Ranks and duties on the Enterprise

[herofan]

If I'm not mistaken, there were over 400 people on the enterprise. I'm sure nobody may have an exact answer, but what rank was most abundant on the Enterprise? Was it ensign? How much of the crew was non commissioned ranks?

Was Spock the only commander?

Who did duties like janitorial work?

Were the bridge officers in charge of others? In other words, was Uhura in charge of teaching some lower ranks about communication, and did Spock lead a team of other science people, even though that training may not have been shown?

 

[Poltargyst]

Seemed like most people were Leutenants, but the answer that makes the most sense is probably Ensign or Crewman.

Spock appears to be the only commander, although that DeSalle guy was a Commander too, wasn't he?

The guys in the blue coveralls did the janitorial work.

I'd like to think the bridge crew with rank (i.e. not Chekov) were in charge of others.

 

[Pauln6]

TOS and the writers were very inconsistent. It looks like the scientists (including doctors) had ranks of at least lieutenant, as did the department heads. Then you had officers in charge of sub-departments in engineering and operations, many of whom were ensigns. They would have been supervising enlisted crew who quite often would be doing most of the actual work. These would mostly have been crewmen with some petty officers (possibly titled 'specialists') and chief petty officers organising them and making things happen.

There is a thread on creating a realistic crew in the fan fiction section that has been lookng at this sort of ting.

 

[Timo]

In "Where No Man", it was stated that the people Kirk summoned to the bridge before the attempt to brave the Galactic Barrier were "department heads", indicating they supervised their respective departments. Only four people responded to the summons, though, which is amazingly low - from which we might infer that many other people already sitting at their bridge stations were also department heads, and thus didn't need a special summons.

Sulu and Uhura certainly could have been heads of their particular departments in the regular eps, as nobody in their respective tasks outranked them. Chekov, probably not, as we saw Lieutenants at Navigation on occasion, and the pilot episode had featured a Lieutenant Commander.

As for Commander-ranked people aboard, Memory Alpha lists quite a few, although most of them under "costuming error": that is, people like Security Chief Giotto, Records Officer Finney and mission commander Markel wore Commander braid but were called Lieutenant Commander in dialogue. Then again, the same was true of Spock himself early in the show! A traditional excuse for this has been to postulate recent field promotion that had not yet reached official Starfleet records (or Kirk's awareness, in the case of Giotto!).

Timo Saloniemi

 

[johnnybear]

Lieutenant Commander Scott anyone?
JB

 

[johnnybear]

And if Sulu was a head of department in Where no man, did he take a step down to be a helmsman or was it a reprimand? Maybe the pay was better!
JB

 

[J.T.B.]

If I'm not mistaken, there were over 400 people on the enterprise. I'm sure nobody may have an exact answer, but what rank was most abundant on the Enterprise? Was it ensign? How much of the crew was non commissioned ranks?

Well we know what the least common officer rank was: lieutenant j.g. Only one seen in the wild!

It's hard to work out specific details on how the ship was organized. There seems to have been a lot higher proportion of officers to enlisted than we would be familiar with today.

In a real navy, what Uhura and Sulu usually do would have been handled by enlisted personnel. Are they heads of their respective departments? Maybe, but they don't seem to spend much time running departments.

FWIW, a US Navy cruiser in the 1960s would generally have a departmental organization like this:

• Administration (mostly personnel/HR plus public affairs, chaplain, discipline)
• Operations (radar, sonar, electronic warfare)
• Communications (might be grouped under Ops)
• Engineering
• Navigation
• Weapons (guns, missiles, torpedoes and fire control systems plus deck force and boats)
• Supply
• Medical
• Marine detachment (25-30 Marines [I think officially under the weapons department])
• Helo detachment (pilot and ≈half dozen "ground' crew)

Most department heads would be Cdr or LCdr.

 

[J.T.B.]

DeSalle was a lieutenant, which made sense as he was assistant chief engineer to LCdr Scott. I thought that was great, turning command over to someone who wasn't a regular cast member. Made the ship seem "bigger."

 

[T'Girl]

Only four people responded to the summons, though, which is amazingly low

Pike's ship only had slightly more than two hundred people, Kirk's crew might have still been that number, the increase coming later.

Sulu and Uhura certainly could have been heads of their particular departments in the regular eps, as nobody in their respective tasks outranked them

It isn't just a matter of rank, there's also the consideration of date of rank.

If you and I are the same rank, but you were promoted the day before I was, you out rank me.

†

 

[Timo]

Pike's ship only had slightly more than two hundred people, Kirk's crew might have still been that number, the increase coming later.

The number of departments would be only weakly connected to crew size, and more connected to what the ship was supposed to do. We could theorize that Kirk at that point had no science department aboard - but no fewer than four people in the scene could be heads of assorted science departments! We can't easily assume Kirk would have left his engineering or combat sub-organizations ashore; what part of his later mission team would be missing here?

It isn't just a matter of rank, there's also the consideration of date of rank.

Yup, and my point was to show that Chekov is an unlikely department head when even his sleeve braid is inferior to those of other navigators. Uhura and Sulu at least stand a chance there, but indeed there's no telling whether Palmer would outrank Uhura or vice versa.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[ZapBrannigan]

If I'm not mistaken, there were over 400 people on the enterprise. I'm sure nobody may have an exact answer, but what rank was most abundant on the Enterprise? Was it ensign? How much of the crew was non commissioned ranks?

Was Spock the only commander?

I think GR said in The Making of Star Trek that everybody was an officer, apparently to make the show more egalitarian. But there's on screen evidence that this wasn't the case.

Also, Spock wasn't the only commander. There was Giotto in "The Devil in the Dark"

http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/1x25hd/thedevilinthedarkhd179.jpg

and two guys who hung back and observed in "The Enterprise Incident"

http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/3x02hd/theenterpriseincidenthd0214.jpg

 

[Avro Arrow]

Also, Spock wasn't the only commander. There was Giotto in "The Devil in the Dark"

But as Timo mentioned, Giotto was identified as a lieutenant commander in dialogue.

and two guys who hung back and observed in "The Enterprise Incident"

http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/3x02hd/theenterpriseincidenthd0214.jpg

The person on the right appears to be a lieutenant commander? (And I'm guessing the person on the left is wearing the uniform originally worn by Giotto. I think it showed up somewhere else in season three, too, but I don't recall where...)

 

[ZapBrannigan]

Calling the "Commander sleeve with Lt. Commander dialogue" thing a costuming error is one interpretation. I see it the other way, that the person talking hadn't noticed someone's true current rank, and the slighted person was too polite or too cool to speak up and risk sounding like a jerk.

I just think it's more plausible for a person speaking casually to make a mistake, even referring to himself as a Lt. Commander from force of habit, rather than an officer putting on the wrong uniform and impersonating a superior.

 

[Avro Arrow]

^ I guess that's possible, although it's kinda odd that Kirk wouldn't know the actual ranks of some of his most senior officers. And it's weird that this same thing happened with *every* named example (IIRC) of a character with two full stripes: Spock, Finney and Giotto.

(And I'm guessing the person on the left is wearing the uniform originally worn by Giotto. I think it showed up somewhere else in season three, too, but I don't recall where...)

I thought this might have been at Kirk's memorial in "The Tholian Web", but I couldn't find any visual evidence for this at TrekCore. However, there was another unnamed lieutenant commander at the service, wearing (what I'm guessing) is the uniform originally worn by Ann Mulhall:

http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/3x09hd/thetholianwebhd0874.jpg

 

[Nerys Myk]

Wasn't Spock referred to as a Lt. Commander at least once. even though he wore a Commander's braid?

 

[J.T.B.]

Calling the "Commander sleeve with Lt. Commander dialogue" thing a costuming error is one interpretation. I see it the other way, that the person talking hadn't noticed someone's true current rank, and the slighted person was too polite or too cool to speak up and risk sounding like a jerk.

I just think it's more plausible for a person speaking casually to make a mistake, even referring to himself as a Lt. Commander from force of habit, rather than an officer putting on the wrong uniform and impersonating a superior.

I could see a mistake happening once, but it happened with Spock and Finney as well as Giotto. Kirk not knowing who the tiny number of full commanders were aboard his ship just doesn't seem likely. Rank is so ingrained in the military, everybody looks for insignia and is aware of who they are dealing with all the time, and nobody would refer to themselves by a lower rank title once they are promoted. Referring to a subordinate by the wrong rank doesn't fit with Kirk's professional persona.

There was apparently some behind-the-scenes confusion in Season 1 about the rank and insignia of commander and lieutenant commander; it doesn't ruin the plot or anything so I just ignore it.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Wasn't Spock referred to as a Lt. Commander at least once. even though he wore a Commander's braid?

Yes. (I mentioned Spock. ) AFAIR, every *named* character in TOS who wore two full stripes was referred to as lieutenant commander in dialogue at least once.

Between that, people abbreviating "lieutenant commander" to "lieutenant" instead of "commander", and the issue with Chakotay's pin not matching dialogue or credits, Star Trek has a history of mangling the lieutenant commander/commander thing quite thoroughly!

 

[J.T.B.]

AFAIR, every *named* character in TOS who wore two full stripes was referred to as lieutenant commander in dialogue at least once.

Agreed, taken literally the evidence in TOS was that lieutenant commanders could wear both 1.5 and 2 stripe insignia. It's not until TMP that two stripes for full commander was given on-screen confirmation.

 

[Timo]

I could see a mistake happening once, but it happened with Spock and Finney as well as Giotto.

I could well accept it happening once only - with Giotto, who might well have been promoted recently (just think of the attrition rate!), and whom Kirk initially addressed over the comms without actually seeing his sleeves. With Spock and Finney, the "error" is not just Kirk's, as in "Court Martial" both get officially branded Lieutenant Commanders by Starfleet bureaucracy. So something akin to frocking is the likelier explanation there.

That, or the "two differently braided ranks called Lieutenant Commander, possibly Lower Half and Upper Half" model above. In which case Kirk's exotic, not-Royal-Navy-minus-one braid might well denote full Commander (a fact masked by his position being that of captain), and three solid stripes would be Captain.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Drone]

Yes. (I mentioned Spock. ) AFAIR, every *named* character in TOS who wore two full stripes was referred to as lieutenant commander in dialogue at least once.

Between that, people abbreviating "lieutenant commander" to "lieutenant" instead of "commander", and the issue with Chakotay's pin not matching dialogue or credits, Star Trek has a history of mangling the lieutenant commander/commander thing quite thoroughly!

Also, Tuvok's rank pip foul up from the get go.