EARL CAMERON - 100 YEARS OF TOOBING [PART I]

ARCHIE BUNKER:

How come all the astronauts are white? 

HENRY JEFFERSON:

Because they're picked by lily-white Americans like you 

Who only pick other lily-white Americans.

'ALL IN THE FAMILY'

Today we are abandoning the TV Western showcase in order to celebrate the 100th birthday of Earl Cameron, an actor who already holds the record for being the oldest living alumnus of 'Doctor Who'.

Cameron appeared in two episodes of "The Tenth Planet", the series' last adventure to star William Hartnell, the First Incarnation of the Doctor.  Cameron was an astronaut named Williams who died during his mission due to the attack by the Mondasians.

From the TARDIS Data Core Wiki:
Glyn Williams and Dan Schultz were the two astronauts on the Zeus IV when it conducted an orbital atmosphere survey mission. Their craft was pulled into Mondas' gravity in December 1986 and when they tried to break free, it exploded, killing them both. 

(TV: The Tenth Planet)

Glyn Williams was not the first astronaut of African ancestry in space, even in Toobworld.  Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez of Cuba went into space in 1980 and the first African American in space was Guion Bluford in 1983.  I would assume that by 1986 it was a commonplace occurrence.  

However, back in 1966 when the serial was written and filmed, it had to be seen as a landmark moment that there would one day be a black astronaut.  I would think it should rank up there with the inter-racial kiss between Kirk and Uhura as being ground-breaking in race relations on TV - and that was depicted as being forced.

Here is the theory of relateeveety for the astronaut Glyn Williams:

In Haiti, an MI-5 agent was working undercover as a travel agent named Darcy and as such served as the contact for John Drake when he came to the island nation in 1966, searching for a missing married couple who were nuclear scientists.

Darcy was hiding in plain sight, using his first name as his alias.  His true name was Darcy Williams and he was the father of Glyn Williams who was born in 1940 when Darcy was 23 years old.  

By 1967, Darcy Williams was recruited by a shadowy and long-running black ops experimental project known as "The Village".  This was a secluded place, perhaps one of many, which became home - actually a prison - to people of various nationalities who knew too much and thus became desirable to others seeking such information... information... information.

It was accepted that one side or the other in the Cold War ran the Village - one of the temporary bureaucrats in charge of the Village admitted as much.  But the outside world never learned exactly who was in charge.  In other words, who was Number One?    

So it could be that Darcy Williams had become a traitor when he took a job as a security supervisor in the Village.  But it also could have been a request from his superiors in the British Government to take on the assignment.

The sins of the father should not be visited upon the son and Glyn Williams wasn't interested in politics anyway.  He had been a test pilot in the military which led to his career in Space Command.  At some point, Williams may have also worked in one of the secret lunar bases, like Moonbase Alpha.

Glyn Williams was 46 years old when he perished in space.  I'm sure there are memorial tributes to him in Geneva, headquarters of Space Command, and perhaps even at Moonbase Alpha.

But his father Darcy may yet be alive and about to turn 100 years old this year as well as Earl Cameron.

Happy birthday, Sir!

TV SHOWS CITED:

'DOCTOR WHO' - "THE TENTH PLANET"

'SECRET AGENT' - "PARALLEL LINES SOMETIMES MEET"

'THE PRISONER' - "SCHIZOID MAN"
'SPACE: 1999'  - "BREAKAWAY"

[This was all conjecture and the characters Glyn Williams, Darcy, and the Supervisor were all played by Earl Cameron.]