Bob was born Sept. 11, 1929, the son of Alvin J. and Katharine Mize Accola.
At Phillips Exeter he won the mathematics prize and graduated cum laude. At Princeton he roomed with Andy Cobb, Bill Dana, Homer Franklin, and Bob MacKennan, and belonged to Quadrangle. As a sophomore with the best record on the Putnam Mathematical Exam, he won the Class of 1861 Prize. As an SPIA major, he graduated with high honors. Bob and Carolyn Pennybacker were married Dec. 23, 1951.
Following two years in the Army in Korea, Bob entered Harvard Graduate School, where he earned master’s and doctoral degrees in mathematics. After two years as an instructor at Harvard, he joined the faculty at Brown in 1960 as assistant professor of mathematics and was named a full professor in 1969. He served as chairman of the mathematics department from 1992 to 1994 and retired in 1996.
Bob specialized in Riemann surfaces; over the years he published 31 papers in professional journals and two monographs.
He died May 15, 2011, of Parkinson’s disease. He is survived by Carolyn; their children, Kristen, Robert, and Katharine; and four grandchildren. His sister, Rosemary Hewitt, and brother, Alvin J. Accola Jr. ’44, predeceased him.