Item Llyfr Ffoto 4694/96. - [Evan Roberts]

Slides 4694/95 & 97 are variants of this.

Evan Roberts (1906-91) was born in Gelli, Capel Curig, the little village where he was to spend all his life. As a youngster in a rural community his future after leaving school at the age of 14 years lay either in sheep farming, slate quarrying or life outside his beloved village environment. His choice was to turn to the quarries, where he would find, he hoped, stability and a living income. He married Mabel, and they brought up a family of three sons and a daughter. But problems hit the slate industry and after 33 years service in the quarry at Capel Curig it closed in 1953 and he was made redundant. He then worked for the Forestry Commission for a short while. It is said that his wife, who was exasperated by Evan being at home on Saturdays used to send him out, and on one of his walks up Moel Siabod he observed a small purple flower (purple saxifrage, Saxifraga oppositifolia) near the summit which he resolved to find out its name, and from this his interest of the local plant life grew into something that was to become part of his world. Fortune was on his side and as his knowledge developed he was able to receive help in his studies from a number of eminent botanists, one of whom was E. Price Evans, a son of a quarryman from Corris, and a noted ecologist who had a distinguished teaching career and lived in Deganwy, not too far from Capel. With this encouragement and support he became a botanist of some distinction and this led to his appointment in 1954, as the first Warden of Cwm Idwal, the first newly founded National Nature Reserve, acquired by the Nature Conservancy Council. This appointment led to him being an inspiration to generations of visitors to the cwm; here his genius shone, and his fame as the foremost authority on the alpine plants of Snowdonia spread. The late William Condry, the distinguished naturalist, describes him as "…. a fountain of all knowledge on the subject". He is recognised as being one of the most outstanding field botanists of the twentieth century. Later he was promoted to become the Chief Warden of the Nature Conservancy Council in North Wales, a position he held till his retirement. The University of Wales awarded Evan an honorary M.Sc. degree in 1956 in recognition for his outstanding contribution to botany; the award of the MBE and membership to the Gorsedd (white robe) followed. (Biography courtesy of Cyngor Bwrdeistref Sirol Conwy website.)

Title taken from 'Portraits' by Kyffin Williams (Gomer, 2007) p124-125.

Preferred citation: Llyfr Ffoto 4694/96.