Roy B. (Roy Bernard) Kester

Born in 1882, Roy Bernard Kester became an influential American accounting educator and writer during the early twentieth century. Reliable catalog and academic sources connect him most strongly with Columbia University, where he served as a professor of accounting and built a reputation for explaining difficult ideas in a direct, usable way.

Kester is best known for works such as Accounting Theory and Practice, a textbook that was widely used by students and teachers. His writing focused on the foundations of accounting, but it was valued because it stayed practical and closely tied to real business problems rather than abstract theory alone.

He died in 1965. Although detailed biographical information is limited in the sources I could confirm, his name remains closely associated with the growth of accounting education in the United States and with the effort to present the subject as a serious academic discipline.