Newell Tarrant
Yancey Newell Tarrant (born 30 October 1942; age 82) credited as Newell Tarrant is a retired Navy flight officer who played Commander Rogerson, the command duty officer of the USS Enterprise in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. He is the son of theatrical director and actor Newell Tarrant and actress Jean Tarrant.
Early life and education
Newell Tarrant was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1942. According to Selective Service records, in his early life Tarrant lived in the vicinity of Erie, Pennsylvania. He attended college for two years, studying acting, and during this time also worked as a salesman. In the early 1960s, his place of residence was listed as Honolulu, Hawaii.
Tarrant enlisted in the United States Navy on March 20, 1964, and attended basic training in San Diego, California before being assigned to the Navy Flight Officer Candidate program in Pensacola, Florida. He was transferred for additional RIO (Radar Intercept Officer) training in Glynco, Georgia and graduated as an Aviation Candidate in September 1965 and was subsequently commissioned as an Ensign in the U.S. Navy Reserve. His first assignment was follow-on flight officer training with the training squadron VF-121.
Tarrant served as a naval officer from 1965 to 1984. He was appointed to the Regular Navy in 1968 and qualified for aviation command in 1979. During the Vietnam War, he served primarily with VF-92, stationed on the USS Enterprise, where he earned over ten Air Medals, the Navy Commendation Medal, and the Distinguished Flying Cross, flying over two hundred combat missions in the Vietnam War. Of all the Star Trek personalities with military service, Tarrant is the only one with service in the Vietnam War. (Source: Navy Personnel Command)
Tarrant was also a graduate of Navy Postgraduate School in Monterrey, California (the location of the Monterey Bay Aquarium seen in Star Trek IV) as well as a graduate of the Naval War College and TOPGUN. He concluded his twenty-year naval career – which included postings on both the Enterprise and the USS Ranger, where scenes aboard the "Enterprise" were actually filmed – as the commanding officer of the Chargers of VF-161, a carrier-based fighter squadron operating from the decks of the USS Midway. His final assignment was as a Navy Commander and staff officer of Cruiser-Destroyer Group 5 in San Diego, California (Source: National Personnel Records Center)
Acting and later career
During the filming of Star Trek IV, Tarrant wore his own naval uniform, with his actual award ribbons. Tarrant also played roles in episodes of Remington Steele (1985, starring Pierce Brosnan, with Leslie Hoffman) and Rags to Riches (1987, with Graham Jarvis), in the comedy Happy Hour (1986), and in the fantasy film Infinity (1991).
Currently residing in Goodyear, Arizona, he has become an author, with his first novel, Shadow War, published in 2002, and his second novel, Dissolution published in 2004. [1]