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for libretto, composition and orchestration. The last two operas have been premiered at major opera houses. Usher House ran again at San Francisco Opera. Upcoming performance of the “scare pair”, meaning Usher and Canterville asa double bill, have been announced in other cities. Plump Jack is still waiting its turn. My interest in human origins led me to the Leakey Foundation. | had read about Louis Leakey in the papers, and had met him a few times in Las Angeles and San Francisco. Brilliant, courtly, fierce. He let you know what was wrong. | became a fellow in 1973, a trustee the next year and chairman the next. Clark Howell, who taught anthropology at Berkeley, chaired our science committee. His co-chair was Dave Hamburg, a Stanford psychology professor who specialized in great ape studies or primatology. Most leading scientists in either field were members or regular advisors. They recommended grants, and we trustees funded them. We took a venture capital role, usually making grants of a few thousand dollars to promising new prospects rather than bigger amounts to steady-state projects already proved. Those proved ones included Jane Goodall’s chimp studies at Gombe or Richard Leakey’s digs at Lake Turkana. National Geographic, or the Wenner Gren or World Wildlife or National Science Foundations tended to fund the known winners. We're a lot bigger now. I am one of the few living links to those great people and times. We've evolved with the science. But we stick to the venture capital role. That always left time to organize lectures and symposia. A few of us including Nancy Pelosi, long before she tried politics, put together an all-star two-day symposium at the Palace of Fine Arts in the San Francisco Marina district in 1973. Tickets sold out, and hundreds watched on screens set up in the lobby. Julian Huxley regretted, but sent his good wishes on tape. The octogenarian Raymond Dart recounted his discovery of australopithecus africanus at Taung cave near Johannesburg in 1924. Louis Leakey had died the year before, but his equally legendary widow Mary updated us on the digs at Olduvai. Dick Hay filled us in on the geology there. Jane Goodall gave the news from Gombe. Dave Hamburg reported on the new Chapter 1: Recollections 1/06/16 15 HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_010931