Star Trek is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry. The franchise began with Star Trek (The Original Series), which premiered on September 6, 1966, on Canada's CTV network. The series followed the voyages of the crew of the USS Enterprise, a space exploration vessel built by the United Federation of Planets in the 23rd century, on a mission "to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before"