Richard Van Gelder, curator of Mammalogy at the American Museum of Natural History, was her father.
Sergej Ivanovich Ognew (1886–1951) was a Russian zoologist and naturalist, remembered for his work on mammalogy.
The specific name, karanshahi, is in honor of Mr. Karan Bahadur Shah, Professor of Herpetology and Mammalogy at Tribhuvan University in Nepal.