has the real blueprint…He’d do the design drawing and it’d go to the blueprint guy who worked in the carpenter shop.” The shuttlepod, which is still a work-in-progress, consits of a metal frame and wood. Lots of wood.

If Derr can get support from convention organizers, he hopes the exhibit will grow, allowing him to travel around the country, displaying the items in his collection for fans across the nation to enjoy. Warp on over to Heavy.com to read much more of my interview with Garrett Derr. The Star Trek Screen-Used Props and Costumes exhibit at the American Helicopter Museum and Education Center runs until Sunday, November 27, 2022 with a speaker series that you can watch from anywhere in the world every Thursday night throughout. For more information, visit AHMEC's website. You can follow Project Stardate on Facebook.