The fossil 'Lucy' was unearthed in Ethiopia
On this day · 24 November 1974
On November 24, 1974, a young paleoanthropologist spotted an arm bone in an Ethiopian gully and rewrote the human family tree.
On November 24, 1974, paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson and graduate student Tom Gray were surveying a gully at Hadar, in Ethiopia’s Afar region, when a glint of fossil bone caught Johanson’s eye. By the time they finished collecting, they had recovered 47 fragments forming roughly 40 percent of a single skeleton — an astonishing haul for a creature that lived about 3.2 million years ago.
The specimen, catalogued AL 288-1, became the type fossil of a new species, Australopithecus afarensis. She stood about 3.5 feet tall, combined an ape-sized braincase with a pelvis and leg built for upright walking, and showed that our ancestors walked on two legs long before their brains grew large.
The camp celebrated to a Beatles song playing on repeat that night — “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” — and the name stuck.
Ethiopians call her Dinkinesh, meaning “you are marvelous.” She remains one of the most complete early hominins ever found.
Sources & references
2 referencesWell-established. Corroborated by 2 independent sources.
