Star Trek: 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Vulcans

As Adam Nimoy tells it in For the Love of Spock, early in 1967, 16 Magazine published the Nimoys' home address in error, and, soon enough, trucks began to arrive "with sacks of mail". Not only were the Nimoys inundated with letters, but fans also paid a direct visit to their house, even knocking at the door expecting a tour or nabbing a bit of greenery from the garden as a souvenir. Spock was an instant hit with fans, and they wanted more. This was Spockmania! NBC soon changed its tune, giving the Vulcan a far more prominent role.

That same year, issue one of the first-ever Star Trek fanzine, entitled Spockanalia — naturally dedicated (for the most part) to all things Vulcan — was published. Over its five editions, the last published in June 1970, Spockanalia featured original fan stories, songs, essays on Vulcan biology, culture, art, psychology, the structure of Spock's family, and even a how-to on how to beat a Vulcan at (3D) chess. D.C. Fontana, Gene Roddenberry, and Leonard Nimoy also sent in letters.

Issue one of Spockanalia is known for giving us the term (and concept) "ni var" (meaning "two form") in Dorothy Jones Heydt's 'The Territory of Rigel (a ni var to be performed by two voices and Vulcan harp)'. Ni'Var is now the name of the unified Vulcan/Romulan planet in the 32nd century.

The essay 'Proposed structural sketch of the Vulcan language' in issue three of Spockanalia, again by Jones-Heydt (as Lt. j.g. Dorothy Conway, Ph.D.), was also the first (known) fan attempt to outline the Vulcan language.