/ 18 May 2004

Ichthyology icon dies aged 97

Internationally renowned ichthyologist Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer died on Monday, aged 97.

Courtenay-Latimer achieved international recognition as the discoverer of the coelacanth in 1938 when it was thought to have been extinct for 70-million years. The fish genus was named Latimeria chulumnae in her honour.

The nonagenarian was the guest of honour at the international Coastal and Ocean Exploration conference held in East London at the beginning of November last year which was organised by the African Coelacanth Ecosystem Programme’s Tony Ribbink.

When she appeared unexpectedly at an afternoon session of the conference she was mobbed by scientists all wanting to shake her hand and have their photographs taken with her. Courtenay-Latimer was admitted to St Dominic’s hospital on Thursday last week where she was being treated for pneumonia and died in the hospital’s medical ward at 1.15pm on Monday.

She had been at the Fairlands home for the aged since the middle of April after suffering a fall in her Vincent home.

Born in East London on February 24, 1907, Marjorie Eileen Doris Courtenay-Latimer spent her childhood in a number of places in the Cape Province and Orange Free State and went to school at the Holy Cross Convent in Aliwal North.

Her parents encouraged her in a wide range of interests including ornithology, botany, cultural history and the decorative arts.

Courtenay-Latimer was the first curator of the East London museum in 1931 and started what has become a world-class facility from scratch — using the Latimer family collection for many of the displays.

She also donated what is believed to be the world’s only dodo egg to the museum.

”The collections built up by Marge with the help of friends and contacts forms the backbone of the museum’s present collections,” Mary Bursey, a natural scientist at the museum said on Monday.

Courtenay-Latimer also pioneered the diorama display for South African museums.

In 1935 she and Eric Wilson excavated the almost complete fossil skeleton of the dicynodont Kannemeyeria simocephalus.

In 1936 she spent two months studying sea birds on Bird Island and became friendly with crew members of a number of trawlers.

This friendship was to immortalise her two years later when Captain Hendrik Goosen of the trawler Nerine called her about an unusual fish he had brought back from a trip on December 22, 1938.

She saw a blue fin protruding from the mound of fish.

”I rapidly removed all the specimens on top and there lay the most beautiful fish I had ever seen,” she said in an interview on her 96th birthday last year.

She made desperate efforts to preserve the fish and to contact the one man who could help in its identification, Professor JLB Smith, who worked for months before officially declaring the find a coelacanth.

Courtenay-Latimer was also instrumental in designing and setting up most of the displays in the ”new” museum when it moved in 1951.

Her work was put into context by East London historian Brian Watson when he said that it was only in 1953 that the first secretary/bookkeeper was appointed at the museum, a learner taxidermist in 1956 and the appointments of the first technician and professional officer followed in 1958 and 1959 respectively.

”This shows how Courtenay-Latimer used her many skills in building up the institution that has obtained worldwide recognition,” Watson wrote of her in 1985.

She was also one of the driving forces behind the establishment of the Gonubie bird sanctuary in 1955, as well as the nature reserve at Potters Pass.

She work hard on helping Auriol Batten and Hertha Bokelmann with their book Wild Flowers of the Eastern Cape Province and helped find a publisher for this definitive work.

She was a founder member of South African Museum’s Association, the Border Historical Society and the Border Wild Flower Association.

She received the freedom of the city of East London in 1974 and an honorary doctorate from Rhodes University in 1971. – Sapa