Mary Acworth Evershed

Mary Acworth Evershed (Orr; 1 January 1867 – 25 October 1949) was a British astronomer and scholar. Her work on Dante Alighieri was written under the pen name M.A. Orr.

Early life
Mary Acworth Orr was born to Lucy Erskine Acworth (1841–1904) and Andrew Orr (ca. 1830–1870) on 1 January 1867 at Plymouth Hoe. Her father was an officer in the Royal Artillery, who married in 1859. Mary grew up in Wimborne and South Stoke in Somerset. Mary’s youngest brother was the colonial administrator Charles William James Orr.

When she was 20, Orr travelled abroad with her sisters, and when in Florence (1888–1890) began a study of the works of Dante which led to her lifelong interest in astronomical references in Dante's poems.

Astronomical career
In 1890 Orr moved with her family to Australia. She found there was no good guide to the southern stars, so wrote An Easy Guide to the Southern Stars, with the encouragement of John Tebbutt, the leading astronomer in Australia at the time.

In 1895, she moved back to England and met fellow British astronomer John Evershed when they both participated in an expedition to view a total solar eclipse of 9 August 1896 in Norway Orr subsequently joined the British Astronomical Association (BAA). At this time the BAA enjoyed the membership of intellectual women barred from the (then) all-male Royal Astronomical Society. During this time she became friends with Agnes Clerke and Annie Scott Dill Maunder, both notable for their contributions to historical astronomy.

Orr married Evershed in 1906. Up to this time he had worked as an industrial chemist, with solar physics as a hobby, but in 1906 was offered a post as assistant astronomer at Kodaikanal Observatory in India. Mary and John moved to Kodaikanal (visiting notable astronomical locations in the United States on the way) to allow him to take up the post in 1907. While in India, Mary collected plants from the region, which were ultimately deposited in the British Museum herbarium. While at Kodaikanal Mary completed an index to the library at the observatory. In 1909 she is recorded as measuring the position angles and heights of solar prominences from photographs taken at the observatory’s spectroheliograph. In 1915 she accompanied her husband on an astronomical expedition to Srinagar in Kashmir.

In 1916 Mary was elected to the membership of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. On the 9 May 1924 as a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society. Lastly she directed the BAA’s Historical Section from its inception in 1930 to 1944. Throughout her life, Evershed travelled to numerous solar eclipses, including Norway in 1896, Algiers in 1900, Western Australia in 1922, Yorkshire in 1927, and Greece/Aegean Sea in 1936.

Dante scholarship
Evershed was also greatly interested in poetry, and while she loved Dante's work, she was worried about his cosmography. Her 1914 book Dante and the Early Astronomers helped clarify Dante's science, as accurate as it could be given existing knowledge.

Awards and honours

 * 1924 – Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society
 * 1971 - The minor planet 12628 Acworthorr is discovered and named after Evershed.