Quarry Closing In On the Missing Link

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY 1 NOV 1993

Anthropologists' search for fossil remains of a ``missing link''--a half-ape, half-hominid creature that gave rise to both living humans and living apes--remains frustrating. Boaz, an anthropology professor at George Washington University, charges that ``paleoanthropologists search for humanity's origin not where it likely occurred but where the deposits are most accessible and the logistics easiest.'' His captivating report blends an account of his fieldwork in Africa, a survey of controversies over the last 40 years, and close-ups of such scientists as Richard Leakey and Donald Johanson. Boaz argues that the branching off of gorillas, chimps and hominids on the evolutionary tree could have occurred in a number of places in Africa, not just in East Africa where most research has focused. He also represents a new scenario to account for bipedalism, arguing that as forests shrank, our hominid ancestors began walking upright to traverse open stretches of savanna and, eventually, to migrate, leaving gorillas and chimps behind.