Ken Gibbs was a brilliant and accomplished astrophysicist, known on Orcas Island primarily for being “just a guy who got things done.” For his doctoral dissertation in the late 1980s, Ken developed a technique that permanently propelled the study and research of very high energy (VHE) gamma ray astronomy. Prior to Ken’s discovery, gamma-ray astronomy was not yet recognized as a viable field of study, only as a subset of cosmic ray physics. Ken was the first to confirm that astronomical objects emit gamma rays when he discovered that the Crab Nebula was an emitter of such rays (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crab_Nebula#cite_note-33). This discovery firmly established gamma-ray astronomy as a field of study in its own right. Today, thousands of scientists conduct research in the field, while the catalogue of astronomical gamma-ray sources grows almost daily.

After moving to Orcas Island, Ken volunteered weekly at the Orcas Island Library and was chair of Friends of the Library from 2017 to 2022. He served on the board of his homeowners association, and was always ready to pitch in with projects in the neighborhood. This serious and dedicated scientist had a whimsical side, which was often expressed with rubber duckies. Rubber duckies in various configurations just “appeared” and, if confronted, Ken would re-direct the conversation, saying something like, “Oh, that’s my wife’s thing.”