Through a series of fortunate events, Terry Lee Rioux ’00 has gone where no one has gone before – completing the authorized biography of actor DeForest Kelley, noted
for his role as Dr. McCoy in the original Star Trek series.
“As a kid, I watched the original Star Trek. It was a very important part of my development as a person who looked for life experience, adventure and investigation. The most interesting character was McCoy,” said Rioux, who now lives in New Orleans.
Although Rioux wrote fiction as a child, she eventually put down her pen. “I really didn’t know what to do with the desire to understand and communicate what I experienced, imagined and thought about,” she said.
After earning her bachelor’s degree in anthropology from the State University of New York in Plattsburgh, she and her husband, Bob, served in the Coast Guard. Rioux served on the Chesapeake Bay. She moved to Port Arthur while her husband was stationed at Sabine Pass. It was Bob who convinced her to get a master’s degree in American history at Lamar. And, in graduate school, the writing bug bit her again.
“I approached graduate school with a vengeance. My first attempt at a biography was a piece about Lamar history professor Ralph Wooster, and people really seemed to like it. So I was off and running.” Rioux decided that if she had to spend a vast amount of time on a research paper, as required by her professors, she could spent a little more time and end up with finished articles.
As a historian-type, she said, she expected to work with dusty archives and old moldy books. But, the reality was very different. “My work was pinned to and with living people, voices about their past or perspectives about our history.”
Rioux’s thesis at Lamar was on George W. Carroll, a prohibition leader in Texas at the turn of the century and pioneer at Spindletop. She published a book on Carroll in 2001.
While completing her studies, a friend told Rioux about DeForest Kelly’s death. “I really wasn’t ready for the effect it had on me. She had been given permission to do his story, but couldn’t. She didn’t have the training or the will at the time.”
Rioux met Carolyn Kelley, DeForest’s widow, and they became quick friends. “Three months after his passing, I was visiting with Kelley's wife in Los Angeles. We talked and hit it off.” She was familiar with Rioux’s work and encouraged her to
write the authorized biography of DeForest Kelley.
With help from Carolyn Kelley and others, Rioux contacted DeForest’s old friends, Hollywood celebrities, actors and Star Trek fans for her research, which took two years. She interviewed stars, including Leonard Nimoy, who played Spock; Nichelle Nichols, known for her role as Uhura; and Harve Bennett, who portrayed Admiral Robert Bennett and was a producer on several Star Trek films. Carolyn Kelley died in 2004.
Although Rioux didn’t have a publisher for the biography when she started, the project was picked up by Pocket Books, a division of Simon and Schuster.
Rioux is conducting book signings around the country to promote the biography. She is honoring the memory of DeForest and Carolyn Kelley by donating a percentage of the book’s royalties to the North Shore Animal League, the couple’s official charity.
And Rioux is no stranger to Beaumont. She still enjoys checking in on her professors, visiting those who sparked her interest in biography. She says what she enjoyed most about writing the book was meeting those people who were close to DeForest Kelley.
“The best thing was finding Kelley's friends and becoming their young friend. I loved traveling to see them and going through the pictures and memories. Of course, interviewing the actors and professionals was pretty amazing, but they were all very kind. I walked through Paramount Studios, Warner Brothers, the streets of old Hollywood, looking and finding what I needed. I went to the Los Angeles archives and research centers to have a look at Hollywood history, and of course I tried to put Star Trek itself into some kind of cultural, historical context.”
As a youth, Rioux always saw DeForest’s character of McCoy as a grandfather figure. And, after his death, his widow became a grandmother figure to her. “I am always surprised by the love everyone had and has for DeForest Kelley. They were deeply affected by him, and the loss of him.”
