Buck Rogers: 1960 - 1979
Who Actually Owns Buck Rogers?
The 1960s would see the rights to Buck Rogers move back and forth more than once. On 5 July 1960, the John F. Dille Company filed for the trademark Buck Rogers for ‘A Newspaper Comic Strip’. The original trademark application stated that the first use of the name/mark was dated 10 September 1928. This date was incorrect, as the first use came in early January 1929, with the earliest ad using the name, Buck Rogers, being 2 January.
On 18 April 1961, a new trademark was granted to the John F. Dille Company, and copyrights for Buck Rogers in the City Below the Sea and On the Moons of Saturn were renewed on 18 October of the same year.
The big change came on 16 April 1962 when Teresa Nowlan[1] filed a copyright registration for a new, revised and re-edited version of Armageddon 2149 in both her and Philip Nowlan’s name. As this was not contested, it meant that the Nowlan family now owned the copyright to a new version of the original story. The original, 1929, version of Armageddon 2149, was still in the public domain, but any use of this newer version would contravene copyright.
The Dillie family owned Buck Rogers, but the Nowlan family now owned the original source story Armageddon 2149. That wouldn’t change.
The last link to the original newspaper strip was lost on 12 May 1962 when Dick Calkins died, aged 67, at the Veterans Administration Hospital in Tucson, Arizona. With his passing, all three men who launched Buck Rogers was gone.
The 1960s would also see the name Buck Rogers become synonymous with space travel and the expansion the world was now seeing. Each time a rocket went up, or a man would walk in space, it was mentioned that Buck Rogers had done it first, as way back as 1929. Buck Rogers was more than just a name; it became part of the lexicon, a descriptive phrase to describe anything futuristic.
Ownership Becomes Complicated
1962 would also see the beginnings of the trademark and copyright exchanges, all of which would continue throughout the remainder of the 20th century and help to confuse the ownership of the character. On the last day of 1962, the John F. Dille Company assigned all its Buck Rogers copyrights, marks and registration to Robert C. Dille. On 1 February 1963, Dille assigned all the copyrights, marks and registration to the National Newspaper Syndicate, only for the Syndicate to send the same back to Robert C. Dille on 3 March 1963 by means of a bill of sale.
On 1 February 1966, Robert C. Dille would convey and assign all his marks to the National Newspaper Syndicate. Further muddying the waters, in 1966 Universal Studios handed over the rights to the Buck Rogers serial to a small company named Film Shows, Inc. Film Shows, Inc, renewed the copyrights to the serial in their name, and began to exploit them both on television and the cinemas. Film Shows, Inc, now owned the copyrights to the Buck Rogers serial.
The copyrights to the original newspaper strips were renewed throughout the 1960s, in the names of Phil Nowlan, Dick Calkins and the National Newspaper Syndicate.
Even though the name Buck Rogers was in public view, with space travel becoming a reality, the newspaper strip was suffering from low readership. In its heyday, the strip was in more than 450 newspapers in forty countries and had been translated into eighteen languages. By 1967, it was reduced to a mere twenty eight newspapers across the United States. It was finally cancelled and the last strip ran on 8 July 1967.[2] It left, after thirty eight years, without much fuss.
A 70mm production was mooted when producers Michael Manley and Ivan Reiner obtained the film rights for Buck Rogers, via their Tam Films, Inc company. The pair went to Cannes and set up an office, hoping to raise money off the back of their just completed film Battle Beyond The Stars. Unfortunately for Ram Films, once people saw their Battle effort, it had been renamed The Green Slime, dubbed into Japanese and received bad reviews. It was barely a B-Grade movie. As such, the money they needed to bring Buck Rogers to life didn’t eventuate.
In November 1969, publisher Chelsea House obtained all rights to publish the complete newspaper strip from 1929 to its finish in 1967. Robert C. Dille. On 15 November 1969, Chelsea House published a large, hardcover, volume The Collected Works of Buck Rogers in the 25th Century.[3] The book, overseen by Robert C. Dille, brought together the early days of the strip, complete with color Sunday strips, along with some promotional images by Calkins and an introduction by noted science fiction author Ray Bradbury. Dille also penned an introduction, which contained some interesting factoids about the creation of the strip. Also included was the Autobiography of Buck Rogers, as penned by Nowlan and Calkins in 1932.
The idea of the book came when Chelsea House founder saw Rick Yager being interviews about Buck Rogers and space travel after Apollo 11 splashed down. Chelsea House was best known for producing and publishing the Sears Robuck catalogs but were branching out. Intrigued by Yager, Steinberg asked Fred Israel, a City College professor who had thought up the Sears Roebuck catalogue reprint, to call Robert C. Dille, and pitch the idea. Dille was all in, and, tasked with picking out the best strips, read the entire thirty-eight years of strips in eight days. It was eye busting work, as Dille would later recount. ‘I got blurry,’ said Dille. ‘Just kept steadily at it, did nothing else, started at 9:30 a.m. and read to 2 a.m.’
This work was hampered by the lack of original art. Most of the early strips had either been sent out to fans who wrote in requesting them or destroyed. When Calkins moved to Arizona, he simply burnt his original art, along with what he called ‘debris’ rather than take it with him.
Dille would also remember how John F. Dille worked with the strip.
There wasn’t a month in my father's life when he wasn't on the quadrangle of the University of Chicago. He was constantly in touch with scientists and with educational and industrial leaders, men of unusually curious natures. As soon as he said he was associated with Buck Rogers, a guy would start pouring out his ideas of what the future was going to be like.[4]
He also spoke about Nowlan.
Nowlan's scientific insight was no more than healthy curiosity. It was not rooted in formal education . Actually, he had been educated to be a financial writer. But he was an avid science reader and an extraordinarily competent writer. The strip started in 47 papers and within five years was running in 440 U.S. papers. The strip was amazingly prophetic about space exploration, and it even expressed our inmost fears years before we were conscious of them. One episode has the 'Red Mongols' occupying part of North America, a possibility that bothers a lot of Americans today. Nowlan called them 'Red’, but he wasn't thinking of them as Communist.[5]
The 376 page book was received well and Dille began to entertain ideas of bringing the strip back to newspapers. It wasn’t to be.
Not much happened on the Buck Rogers front for the first half of the 1970s
On 31 May 1974, the National Newspaper Syndicate again conveyed and assigned all its rights and marks to Robert C. Dille. It is worth pointing out that, as Dille was the president of the Syndicate, he was merely assigning the rights between himself and his own company. In this way, he never relinquished control of Buck Rogers.
In March 1976 New York based Leisure Concepts, Inc, acquired the merchandising and production rights to Buck Rogers. Again, nobody was overly interested in bringing the character to the big screen, until May 1977 when Star Wars hit the screen.
George Lucas had tried to buy the rights to both Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon with the view of making a movie of either of them. When that failed, he simply adapted his own script and used the basic ideas of the two serials – space travel, damsels in distress, futuristic weapons and concepts – and released a film that would go on to become a phenomena. The money that Star Wars brought in, both at the box office and via merchandising (which Lucas had the rights to, as 20th Century Fox felt they weren’t worth the effort or expense) made people sit up and take notice. With Lucas talking about Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon as influences, film studios began to enquire about both.
Universal Television bought the exclusive worldwide live action film and television rights to Buck Rogers from Leisure Concepts on 12 May 1977. The contract would be amended in March and April 1978, as Star Wars showed no sign of slowing down. The contract with Universal called for the following. A show up to 60 minutes: $15,000 per show, 61 to 90 minutes: $20,000, 91 to 120 minutes: $25,000. A non-recoupable fee of $5,000 is paid and options are available for extensions which will net another $20,000. The money offered to Leisure was good, for the time, but it should have been better. It mattered not, Universal announced plans for a television series in the first instance, with a film possibility.
New York based Crystal Films, Inc, had already obtained the rights to the Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers 1930s serials from Film Shows, Inc and were shopping both to television and cinemas. The original Flash Gordon, Buster Crabbe, was promoting himself as being in top shape and ready to step back into the role.
In September 1977, NBC gave the green light to a Buck Rogers television series. Producers Andrew J. Fenady and Dick Caffey would be overseeing the new series. David Gerrold, best known for his Star Trek Trouble With Tribbles episode was hired as story editor. Gil Gerard was cast as Buck and Erin Gray as Wilma. The budget for each of the two hour shows had been set at $2,000,000, with more than $500,000 alone being spent on sets.
With the growing popularity, the Nowlan family contacted Robert C. Dille with a proposal to re-issue Armageddon 2149 and branding it The Seminal Novel of ‘Buck Rogers’. Dille agreed to this and also gave the green light to a series of sequels, in which Dille’s ownership of the Buck Rogers trademark is made clear.
The initial idea was to film and screen three two hour telefilm installments of the new adventures of Buck Rogers. The first installment was nearing completion when Universal Television had a change of mind and decided that it would be a feature film after all. It made more economic sense to release it worldwide for profit than it was to sell to television. As such the budget was increased to $4,000,000 and the remaining two hour films were pulled from NBC. Part of the reason for the change was Universal’s concern that the sheer amount of special effects and stages used for the film was taking resources away from their flagship show, Battlestar Galactica.
Directed by Leslie Steves and produced by Glen A. Larson, the film appeared on 30 March 1979. Where Star Wars borrowed from Buck Rogers, the opposite appeared to happen here. Reviewers were quick to point out that Buck Rogers seemed to be a poor person’s Star Wars, again, a property that was influenced by Buck had overtaken it.
When the film completed its run, it grossed $11830,000 in the USA alone, which was a good return on the $4,000,000 investment. It would ultimately earn a reported $21,300,000 worldwide by the end of its run. When it came to science fiction films in 1979, only Alien and Star Trek[6] made more money at the cinemas than Buck Rogers. Buck beat a reissue of Star Wars, along with Battlestar Galactica, Meteor, Star Crash and Abba: The Movie on the end of year big rental films of 1979 in Variety.
NBC went ahead with the television series. It was budgeted at $750,000 per show. A two hour premiere hit the small screens on 20 September 1979 to mixed reviews. Guest star Jack Palance chewed through the scenery like it was cake, Roddy McDowell was described as being ‘appropriately spacey’ and Macdonald ‘Days Of Our Lives’ Carey added some gravitas. One thing was for sure; it was aimed squarely at the younger end of the Star Wars generation.
The Dille’s now had a valuable mark on their hands. On 16 August 1979, Robert C, his wife Virginia Dille created The Dille Family Trust in California. The trustees were Robert C. and Virgina N. Dille, with the successor trustees being their two children, Lorraine and Flint. If either child were unable to take on the task, the successor would then be John F. Dille Jr, Roberts brother. On the same day Robert C. Dille assigned all marks, registrations and assignments of all applications to the Dille Family Trust.
Who Owned What?
As the 1970s closed, the Dille Family Trust owned the trademarks and copyrights to Buck Rogers.
Universal Television owned the rights and copyright to the 1979 film and tv series.
Crystal Films, Inc, owned the rights to the 1930s Universal Studios serial.
The Nowlan Family Trust owned the rights and copyright to Armageddon 2149.
[1] I’m not entirely sure if this was Nowlan’s widow or his daughter. In the copyright notice, the spelling is clearly ‘Teresa’. This spelling and the passage of time could indicate that this was Philip and Theresa’s daughter.
[2] In an amazing stroke of serendipity, the author bought, via eBay, the original art to Buck Rogers newspaper strip in the early 2000s for a low price. The art, by George Tuska, was professionally framed. It turned out that this was the penultimate daily strip, dated 7 July 1967. The art has been on my wall ever since.
[3] The book was distributed by Random House.
[4] The Morning Call, 2 December 1969
[5] Beaver Dam Daily Citizen, 16 December 1969
[6] Star Trek, another science fiction concept inspired by Buck Rogers, was another film given the green light for a full blown motion picture after the success of Star Wars. Star Trek opened late in the year and would go on to gross a reported $139,000,000 worldwide.