Roger Littlejohn
(26 February 1955 - 6 March 2011)

It is with sadness that we report that Roger Littlejohn died on the morning of 6th March, 2011, following a battle with secondary melanoma, having just turned 56. Vanessa Cave is putting tributes on the NZSA web and there is a growing collection of photos of Roger. Email Vanessa if you'd like to add a tribute.

Roger Littlejohn was employed as a statistician with AgResearch (formerly Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries), based at the Invermay campus, from August 1983 until his death. He was an expert in the analyses of time series and in the application of hidden Markov models, and made major contributions in the analysis of hormone profiles and data on animal positions through time. He devised practical solutions to the diverse range of problems that were presented to him and was greatly appreciated by his workplace colleagues. He contributed to over 200 publications.

He contributed to the wider statistical community in a number of ways, including being a committee member of the NZ Statistical Association. Roger was the Editor of the NZSA newsletter September 2002-March 2006, President of the NZSA from 2006-8, and NZSA Webmaster January 2004-February 2010. For the last few years Roger has been the ANZJS Non-Editorial Management Representative and on the Awards Committee. He was a member of several conference and workshop organising committees, as well the board of directors for the NZIMA Hidden Markov Models and Complex Systems programme. He also contributed a number of time series procedures to the GenStat procedure library.

Roger was always ready to help and promote others, as can be seen in his mentoring of a number of project and thesis students. He instigated and edited a festschrift for Peter Johnstone to celebrate Peter's 65th birthday. His own contribution on writing workplans is a testament to his eloquence and humour.

Away from work Roger was an active member of the dramatic society, and of his church. He was a devoted father and husband. He leaves his wife Annette and two children, Jeremy and Tabitha.

Roger will be missed as a colleague and friend by us all.

AgResearch Stats Team

Tributes for Roger

A tribute page has been set up. If you would like to contribute please email Vanessa Cave. A collection of photographs of Roger at conferences, meetings and events through the years has been compiled by Harold Henderson. Click here to view the collection [pdf: 4.8MB].

So far tributes have been added by many individuals and organisations; David Baird, David Fletcher, Shirley and Ken Pledger, Sharleen Forbes, Angela Anderson, Peter Hall, David Scott, David Vere-Jones, Mario D’Antuono, Jennifer Brown, Estate Khmaladze and Geoff Lee. Four are reproduced here.

Roger is someone who I will always remember as generous - he was generous with his time he dedicated to NZSA, generous with his willingness to help me as a new President and to help others, generous with his caring and fun personality, and generous with his enthusiasm for statistics. Roger, I will miss you so much.

Jennifer Brown
NZSA President

Roger was a committed member of NZSA quietly but willingly doing a heap of work (often in the background).

He was always smiling with a keen sense of humour and a knack of making people around him feel comfortable.

He was such a regular attendee at annual conferences that I’m having trouble reconciling myself to the fact that he won’t be at the next one.

I am one of the many that will miss him - one of the well-known personalities of New Zealand statistics.

Haere ra Roger. Haere ra i te rangimaire.

Sharleen Forbes
General Manager, Statistical Education
Statistics New Zealand

It is with great sadness to hear the news that Roger has passed away. A respected and gentle giant amongst his colleagues and friends he is a great loss to the Biometrics community.

On behalf of the committee and members of the Australasian Region of the International Biometric Society, we extend our sincere condolences to his wife Annette and two children, Jeremy and Tabitha.

On a personal note, he was a poet as well and composed a poem with that typical Roger humour after my talk in Marysville, 2008.

Young Mario from Perth was a teazza
Of Italian, life and statistizza.
He knew how to cook
Up a book, pasta, and chook,
GenStat-R code and a pizza.

A special thanks to special man who travelled to all corners of the region to support biometrical activities.

Rest in peace.

Mario D’Antuono
President IBS-AR
Perth, Western Australia

It was very sad news to hear of Roger's death, and especially that he left a wife and young children.

I did not know much of his statistical work, but I knew him through his contribution to the NZSA and through conferences. He took over from me as NZSA webmaster, and was later President. Roger exhibited virtues which are perhaps considered old-fashioned. He was hardworking, enthusiastic, gentle, good-humoured and modest. He will be missed.

David Scott
The University of Auckland

And Finally

"Statistics is a Cinderella amongst the Sciences, cleaning, sweeping, bringing order, but rather ill-equipped for the Ball."

Roger Littlejohn
President's Column, NZSA Newsletter 65

Farewell Roger