Canadian Paleoanthropologist Davidson Black

Davidson Black was a Canadian paleoanthropologist that was born in Toronto, Canada , in 1884. Black began to have an interest in human evolution after he worked with the famous neuroanatomist Grafton Elliot Smith. He spent a fair amount of his time working in China, which he didn't mind, because he knew it was greatly thought that humans had originated in central Asia. Davidson Black was best known for his discovery of Sinanthropus pekinensis, now known as Homo erectus pekinensis.

As a child, Davidson Black would spend many summers by the Kawartha lakes. He enjoyed outdoor activities and easily became an expert at canoeing. Black would spend hours searching for gold along the Don River and also found enjoyment collecting fossils along the banks. When Black was a teenager, he would carry heavy loads of supplies long distances for the Hudson Bay Company, simply by using his canoe. He also became good friends with the First Nations people, in addition to learning one First Nations language.

Davidson Black gained a degree in medical science in 1906, then returned to school to study comparative anatomy, and began working as an anatomy instructor in 1909. He spent a half-year in 1914 working under neuroanatomist Grafton Elliot Smith during the point Smith was studying Piltdown Man. From that Black's interest in human evolution began.

Davidson Black joined the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps in 1917, where he treated injured Canadian Soldiers that returned from the war. However, in 1919 after being discharged from the Canadian Army Medical Corps, Black went to Peking, China, so that he could work at Peking Union Medical College. At first, Black was the Professor of Neurology and Embryology there, until he was promoted head of the anatomy department in 1924. He had wanted to go searching for human fossils in 1926, but the College encouraged him to concentrate on his teaching obligations and medical duties. Around the same time, Johan Gunnar Anderson, a man who had done excavations near Zhoukoudian, had attained information of his fossils examination in Sweden. He gave Black two human-like molars for further examination. Then that following year Black was given a large grant from the Rockefeller Foundation to began a large scale investigation in Zhoukoudian. Black was appointed the primary coordinator and he then appointed both Caucasian and Chinese scientists.

During the search in 1927, Black found a tooth that struck his eye, he put this tooth in a locket, which he placed around his neck.. This tooth belonged to what Black believed was a new species and genus that he later named Sinanthropus pekinensis. Many scientists were skeptical about Black defining a new genus based on such little material. Sinanthropus pekinensis was eventually categorized as a subspecies of Home erectus.

While Black was traveling in 1928 and trying to convince others of Sinanthropus