Kenyan paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey dies at age 77

 

Kenyan paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey dies at age 77

Paleoanthropologist Richard Leakey, whose surname is tantamount to the origins of mankind, has died Sunday at his native Nairobi, it was announced. He was 77.

“I have this afternoon... received with deep sorrow the sad news of the passing away of Dr Richard Erskine Frere Leakey,” President Uhuru Kenyatta said in a statement late Sunday.

The globally famous conservationist gained worldwide notoriety alongside other members of his family for groundbreaking discoveries since the early 1970s of skeletons deemed to belong to what could be referred to as “the missing link,” which were believed to prove humankind evolved in Africa.