Raymond (Ray) John Heaphy Beverton CBE FRS[1] (29 August 1922 – 23 July 1995) was an important founder of fisheries science.

Beverton's life and achievements are described in detail in several obituaries written by prominent figures in fisheries science.

Beverton was also one of the first to acknowledge the variation of life histories that exists in fish, and the importance of this in fisheries management.

The legacy of the 1957 Beverton and Holt treatise is commemorated in the volume Advances in Fisheries Science.

Originally the model had a more specific usage; it was devised to describe the dependence of recruitment on spawning stock biomass.