Professor Oak (anime)/Manga/The Electric Tale of Pikachu

Professor Oak makes a few appearances in The Electric Tale of Pikachu manga. He is a role model to and is Bill's mentor. Unlike in the anime, he does not give Ash his ; in fact, he does not meet Ash until after he has already begun his Pokémon journey.

Ash meets Professor Oak for the first time in Clefairy Tale. They meet at Mt. Moon after Ash has been wandering lost in the mountains for weeks, searching for a rare. Oak, who has been living among the Clefairy, rescues Ash and introduces him to Bill and a tribe of wild Clefairy. The three attend the tribe's evolution ceremony, after which Oak gives Ash the latest upgrade to the Pokédex for free, months before it will be available to the public.

Ash later encounters Oak again in Clefairy in Space, where he is investigating strange activity, which turned out to be caused by another group of Clefairy.

Ash encounters Oak one last time at the Pokémon Research Center in The Orange Islands, shortly before he travels to the Orange Archipelago. Here, the Professor and Bill are researching a  that was found in the Pokémon Storage System.

In this canon, Oak first began his Pokémon journey when he was six years old, in which he traveled with his father (who was also a Professor) on research expeditions. During his first journey, he caught a which eventually evolved into a  and then a. 