Robert Owen Evans | |
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| Born | (1937-02-20)February 20, 1937 Sydney, Australia |
| Died | November 8, 2022(2022-11-08) (aged 85) Springwood, New South Wales |
| Education | University of Sydney |
Robert Owen Evans,OAM (20 February 1937 – 8 November 2022) was an Australianminister of the Uniting Church inHazelbrook, New South Wales, and an amateur astronomer who holds the record for visual discoveries ofsupernovae (42).[1][2][3] He also co-discoveredC/1996 J1 (Evans–Drinkwater), his only comet alongsideMichael J. Drinkwater, on 10 May 1997.[4]
Evans was born on 20 February 1937[5] inSydney, Australia. He graduated from theUniversity of Sydney, majoring in philosophy and modern history. Coming from a religious family, Evans trained to become aMethodist minister and was ordained by the New South Wales Conference in 1967. He served as acircuit minister until his retirement in 1998. He wrote a number of books on the history of evangelism.[6]
Evans took up supernova hunting around 1955, but his first adequate instrument, a 10-inch (25 cm)Newtonian telescope was assembled only in around 1968. He made his first official supernova discovery in 1981 and found nine more before using larger telescopes. While living inCoonabarabran, New South Wales, he used his own 16 inch (40 cm) telescope. From early 1995 to mid-1997 he also had limited access to theSiding Spring 40-inch (1.0 m) Telescope atSiding Spring Observatory (he was allocated about 110 nights, half of which were suitable for observing), resulting in about 10,000 galaxy observations, another three visual supernovae discoveries and an additional four supernovae spotted on photographs made at the observatory.[7]
By 2001, he had made 33 visual discoveries and by the end of 2005, despite the increasing competition from automated telescopes, the total number had already increased to 40 visual supernova discoveries plus one comet. In 2005, Evans relied almost exclusively on his 31 cmDobsonian. He reported 6,814 galaxy observations in a period of 107 hours and 30 minutes, spread out over 77 nights. During that time, he found four supernovae; three had already been discovered by others, the fourth wasSN 2005df, which was Evans's third supernova discovery inNGC 1559 (after SN 1984J and SN 1986L) and his 40th visual discovery.
In an interview, Evans reported that he was able "to observe 50 galaxies an hour when they were scattered around the sky, and 120 galaxies an hour inVirgo".[8] Only in the 1990s did automated telescopes come into use which offered a comparable speed – like theKatzman Automatic Imaging Telescope. Evans also features prominently inBill Bryson'sA Short History of Nearly Everything which quotes him as saying "There's something satisfying, I think, about the idea of light travelling for millions of years through space andjust at the right moment as it reaches Earth someone looks at the right bit of sky and sees it. It just seems right that an event of that magnitude should be witnessed."[9]Supernova 1983N, spotted by Evans in 1983 in the galaxyM83 long before it reached its peak, turned out to be the first discovery of a new type of supernova, later namedType Ib.[10]
In 2005, Evans resigned from being the chairman of theAAVSO Supernovae Search Committee after serving in that position for two decades.
Evans lived inHazelbrook,Australia where he wrote books. Meanwhile, he continued his supernova hunting using a 12-inch (31 cm)reflecting telescope from his backporch. The bulky 16-inch (410 mm) telescope fell into disuse since his home in Hazelbrook did not accommodate a permanent installation in the back yard.
Robert Evans wrote and published books on the history ofevangelism in the 19th and 20th centuries under hisimprint Research in Evangelical Revivals.
Citation reads: 'In recognition of service to science, particularly astronomy.'
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| Preceded by | Amateur Achievement Award of Astronomical Society of the Pacific (together withGregg Thompson) 1985 | Succeeded by |
