F. Clark Howell was born in Kansas in 1925. He was raised on a farm where he became interested in natural history. He served in the United States Navy during World War II. Following the war he studied anthropology and various related biological and geological sciences at the University of Chicago. Professor Howell’s interest in human evolution began with his studies of Neanderthal man. Following his course work Professor Howell taught at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis before moving back to the University of Chicago in 1955. He stayed in Chicago as a Professor and Chairman of the Anthropology Department until 1970.
In 1970 Professor Howell moved to the University of California at Berkeley as a Professor in Paleoanthropology. Today Professor Howell remains at the University of California at Berkeley as a Professor Emeritus where he co-directs the Laboratory for Human Studies.
Professor Howell’s knowledge of the fossil record has been gained firsthand with work in Africa, Asia, and Europe. It is in the field that Professor Howell has gained some of his greatest notoriety. In 1966 he organized and lead the Omo Research Expedition to the Omo Basin of southern Ethiopia to study Pliocene and Pleistocene fossil deposits. Results of these digs revealed teeth and jaw fragments proving that australopithecoid ancestors lived four million years ago, doubling the age of previous estimates of two million years. Professor Howell has also done field work in such areas as Ambrona and Torralba in Spain, and the Acheulian sites of Isimila in Tanzania.
Professor Howell has written countless papers and several books over his career. Among his publications are Early Man of the Time-Life series and African Ecology and Human Evolution. He also holds memberships in the National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and is a Trustee of the California Academy of Sciences.
Howell, F. (Francis) Clark,” http://Biography.com/ 1997. F. Clark Howell, Professor Emeritus,”
ARF Faculty Associates, http://www.berkeley.edu/ .
Howell, F. Clark, Early Man, Time-Life Books, Virginia, 1980
Bourliere, Howell, African Ecology and Human Evolution, Aldine, Chicago, 1963.
Written by: David Loberg And Students in an Introduction to Anthropology Class, Minnesota State University, Mankato, Minnesota 2003