Renowned Coelacanth icon Courtenay-Latimer dies at 97

Herald Correspondent

East London — Internationally renowned and respected ichthyology icon, Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer, died yesterday aged 97.

Ms Courtenay-Latimer achieved international recognition after discovering the coelacanth – a fish species – in 1938.

The coelacanth was thought to have been extinct for 70 million years.

Ms Courtenay-Latimer was admitted to St Dominic’s hospital last Thursday where she was treated for pneumonia. She died in hospital at 1.15pm yesterday, a hospital spokesman confirmed.

She was residing at the Fairlands home for the aged since the middle of April after having suffered a fall at her Vincent home.

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

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

Ms 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.

In 1936 she spent two months studying sea birds on Bird Island and this is where she befriended crew members of a number of trawlers. This friendship was to develop into major significance two years later when Captain Hendrik Goosen of the trawler, Nerine, informed her about an unusual fish he had brought back from a trip on December 22, 1938. On closer inspection 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 was quoted saying in an interview last year. She made desperate efforts to preserve the fish and finally contacted Rhodes University’s Professor JLB Smith, who worked for months before officially declaring the find a coelacanth.

She was a founder member of the 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.

Funeral arrangements have not yet been finalised, her nephew Doug Buchholtz said.

“A lot of people have to be contacted and we will only know later where and when the funeral will be held,” he said.

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