Catalogue of the papers and correspondence of ULICK RICHARDSON EVANS, CBE, FRS (1889...

SECTION A BIOGRAPHICAL AND PERSONAL A.1 - A.23

A.1 - A.11 BIOGRAPHICAL AND AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL

A.12 - A.15 CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY

A.16 - A.19 FAMILY AND PERSONAL CORRESPONDENCE

A.20 - A.23 AMENITY SOCIETIES AND THE ENVIRONMENT

SECTION B RESEARCH PROJECTS B.1 - B.31

B.1 - B.6 ELECTROCHEMISTRY AND CORROSION

B.7 - B.16 ENERGY CONSERVATION

B.17 - B.31 NUTRITION AND FOOD SCIENCE

With an introductory note

SECTION C NON-SCIENTIFIC WRITINGS C.1 - C.6

SECTION D CORRESPONDENCE D.1 - D.31

Evans's intellectual vigour and spirit of enquiry remained undiminished to the end of his very long life, as can be seen from several surviving letters written after he was ninety. He was fully conscious of his continuing achievements in extreme old age, and nurtured them by a regime of outdoor exercise, careful diet and self-imposed limits on social activities. As the years went by, however, he realised the need to make suitable dispositions of his possessions; scientific books and journals were offered to appropriate institutions, and in 1964 Evans made a selection of personal writings, photographs and other material which, in bound or typescript form, he circulated among his family and friends: these appear at A.3, A.6 and C.6 in the present collection. It seems that he then destroyed his remaining papers; consequently, no personal records survive of his most important research findings, or of his consultative work for government and industry in the earlier part of his life, and the existing documents are essentially confined to those which accumulated after this major clear-out in the 1960s.

An exception to this is the material relating to Evans's tripartite consultancy with S. Rideal and his son E.K. (later Sir Eric) Rideal in 1912 (see B.2 - B.5). The remaining material in Section B has its interest in documenting Evans's lifelong concern - no doubt continuing that of his father Richardson Evans - for the conservation of the natural environment, whether by the use of windmills to replace or supplement fossil fuels, or by his somewhat less than practical scheme to foster economical and nutritious home baking which greatly occupied his time and tea parties in his last years (see B.17 - B.31 and introductory note).

Several of the letters in Section D refer to the considerable achievement of his publication in 1976 of the 'Second Supplementary Volume' of his major book 'Corrosion and oxidation of metals'. He was then eighty-seven, but continued to ask his correspondents for comments and additional references which he was assembling for use by a successor who would after his death compile a third supplement.

Compiled by: Jeannine Alton Julia Latham-Jackson

The work of the Contemporary Scientific Archives Centre, and the production of this catalogue, are made possible by the support of the following societies and institutions:

The Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland

The Biochemical Society

The British Pharmacological Society

The Charles Babbage Foundation for the History of Information Processing

The Institute of Physics

The Institution of Electrical Engineers

The Nuffield Foundation

The Physiological Society

The Royal Society of London

<p>A small amount of material, including apparatus and specimens, is held in the Department of Metallurgy, Cambridge.</p>

The majority of the material was received from Dr. J.E.O. Mayne, a professional colleague, close personal friend and neighbour of Evans. Dr. Mayne also collaborated with Sir Alan Cottrell in the Royal Society Memoir (Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society, 27, 1981).

Volume III of Evans's 'Non-scientific Efforts of a Scientist' was made available by Mrs. Ann Wilson (niece) and is included as item C.6.

Evans was internationally known as the 'Father of the modern science of corrosion and protection of metals'; he went from Marlborough to King's College, Cambridge, in 1907, remaining there until 1911 and returning after army service in the First World War. He spent the rest of his life in Cambridge, researching and writing prolifically on corrosion and oxidation of metals, and died there, unmarried, at the age of ninety-one.