A really awesome book you should find on inter-library loan Wrote:What's In A Name?

Sometime in the mid-1970s NASA decided upon a name for at least the first Orbiter, but any further list has apparently been lost to time. All that is known is that Constitution was proposed as the name of OV-101 in recognition of the U.S. Constitution Bicentennial that was occurring the same year the vehicle was rolled out. But the public (i.e. Trekker) fervor to change the name of the first Orbiter to Enterprise finally convinced Washington to do so. In response, and to keep a similar incident from happening again, NASA decided to formalize its naming convention.

On 26 May 1978 John F. Yardley, the NASA Associate Administrator for Space Transportation Systems, sent the Public Affairs Office a list of potential Orbiter names. (...) The attached list included 15 names: Constitution, Independence, America, Constellation, Enterprise, Discoverer, Endeavour, Liberty, Freedom, Eagle, Kitty Hawk, Pathfinder, Adventurer, Prospector, and Peace.

This apparently did not satisfy everybody, and the issue remained open. Another Orbiter naming committee met three times through the end of November 1978 to determine a strategy for naming the new spacecraft. (...) Several themes were proposed: bright stars, constellations, American flight history, American history, explorer vessels, and American Indian tribes. The final recommendations were sent to Acting Administrator Dr. Alan M. Lovelace on 11 December 1978. "Three categories of names were selected by the committee by their vote in the following order of preference: (I) Explorer's Vessels - Enterprise, Endeavor, Discovery, Resolution, Adventure; (II) American Tradition and Spirit - Enterprise, Independence, Constitution, Freedom, Liberty, Republic, Columbia; and (III) Stars and Constellations - Orion, Arcturus, Polaris, Pegasus, Canopus, Capella, Alpha Centauri." It was noted in earlier memos that Enterprise did not fit well into the third category, and that there was some concern over the name Polaris because of its association with the Navy fleet ballistic missile program.

Orbiter Names

(...) In March 1988, NASA Headquarters announced a contest to name OV-105. As a tribute to school teacher Christa McAuliffe, who was on Challenger, the contest was open to all kindergarten through 12th grade students in the United States. In honor of the crew, the name Challenger was permanently retired. During the fall of 1988, 71,652 students formed 6,154 teams which submitted 422 different names.

The official list of finalist names included: Adventure, Calypso, Chatham, Deepstar, Desire, Dove, Endeavour, Godspeed, Hokule'a (a Polynesian heritage name), Horizon, Nautilus, North Star, Pathfinder, Phoenix, Trieste, Victoria, and Victory.

Other public reports have indicated there were 29 names on the final list, including Adventure, Blake, Calypso, Deepstar, Desire, Dove, Eagle, Endeavor (American spelling, Endeavour (British spelling), Endurance, Godspeed, Griffin, Gulf Stream, Chatham, Hokule'a, Horizon, Investigator, Meteor, Nautilus, North Star, Pathfinder, Phoenix, Polar Star, Resolution, Trieste, Victoria, and Victory.

The names were evaluated by two seperate NASA committees, and the results forwarded to the NASA Administrator, and then to President George (H.W.) Bush. Continuing with the tradition of naming the Orbiters after famous sailing ships, OV-105 was christened Endeavour in May 1989.

M Fnord Wrote:Hm, anybody got an idea for a badge for Gjøa? I'm drawing lots of blanks here...