Roddenberry is asteroid #4659 and also known as 1981 EP₂₀. Roddenberry was discovered by the American astronomer Schelte John “Bobby” Bus at the Siding Spring Observatory in Australia. Roddenberry’s orbit is characterized by a semi-major axis of 2.37 Astronomical Units, an eccentricity of 0.22, a period of revolution of 1 333 days, and an inclination of 2.5 degrees. Roddenberry is a member of the asteroid-family Nysa and as such a member of the Nysa-Polana asteroid-complex.

Roddenberry is named after the American screenwriter, producer, and futurist Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry, who lived from 1921 until 1991. A crater on the planet Mars is, after the same person, named Gene Roddenberry. This crater is located to the east of Argyre Planitia (a basin) in Noachis Terra (a landmass in the south) on Mars and got photographed by the Viking-1 space probe.

Roddenberry was born in El Paso, Texas, USA, but he grew up in Los Angeles because his father got a job as a policeman there. Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry nevertheless got raised as a good Texan Baptist. His religious views changed later. Professionally he first became a pilot. After a plane crash, he became a plane crash investigator. He was involved in a second plane crash. He was the pilot in his first plane crash and a passenger in the second. Some years after the Second World War Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry followed in his father’s footsteps and became a policeman. He began writing screenplays while he had this job. He retired later as a policeman when his workload as a writer became overwhelming. He is most famous for the Star Trek tv series and the first to sixth Star Trek movie. Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry married during the Second World War and had two daughters with his first wife. He got divorced, married again in 1968, the peak of the Hippie time, but in Japan in a Shintō (神道) ceremony. He had a son with his second wife. Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry also notoriously had extramarital affairs. Some people, who should have known him well, described Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry as Atheist, but he always rejected this point of view. He said that he believes in God, but not in organized religions. He had the comprehensible view that organized religions work like malfunctioning substitute brains. Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry was close friends with drug advocate Timothy Leary and Scientology’s founder Ron Hubbard. Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry even believed in a kind of paradise, but did see this coming in the future, created by social and technological advancements. He tried to spread his vision of a positive future through Star Trek. The official naming citation states that this is one reason to name the asteroid 1981 EP20 Roddenberry and another reason is that Gene Roddenberry circumvented television network censors to expound on controversial social and political topics. Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry created many other screenplays besides Star Trek, but most weren’t successful. He had such a huge workload as a writer that he needed stimulants in order to do his work. So he also is known for the abuse of alcohol, cocaine, amphetamines, and several anti-depressants. The drug abuse caused an encephalopathy, which did cost his life. His mortal remains were cremated and some attempts were done to put his ashes into space. A first spaceflight landed with his ashes still on board, a second spaceflight, with only a part of his ashes on board, ended burning up in the Earth’s atmosphere. A third spaceflight got cancelled.

Roddenberry is a connection between all asteroids of the Star Trek theme, like Spock, McCoy, or Picard. Because Gene Roddenberry was a producer, so Roddenberry also connects the asteroids named after the actors of Star Trek. Gene Roddenberry worked at many other projects too, so if there are asteroids with names related to them, then these asteroids are also connected when appearing together with Roddenberry and they are also connected with the asteroids of the Star Trek theme this way. When looking at the biography of Eugene “Gene” Wesley Roddenberry, then the asteroid Roddenberry could also hint to pilots, plane crash investigators, religious tolerance, and extramarital affairs. Some of these meanings are perhaps better represented by other asteroids, but this wants to be tested.