[1] Steavenson developed an interest in astronomy as a child after receiving a small folding telescope as a gift.
In September 1911, while still a schoolboy at Cheltenham College, he independently discovered the comet C/1911 S2, but unfortunately for him he did not check his photograph quickly enough and credit went to Ferdinand Quénisset.
[3] He chose medicine as his profession and became a surgeon, but pursued astronomy his entire life and was a skilled observer.
[1] Steavenson studied how the human eye operates, particularly at the low-light levels encountered in visual astronomy.
He measured the diameter of the pupil of a dark-adapted eye to be 1⁄3 inch (8.5 mm), which was larger than the figure that was believed at that time.
He worked for 30 years as astronomy correspondent for The Times and won the Jackson-Gwilt Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1928.