Richardson Evans (5 April 1846 – 10 May 1928) was a British civil servant, journalist and author. Evans served in the Indian Civil Service, for the

North-Western Provinces The North-Western Provinces was an administrative region in British India. The North-Western Provinces were established in 1836, through merging the administrative divisions of the Ceded and Conquered Provinces. In 1858, the nawab-ruled kingdom ...

from 1867 to 1876, after which he worked in London as a journalist. From the 1880s onwards, Evans campaigned to limit advertising in the fields alongside railway lines; to save the view of the Thames from Richmond Hill, and similar causes. In October 1890 the '' National Review'' carried an article by him entitled "The Age of Disfigurement". It was a vigorous attack on the various abuses which had arisen through the indiscriminate use of posters and advertising signs, which he believed ‘are efficacious very often in proportion to the annoyance they cause’. Evans believed there should be regulation, allowing local bodies to control advertising, ‘to schedule scenes of remarkable beauty or interest and to protect them from desecration by a general Act’, to tax posters and to boycott goods which were ‘offensively advertised’. Evans lived at The Kier, on the west side of

Wimbledon Common Wimbledon Common is a large open space in Wimbledon, southwest London. There are three named areas: Wimbledon Common, Putney Heath, and Putney Lower Common, which together are managed under the name Wimbledon and Putney Commons totalling 460 ...

. In 1903 he was the principal founder of the John Evelyn Club, now known as the Wimbledon Society, and was its secretary until 1920. He was also a founding member of the Wimbledon 1914 Choral Society, now the Wimbledon Choral Society, and its first president, until 1919. The Richardson Evans Memorial Playing Fields (REMPF), at

Putney Vale Putney () is a district of southwest London, England, in the London Borough of Wandsworth, southwest of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London. History Putney is an ancient paris ...

beside

, are named in his honour. ‘Nature provides the best memorial’ is part of the inscription on the war memorial within the Playing Fields, designed in 1921 by

Madeline Agar Madeline Agnes Agar (21 May 1874 – 30 November 1967) was a British landscape designer. She was an early professional female landscape designer in Britain, and responsible for the design and the layout of a number of public gardens across London ...

, assisted by

Brenda Colvin Brenda Colvin CBE (1897–1981) was a British landscape architect, author of standard works in the field and a force behind its professionalisation. She was part of the Colvin family, which had long ties to the British Raj. Biography Colvin ...

. There is also a memorial plaque on Owler Tor in the

Peak District The Peak District is an upland area in England at the southern end of the Pennines. Mostly in Derbyshire Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes much of the Peak District National Park, the southe ...

with the inscription 'This viewpoint and 25 acres around forming part of the Longshaw Estate are given in memory of Richardson Evans 1846–1928' and a quotation is from "The Children’s Song" from '' Puck of Pook's Hill'' by

Rudyard Kipling Joseph Rudyard Kipling ( ; 30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936)''The Times'', (London) 18 January 1936, p. 12. was an English novelist, short-story writer, poet, and journalist. He was born in British India, which inspired much of his work. ...

. Reporting the ceremony handing over the Deeds of

Longshaw {{Infobox UK place , country = England , coordinates = {{coord, 53.517233, -2.7157, display=inline,title , official_name = Longshaw , metropolitan_borough = Wigan , metropolitan_county = Gre ...

to the

National Trust The National Trust, formally the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, is a charity and membership organisation for heritage conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, there is a separate and ...

on 27 June, the '' Sheffield Telegraph'' wrote:
‘A part of the estate, covering 25 acres, consisting of Owler Tor, a view-point near the Hathersage Road, and surrounding Land, will always be a memorial to the late Mr Richardson Evans, a pioneer in the work of preserving natural beauty, and a founder of the

Scapa Society The Scapa Society (Society for Checking (or Controlling) the Abuses in Public Advertising) was an organization founded in Britain in 1893 to protest against the burgeoning advertising business. It was founded by Richardson Evans, and has been ca ...

, his widow having given £500 to the fund on condition that his name was associated with it in this way.’ (Sheffield Daily Telegraph 29 June 1931). The Scapa Society (Society for Checking the Abuses in Public Advertising) was ‘the first organized reaction against advertising’.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Evans, Richardson 1846 births 1926 deaths British civil servants British journalists British writers People from Wimbledon, London Indian Civil Service (British India) officers Members of the Middle Temple Alumni of Queens College Cork Irish colonial officials Alumni of Wadham College, Oxford