by William A. Hoesch, M.S.*
http://www.icr.org/i/pdf/btg/btg-211.pdf
Lucy, to TV audiences of the 1950s and
1960s, was a spunky red-headed actress.
To our more educated schoolchildren today,
however, “Lucy” means somethingquite different. She is the celebrated fossil
that appears in textbooks as a hairy, seminaked,
upright-walking ape striding boldly
across a treeless African landscape. Her jaw
is set and she leaves behind her a set of
trailing footprints. As the unquestioned icon
of human evolution, her fame is comparable
to that of the former actress. Why is it that
all public school children have heard of this
fossil? Let us consider Lucy and her species,
Australopithicus afarensis.
The human evolution story usually begins
with the more primitive australopithocines
(literally, “southern apes”) that
transition into the genus Homo (or human),
through either Homo habilis or
Homo erectus, depending on who you talk
to. Homo habilis is a mixed taxon of both
human and ape remains, and has fallen into
disrepute. As for Homo erectus, a great
many suggest this category be subsumed
into Homo sapiens. Thus “Lucy” and the
afarensis fossils occupy a critical place in
the human evolution story, squarely between
that of the truly apish australopithocines
and humans.
Lucy’s skeleton was about 40% complete
and was a remarkable discovery
when unearthed by Don Johanson in 1974.