Robert William Evans

Robert William Evans (24 July 1872 – 11 June 1955) was an Australian politician, businessman, community leader and music advocate, best known for serving two terms as mayor of Rockhampton, Queensland from 1936 until 1943.

[2][3] After arriving in Australia, the family settled in Far North Queensland, where Esther was employed as a governess for her brother's children on "Fairview Station" near Cooktown.

[1] For a time, Evans worked at local Rockhampton newspaper, the Daily Record, where he was employed in the circulation and advertising departments while also occasionally undertaking some reporting duties.

[9] Despite the challenges of being a wartime mayor, Evans' desire to modernise the city with new infrastructure resulted in him accomplishing a number of considerable achievements for Rockhampton.

[10][11] Evans made a concerted effort to seal the streets of Rockhampton with bitumen, securing substantial loans to make it happen.

[13] In 1939, Evans successfully updated the city's public transport network by replacing Rockhampton's ageing steam trams with a fleet of diesel buses.

[20] Throughout his time in local government, Evans worked hard to ensure women had access to various amenities, such as public toilets and air raid trenches.

In 1936, Evans said that there were many matters that be believed would be "handled much better by women than men", and in 1940, he encouraged the organisation to nominate one of their members to run as a candidate for Federal Parliament.

[27] He was also quick to defend Rockhampton, publicly chastising geologist Robert John Tillyard for his controversial "papaw comments" about the city in 1936.