47

I have to give props to The Sci-Fi Channel show Exposure for tweaking my melon about this humble prime...not so humble it turns out!

Forty-Seven (or "47" for those of you who insist on beginning a sentence with a numeral) apparently has deep significance in the Star Trek oeuvre.

"As a writer and co-producer for the television series "Star Trek: The Next Generation," Menosky {Pomona College's Joseph Menosky '79} included the number 47 in almost every episode he wrote. The crew stops at Sub-space Relay Station 47. Data is unconscious for 47 seconds. There are 47 survivors on a planet. The crew discovers element 247. "

Quoted from http://www.pomona.edu/Magazine/pcmfl00/1.shtml. No, this isn't a rumor! Read the letter they got from Voyager producer Brannon Braga, http://www.pomona.edu/Welcome/Trek/kyl.shtml

In fact there's an entire database proving the Trek <-> 47 bizarreness, see http://members.ozemail.com.au/~davidml/st-47/

But wait, there's more

"To the uninitiated, 47 is a mystery. To knowledgeable Pomona Sagehens, 47 is dogma. To sociologists, 47 is a prime example of a minor piece of whimsy that somehow developed into a legend." So stated the "Pomona Student Handbook" in 1985-86.

However, some "47" references them thorough Sagehens seem somehow to have missed include the famine in Ireland in 1847, not to mention Black '47, a talented group of Irish Rockers.