@Wintermane @Lana @roknrol

In one of his Star Trek books, about working with the show, Gerrold talks about the fan mail Nimoy got (and that Mark Lenard also got, after playing Sarek). Very steamy, and sometimes pretty explicit!

@Lana @roknrol

IIRC, they added Chekov as a "heartthrob" in order to appeal to teenage girls

In the mid-60s, the wild success of theBeatles, the Monkees, and even The Man From Uncle (bc Ilya) etc., were showing that teenage girls were an important and profitable demographic - and those teenage girls liked attractive young guys who had just a touch of an exotic/dangerous air about them.