A Big Star from Star Trek Visited the ’68 Wenatchee Apple Blossom Festival
Imagine the impact a huge television star like DeForest Kelley, from the hit show Star Trek had on Wenatchee in May of 1968. Kelley portrayed Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy on Start Trek starting in 1966 and a host of Star Trek films that followed over the years.
Kelley and his wife were invited to Wenatchee to serve as Grand Marshall of the Washington State Apple Blossom Festival Grand Parade that year.
By many accounts, he graciously signed autographs and posed for photographs with fans, the instant developing polaroid variety of the day.
One fan in particular was Kristine Smith who drove all the way from Cle Elum with her friend Corean to the big city of Wenatchee, just to see Kelley in person.
Smith's encounter would mark the beginning of an amazing relationship with the TV star and his wife until his death that she writes about in her 2015 book "
Smith's first encounter with her Star Trek 'hero" was also covered in a newspaper account shared on the Facebook group I Grew Up in Washington
Kelley died at age 79 of stomach cancer in his home in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles on June 11, 1999.
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