It was in the police that he met lifelong friend Gene Roddenberry for the first time, and both of them transitioned from the Newspaper Unit within the Traffic Department to the new section when Parker was made chief.
[2] The duo shared a desire to become writers, with Ingalls being the first between them to resign from the LAPD to pursue this objective.
Roddenberry was initially the more successful of the two, and recommended Ingalls as story editor to Sam Rolfe on the television series Have Gun – Will Travel.
[1] When Roddenberry began to develop Star Trek, he sent Ingalls a series outline but asked him to keep it "very, very confidential".
[8] He wrote episodes for a variety of television series, and was a producer on shows such as Fantasy Island, T.J. Hooker and Kingston: Confidential.