Dorothy Catherine Fontana March 25, — December 2, [ 1 ] was an American television script writer and story editor , best known for her work on the original Star Trek series. After a short period working for Samuel A. Though The Lieutenant was soon cancelled, Roddenberry began working on Star Trek , and Fontana was appointed as the series' story editor, but left after the second season to pursue freelance work.
Roddenberry hired Fontana to work on Star Trek: The Next Generation , but, while she was given an associate producer credit, the experience soured their relationship and resulted in a claim put to the Writers Guild of America. Fontana decided at the age of 11 that she wanted to become a novelist. She attended Fairleigh Dickinson University , where she graduated with an associate degree as an Executive Secretarial major. Shortly after his death, she returned to her home state briefly then moved to Los Angeles.
She gained employment in the typing pool at Revue Studios , [ 7 ] working as the secretary to writer Samuel A. Peeples during his time on the Western television series Overland Trail. Another episode on which she worked had to be re-written to remove any outside scenes, as it was raining during the shoot, which could not be delayed for the weather to change. Fontana saw a position on a Marine Corps -based series called The Lieutenant and applied; [ 13 ] Fontana began working as a secretary for producer Del Reisman.
Fontana for her writing, to prevent her pitches being prejudged on the basis of her gender, as she was one of the few female writers at NBC at the time. After finding out she wanted to become a writer, Roddenberry encouraged her. After the series was canceled, Roddenberry began work on Star Trek , and Fontana was introduced to science fiction, which had not been a previous interest of hers.
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Justman , [ 10 ] and as she had been working on the show from the start of the development, Roddenberry assigned her the task of writing a teleplay on an idea he had for an episode called "The Day Charlie Became God".
