Gerry Evans (1937-2008)
One-time seaman, wharfie and union leader, writer Gerry Evans of Wellington jokingly asked that his ashes be scattered in Karori Library. Born in Wales, he went to sea as a 16-year-old, and didn’t begin writing until 1994, when he embarked on a creative writing degree at Victoria University.
His memoir Shipping Out was published in 2006. He was 2006 writer-in- residence at the Michael King Writers’ Centre, and, when he died, was about to take up a residency at the Robert Lord Writers Cottage in Dunedin to further his biography of writer Noel Hilliard.