Robert F Wing

Remembering Robert F Wing PhD

Robert F. Wing passed away peacefully at home on April 3, 2026 at the age of 86. He was a Professor of Astronomy at The Ohio State University from 1967 until his retirement in 2002, when he was given the title of Emeritus Professor. He was known for his research in the spectra of cool stars, especially Red Giants.

Born in Woodbridge, Connecticut to Charlotte Farquhar Wing and Donald Goddard Wing, Robert (known as Robin then Bobby as a child and Bob thereafter ) attended the Foote School for his elementary school years and kept up with his classmates for over seven decades.

He graduated from Westminster, a boarding school in Simsbury, CT in 1957. Later in his life, he contributed funds and expertise towards the founding of Westminster’s observatory and science center to nurture the enthusiasm of budding scientists.

He followed his father’s path to Yale, joining the class of 1961, where, in the spring of 1959, Bob Wing was the only student to sign up for a newly-offered major in “Astronomy and Physics,” which would later become known as the Astrophysics major. Because of this hapenstance, Bob can be considered Yale’s first Astrophysics major. Also musically gifted, he sang as a tenor in the Yale Russian Chorus. He was with the YRC for two of their amazing tours of the Soviet Union during the Khrushchev era, and continued singing in the touring Alumni YRC until very recently.

Bob was introduced to his wife-to-be, Ingrid McCowen, by his sister Cathya, during her year at Oxford University, England in 1960. They exchanged records and kept in correspondance. Ingrid visited Bob for a Yale-Harvard football game in New Haven. Then Bob studied for a year at Cambridge University following his graduation from Yale, when he saw Ingrid often.

Ingrid and Bob were married in the garden of the Quaker Meeting House in Reading, England before setting off for Berkeley, California, first on a trans-Atlantic steamer and then a cross-country Zephyr train.

Bob pursued his PhD in Astronomy (1967) at the University of California, Berkeley. When he was just hours shy of his 25th birthday, his first child, Sylvia was born. His dissertation topic was the near-infrared molecular spectra of late-type stars.

In the Fall of 1967, the young family moved to Columbus, Ohio where Bob began his faculty position at The Ohio State University. Their second child, Roger, was born in March of 1968 and James arrived in February of 1971.

As an astronomer, Bob travelled around the world for conferences and solar eclipses, visiting six continents. He made frequent observing runs in Arizona, and the last of his 50 visits to the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile was celebrated there. Known for taking long road trips, he visited all 48 contiguous US states and many Canadian Provinces, and visited telescopes in Hawaii.

Bob inherited an interest in rare books from his father, a long-time Yale librarian, who developed his Short-Title Catalogue of books published in English in the 17th century. In his father’s honor, Bob established in 2004 an endowment at OSU for 17th century books.

He played the piano beautifully all his life. He was an active supporter of music and the arts, and served as a Sustaining Board Member of the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra. Always politically active, Bob attended protests, followed politics, supported progressive candidates, and contributed to social justice organizations. On a recent weekend he carried a homemade sign in a No Kings protest march.

He was a sports enthusiast and OSU football season ticket holder for many decades. He loved introducing people to American football at The Shoe. His home was well-loved for its ravine setting, croquet lawn, mature trees, and local wildlife. The Wings hosted many parties with students, colleagues, friends, and neighbors. Bob was quiet and reserved, spending long hours advising dissertation research and meticulously editing the scholarly work of colleagues from around the world.

Bob was predeceased by his wife Ingrid in 1999 and is survived by his three children, Sylvia W. Önder, Roger V. Wing, and James D. Wing, three grandchildren, Timur Onder, Maggie Wing, and Manzanita Wing, his sister Cathya Stephenson, her two children, Margaret (Vladimir) Stephenson and Donald Stephenson and her four grandchildren.