Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
Gregory reversed his earlier opinion that Taung was not a human ances-
tor and, instead, concluded, “It is the missing link no longer missing. It
is the structural connecting link between ape and man. . . . This is an
actual fossil form found in South Africa and it does, to that extent, favor
the view of Darwin that Man arose in Africa.”
59
After Dart learned in 1931 that his nearly 300-page monograph on
Australopithecus
would not be published, he went into an eclipse as far as
that aspect of his research. What was needed to vindicate his ideas was
for someone to go out and discover more fossils like Taung—but pref-
erably adults. Dart's elderly and faithful colleague Robert Broom did
just that from 1936 to 1949. Because of Broom's tireless efforts, numerous
fossils of
Australopithecus africanus
came to light from a quarry site called
Sterkfontein, as well as other fossils from a second hominin species with
a more robust skull
(Paranthropus robustus)
at a nearby cave on a farm
called Kromdraai. (These two groups are generally referred to as aus-
tralopithecines.) Broom's wonderful discoveries represented various
parts of the skeleton and ushered in what Dart would later remember as
the period of his vindication.
60
Despite his well-earned reputation for stoicism, Dart suffered because
of the prolonged controversy surrounding Taung. In 1943 he experienced
a “nervous breakdown,” in which he was “emotionally, and physically
broken,” partly for personal reasons (related to the health of his handi-
capped son, Galen) and partly because of “the strain suffered during
On the recommendation of his physician, Dart took a year of work
and “emerged from his recuperative period revitalized. . . . Recovered
from his former weariness, he could single out with enhanced acuity
the fossil's remaining foes—all those in the Piltdown camp including
Sir Arthur Keith—and, at the same time, better appreciate the growing
