Starship Insignia

Discussion in 'Star Trek - The Original & Animated Series' started by Tallguy, Aug 14, 2017.

  1. Shamrock Holmes

    Shamrock Holmes Commodore Commodore

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    Agreed. Which is why IMO Decker was a CDRE mainly for out-of-universe reasons. The production team wanted him to outrank Kirk so he could 'take over', but it doesn't really work because Kirk didn't seem to recognise Decker's authority anyway, over him suggesting that position/posting trumps rank and "Starship Commodore" Decker sans starship doesn't really outrank "Starship Captain" Kirk (this would be somewhat similar to the current situation on the HMS Queen Elizabeth R08 where the CO, Jerry Kyd, is currently assigned as a Captain despite previously having held CDRE rank in shore positions).
     
    Last edited: Sep 23, 2017
  2. aridas sofia

    aridas sofia Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    This will drive some people crazy, but when I did the Federation Reference Series in the 1980s, I tried to reconcile what was onscreen with Franz Joseph's assertion that the arrowhead was the Starfleet insignia. Little did I know that Roddenberry had intended something similar and that the arrowhead was indeed intended to be a duty patch for starship crews. I took the instances of flag officers wearing ship-specific patches, ignored the powdered guy on Exeter who shared Tracy's insignia, and said Tracy's was a rank designator for fleet captains. Decker's was a rank designator for commodores. The starburst was for the admiralty, which included commodores among their number. Maybe "upper half" or "fleet commodores" like the USN has "lower half" rear admirals.

    It was far from a perfect solution, and does not in any way match the intent of the people making the show. But it does go with the idea that as you climb the rank ladder, the regalia tends to multiply.
     
    Last edited: Sep 23, 2017
  3. John Cooley

    John Cooley Lieutenant Red Shirt

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  4. 137th Gebirg

    137th Gebirg Admiral Premium Member

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    ^^^ NICE! :techman:
     
  5. UssGlenn

    UssGlenn Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I'm especially impressed by the justification of the Constellation insignia. The only thing left to hash out is to explain the Exeter.
     
  6. John Cooley

    John Cooley Lieutenant Red Shirt

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    Which I’ve left for now. I’m a researcher. I don’t create retcons, I smash them to bits.

    LLAP,
    John
     
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  7. Tallguy

    Tallguy Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Outstanding.
     
  8. 137th Gebirg

    137th Gebirg Admiral Premium Member

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    The article does concede that Exeter's insignia was a pre-memo error that wasn't subsequently repeated, post-memo. The meta-reason is all that can be legitimately accepted, barring further information from official sources. To provide an in-universe explanation would be tricky. I can try though! ;)

    As a matter of real-world history, the CO's of many ships and bases do have some latitude over the kind of uniform types being worn, along with any deviations from the general Uniform Code (no hat/cover use areas, no salute areas, etc.), but the concepts of insignia devices and military symbolism exist in a different strata of regulation from general uniform use and fore-mentioned allowances. I'm not sure if Starfleet would afford the kind of latitude to Ron Tracy as to allow him to fabricate a custom design for his ship and crew exclusively. Such an action would indicate an almost elitist mentality and provide for some potentially bad feelings between crews within the fleet, non-conducive to preserving inter-vessel morale.

    However, it is possible that it is perhaps it is a fleet-sanctioned unit citation/commendation over some action that the Exeter engaged in at some point in her history. Since it does contain the branch designation of the wearer, the insignia can serve a double purpose as a campaign ribbon, indicating special merit in the fleet. There may be other ships who posses this insignia, and we just never saw them because the series didn't last long enough.

    That's the best explanation I can extract from deep within my ass. YMMV. :shrug:

    Enterprise's "In A Mirror, Darkly" Defiant insignia, however, stirs up some shit with this, especially since we did see the one TOS Defiant crew member with a standard arrowhead fleet service insignia (which the article quite conspicuously failed to mention).

    Other than that one little thing, BEAUTIFUL article! :)
     
    Last edited: Oct 2, 2017
  9. John Cooley

    John Cooley Lieutenant Red Shirt

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    I consciously omitted Enterprise as a retcon, and concerned myself only with TOS.
     
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  10. Tuskin38

    Tuskin38 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    http://www.startrek.com/article/starfleet-insignia-explained


    I found that an interesting read. The Enterprise's arrow head was meant to be used on all Starships, but there was some sort of confusion because of the merchant marine emblem used in 'Charlie X', and production thought each ship was meant to have its own emblem.
     
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  11. Tallguy

    Tallguy Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    I wish more would do the same.

    That's not disparaging ENT, I just hate it when ENT (or TNG or whatever was the later work) would retcon something and then people will hold the retcon up as proof that TOS (for example) must have been wrong.
     
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  12. J.T.B.

    J.T.B. Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    It's about as good a rationalizing as can be made, for original intent it is similar to something we speculated on here years ago. I think it might overstate the case, though, to say that Justman not mentioning Decker/Constellation is evidence of intent rather than something he overlooked. It may be, but (so far) there is nothing positive either way.

    "Starfleet's Merchant Marine Corps" seems odd to me. Are they turning a profit? Of course it was a little odd for Justman to use "merchant marine," too, when in the episode Antares was a cargo vessel, a transport, and a science probe vessel. But not a dessert topping.
     
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  13. Shaw

    Shaw Commodore Commodore

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    I always liked the designs for both the Exeter and Constellation insignia, regardless of how they work out in the end.

    [​IMG]
     
  14. Mysterion

    Mysterion Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Agreed. Seems like it would be more equivalent to the US Navy's Military Sealift Command: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_Sealift_Command
     
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  15. Longinus

    Longinus Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Nice article. Good thing that this is finally settled.
     
  16. Kor

    Kor Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Yes, quite informative. Perhaps this could be introduced into the other thread dealing with this topic.

    Kor
     
  17. Tuskin38

    Tuskin38 Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    It was.

    I didn't see that thread until later.
     
  18. aridas sofia

    aridas sofia Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Not to blow my own horn but I really can't believe that what I did with this in the FRS turned out to be as close to correct as it is. I always thought I was sorta pulling that out of my nether regions.
     
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  19. JonnyQuest037

    JonnyQuest037 Vice Admiral Admiral

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  20. JonnyQuest037

    JonnyQuest037 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Hear, hear! Yeah, I'm not nuts about the subsequent series retconning major aspects of TOS that way. It seems very much the tail wagging the dog to me. When I was putting together my TOS timeline, I only incorporated information from the latter shows when it didn't significantly contradict TOS. So as far as I'm concerned, McCoy was in his 40s during TOS, not in his 30s or whatever his quoted age in "Encounter at Farpoint" says. Data saying he was in the "Starfleet class of '78" in that episode is commonly disregarded, so I see no reason why McCoy's stated age of 137 should be carved in stone.
     
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