Regor
Authors: Eric Mamajek, Susanne M Hoffmann, Youla Azkarrula
Regor was a name from the space age attached to the bright star Gamma Velorum (gam02 Vel).
Etymology and History
Regor was one of three mysterious new names that started appearing around 1967 on American navigational star charts early in the history of the NASA Apollo crewed lunar missions.
Extensive notes exploring the origins of the names and the parties involved are documented in the Apollo 15 Lunar Surface Journal: Post-Landing Activities site (Eric M. Jones, 1996, last revised 2026) and a 2016 memo written by Apollo 15 Commander David R. Scott to Eric M. Jones for the Lunar Surface Journals. Astronaut David R. Scott states:
"Unfortunately, as a result of these incorrect entries in the Journal, the origin of Navi, Dnoces, and Regor as a joke has been widely distributed in all forms of information on Apollo. The origin of these names was not a joke; the origin was intended to honor and memorialize three wonderful men who worked so hard to make Apollo a success and eventually gave all they had. Dr. Cleminshaw himself recognized this as an honor in his 1977 book, The Beginners Guide to the Skies:
“Navi (Gamma Cassiopeiae) is “Ivan” spelled backwards and was named in honor of Virgil Ivan Grissom, one of the three astronauts killed in the Apollo fire.” (Note: “in honor of…Grissom”, not “by…..Grissom”). (Similar entries are included for Ed White and Roger Chaffee.)"
Some sources, including Wikipedia, have mistakenly attributed the naming by the Apollo 1 (AS-204) astronauts themselves before their deaths. The origin appears to be the 1988 book Schirra's Space by R. Billings. Astronaut David Scott documents several pieces of evidence in his 2016 memo, first-hand accounts, timing of events, etc. that the Apollo 1 astronauts themselves could not have named them for themselves.
"Among many other factors, I was Gus’s [Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom] backup navigator for the first seven months during this period [March-October 1966]; I worked with him [Grissom] almost daily; I flew with him many times, including at night discussing the brilliant stars overhead; and he never said a word about these names. Neither did any of our other four crewmates (Ed [Edward H. White II], Roger [Chaffee], Jim [McDivitt] and Rusty [Schweickart]) ever even hint at new star names."
Astronaut David Scott constrains the likely timing of the naming to March-April 1967, shortly after the January 1967 Apollo 1 fire.
In The Griffith Observer edition of September 1967, Griffith Planetarium director Clarence Cleminshaw mentioned the names Navi, Dnoces, and Regor for those three stars in a story on navigational stars. David Scott states that the Apollo 1 crew would not have trained with Cleminshaw in 1966 as Cleminshaw and Griffith Planetarium did not get a contract to train Apollo astronauts for star navigation until September 1966. The Apollo 1 astronauts left California to train at Kennedy Space Center in Florida in early September 1966, shortly after the AS-204 / CM-012 / Apollo 1 spacecraft was shipped (August 1966). David Scott's notebook from mission training in October 1966 listed three bright navigational stars (gamma Cassiopeiae, iota Ursa Majoris, gamma Velorum) that were the only ones of the 37 lacking common names.
The Apollo 1 fire was a great national tragedy in the United States, and in the months afterwards there were commemorations of the astronauts for landmarks like schools, parks, streets, etc. Near the city of Downey, California, home of the North American Aviation plant that designed and built the Apollo Command and Service Modules (CSM), the neighboring city of Long Beach approved on March 21, 1967 the naming of four new artificial islands for four astronauts that had recently died ("Chaffee", "Grissom", "White", and another - "Freeman" for astronaut Ted Freeman, who perished in a flight accident in 1967). David Scott suggests that the naming may have been influenced by this naming:
"And this remembrance could very well been influenced by the three islands in Long Beach Harbor that were named in honor of Gus, Ed and Roger soon after the Apollo 1 fire. During the months before the fire [1966], all six of us had spent many hours at the Long Beach Athletic Club and surroundings during our evening leisure activities – Gus, Ed and Roger were good friends of Long Beach too."
IAU Working Group Star Names
Weblinks
- Website of the IAU WGSN: https://exopla.net/
- Apollo 11 Flown Star Charts (scans courtesy of Larry McGlyn
- The Apollo Lunar Surface Journal and Apollo Flight Journal (NASA), links to Eric M. Jones' Apollo documentation, Apollo Flight Journals (Apollo 7-17), Apollo Lunar Surface Journals (Apollo 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17), Navigation Stars used in the AOT (Alignment Optical Telescope)
- REGOR (Gamma-2 Velorum), STARS, Jim Kaler
- SIMBAD page on Regor / gam02 Vel , CDS
- Regor (Gamma Velorum) - entry in "The Beginner's Guide to the Skies: A Month-by-month Handbook for Stargazers and Planet Watchers" by Clarence Higbee Cleminshaw, 1977, Crowell
