One name came up both in regard to Comet Shoemaker Levy and to the NEAR Shoemaker mission to asteroid EROS.
The husband and wife science team of Carolyn and Gene Shoemaker were co-discoverers, along with David Levy, of the comet. At one time Carolyn Shoemaker held the record for the number of comets discovered.
A geologist by training. Gene Shoemaker was also not merely a planetary scientist, but is described as one who
almost single-handedly created planetary science as a discipline distinct from astronomy. . . . He brought together geologic principles to the mapping of planets, resulting in more than 3 decades of discoveries about the planets and asteroids of the Solar System.
Sadly, he died in 1997 in a car accident in Australia. The Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) mission, launched in 1996, had Shoemaker's name added to the its name.
Shoemaker had wanted to be an astronaut. However he had a health problem that disqualified him, though he did help train astronauts. His wish to go to the Moon was unfulfilled in his lifetime, but NASA's Lunar Prospector mission took an ounce of his ashes to the Moon.