LEAKEY’S “THIRD ANGEL,” BIRUTE GALDIKAS: IMPORTANT ARCHIVE OF CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN LEAKEY, GALDIKAS AND WILKIE REGARDING THE ESTABLISHMENT OF AN ORANGUTAN RESEARCH PROJECT IN INDONESIA AND THE PROGRESS OF GALDIKAS’ RESEARCH THERE

LEAKEY, Louis S.B. and GALDIKAS, Birute. Archive of documents concerning Louis Leakey and Birute Galdikas’ Orangutan research in Indonesia, including: LEAKEY, Louis. Three typed letters signed. Nairobi, Kenya, November 19, 1969-December 20, 1971. Quarto, writing on rectos only, to Leighton Wilkie, on National Museum Centre for Prehistory and Paleontology letterhead. WITH: LEAKEY, Louis. “Research Programme on Orang Outans (Orang hutans) in Malaysia.” Typed Manuscript signed by Leakey. No place, [1969]. Quarto, three pages. WITH: GALDIKAS, Birute. Seven typed letters signed, to Robert and Leighton Wilkie. Los Angeles; Burnaby, British Columbia; Indonesia, December 3, 1970-May 1, 1984. Legal folio and quarto, twenty pages, several on onionskin. WITH: 15 black-and-white and color photographs of Galdikas and orangutans at Camp Leakey; Photocopy of Galdikas’ 1978 dissertation; offprints of several scholarly articles, many inscribed to Wilkie by Galdikas. Nairobi; Los Angeles; Burnaby, British Columbia; Indonesia, 1969-1984. Variety of formats, mostly typing paper and legal paper. $9200.

Three Louis Leakey letters to Leighton Wilkie regarding the establishment of an orangutan project, together with his typed manuscript signed (“L.S.B. Leakey”) describing his proposal for Galdikas’ orangutan research project. With seven typed letters signed by Birute Galdikas, also to the Wilkie brothers, describing the progress of her research—including her discovery that orangutans are not exclusively arboreal—along with black-and-white and color photographs of Galdikas at Camp Leakey, Camp Wilkie and among the orangutans she studied.

Birute Galdikas was the third of Leakey’s “Angels,” selected after the successes of Goodall and Fossey to focus attention on the orangutans of Indonesia. In Leakey’s 1969 letter, he again asks the Wilkie foundation to fund his new project, and sends the three-page proposal for Galdikas’ project which describes the purpose of the project, the problems inherent in studying the orangutan—they are located in Islamic countries that do not readily accept the presence of single women working alone, and they are largely tree dwelling—and Leakey’s solutions, which include having Galdikas marry her fiancé, sending her to train with Fossey and Goodall, and train herself “to swing high in the trees.” The 1971 letter forwards a photostat copy of Galdikas’ letter to Leakey describing the problems the project has run into.

Like Fossey and Goodall before her, Galdikas writes the Wilkie brothers to keep them apprised of the progress of her research. In a letter dated November 29, 1972, she describes her discovery that, contrary to what was previously thought, orangutans were not exclusively arboreal, and in fact traveled quite a bit on the forest floor. With a 1973 letter she sends a copy of her progress report submitted to the Leakey Foundation and describes her research in detail.