You might wonder how a real-life trigger-happy thief who inspired a movie from the 1940s led to the inauguration of Barack Obama, but sometimes the universe works in mysterious ways.
Let’s start at the beginning, when William Erwin Walker, often referred to as Machine Gun Walker, began a crime spree in the 1940s, which included stealing an extensive amount of goods, from guns to electronic equipment. He wasn’t afraid to fire his gun if necessary, and this ultimately resulted in the death of Officer Loren Cornwell Roosevelt from the California Highway Patrol.
Walker’s story was transformed into the film He Walked By Night in 1948, just three years after his initial crimes, although they might as well have made a sequel, because he spent the following decades on and off death row, only to end up in a psychiatric hospital (which he attempted to escape), before eventually re-entering the real world and working as a chemist into the 2000s, when he died.
He Walked By Night was rather successful, but more interestingly, the knock-on effects it inspired were far greater than anyone could’ve imagined. Usually, with these kinds of stories, it feels like a bit of a stretch, but as with the 9/11 to My Chemical Romance to Twilight to Fifty Shades of Grey to the downfall of Ellen DeGeneres pipeline, this one is pretty crazy.
Webb decided he needed to try harder and make something better. He got to work, conjuring up a much better crime-themed drama that would actually impress people. Thus came Dragnet. The show was a hit, with Webb also starring in the show, which has since gone on to inspire various TV revivals and films.
Then comes the next piece in the puzzle – Star Trek. The hit show was created by Gene Roddenberry in 1966, but he was initially a member of the Los Angeles Police Department who got his start in television writing when he was hired as a consultant on Dragnet to help provide real cases to be turned into plot lines. Without his entry into the industry through Dragnet and his close work with Webb, he likely would’ve never had the chance to make Star Trek.
Which brings us to Star Trek: Voyager, the spin-off that pushed the franchise into the 1990s. It was Jeri Ryan’s breakout role as the Borg character that really put her on the map. Not long after, though, her rising fame became tangled in a political scandal involving her then-husband, Jack Ryan – a Republican politician she ended up divorcing in 1999.
When he ran for US Senate in Illinois a few years later, it was only a matter of time before publications began digging up some of his personal history, and with their hands on his divorce papers, it was discovered that Ryan had attempted to pressure Jeri into sexual acts in public. These claims destroyed his chances of success – with his wife a famous star, there was no hiding.
He had no choice but to withdraw from his campaign, and the fact that he got his campaign workers to essentially stalk his opponent Barack Obama for a day didn’t help either. It was no good; he wasn’t going to succeed. With Ryan’s reputation in the gutter, this significantly helped Obama to gain popularity in Illinois with no one competent enough to replace Ryan in such a short amount of time (although is any Republican competent?).
Thus, Obama was able to rise further up the political ladder until he ultimately became the 44th President of the United States. Now, how’s that for a butterfly effect?
