KELLY STEWART-HARCOURT

Kelly was born in Los Angeles where she grew up with her twin sister and two half-brothers. She has spent most of her adult life involved in the study and conservation of wild animals, specifically monkeys and apes. She inherited her love of science, wildlife and wild places from her parents who took the family on a wildlife safari to East Africa when Kelly was 14. After obtaining her BA in Anthropology from Stanford University, Kelly went to Rwanda where she spent several years in the 1970s and 1980s studying the behavior and ecology of wild mountain gorillas. She was based at Dian Fossey’s research center, set high in the mountain forests. It was there she met her future husband, Sandy Harcourt. Along with their work in Rwanda and Congo, the two also conducted surveys of forests in Uganda and Nigeria. Kelly received her PhD in Zoology from Cambridge University. In 1989, she moved back to her native California where she and her husband took up positions in the Dept. of Anthropology at the University of California, Davis. They have since retired but are still involved in gorilla conservation.