What I'm suggesting is a new naming theme to which names of heroes are automatically added as they appear.
Designating someone as a hero could be done via medals (new checkbox in medals creation window).
As an example:
1) Create a medal and tick the new checkbox "hero" (or whatever you may call it).
2) The medal gets awarded to someone for some kind of achievement, the person's name gets added to the "heroes" naming theme.
3) If a ship class uses the "heroes" naming theme a constructed ship automatically gets assigned a name of an empire specific hero.
I hope the description isn't too confusing.
Tell me what you think.