The Origin Story of Origin Stories – 10th Anniversary

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Meredith Johnson: This is Origin
Stories, the Leakey Foundation podcast.

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I’m Meredith Johnson, and I’ve
been saying this to you about

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once a month for a full decade.

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It’s our 10th anniversary, and
today on the show I’ll tell you

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the origin story of origin stories.

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We’ll go behind the scenes, revisit
some milestone episodes, and I’ll

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update you on some exciting developments
in a story that’s close to my heart.

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Before we get into it, I
need to ask for your support.

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In this moment when federal
research and education budgets

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are being slashed, you can keep
human origin science going strong.

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Every donation will be matched,
so your impact will be doubled.

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In celebration of 10 years of origin
stories, please consider giving $10

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a month to help support this show and
the critical research we talk about.

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We’re the only 100% donor
supported nonprofit dedicated to

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funding human origins research.

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And right now we need all
the support we can get.

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Go to Leakey foundation.org/origin stories
or click the link in your show notes.

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Your gift will fund this show and directly
support the science we talk about.

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Now, here’s our story.

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I remember the exact moment.

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The idea for this show was born.

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It was in 2013, just a few months
after I’d started my new dream

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job at the Leakey Foundation.

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I was organizing school visits to bring
scientists into classrooms and planning

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lectures at museums across the country.

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It was exciting and more
than a little overwhelming.

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For the first time in my life, I
was spending time with scientists

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and learning who they were
and why they do what they do.

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So it’s May of 2013, and I’m at
one of my first public lectures,

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a symposium on Paleolithic Art
at the Field Museum in Chicago.

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I was there with one of our speakers,
the foremost French expert on

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paleolithic art, Jean Clottes.

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Jean Clottes: You see in, in this
big chamber, which is really huge.

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It’s the biggest in the cave.

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There are no paint tags
except right at the end.

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Meredith Johnson: I’d seen him in Werner
Herzog’s, cave of Forgotten Dreams.

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Werner Herzog: The paintings looked
so fresh that there were initial

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doubts about their authenticity, but
never imagined I’d ever meet him.

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Meredith Johnson: I remember
standing at the back of the

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auditorium with Don Dana, the then
president of the Leakey Foundation.

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Don and I are watching everyone
shuffle into the auditorium.

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The Leakey Foundation’s been doing public
lectures since its beginning in 1968.

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But the appetite for science
lectures in 2013 wasn’t the same as

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it was in the 1960s, and a lecture
hall can only hold so many people.

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If you weren’t there, you’d never hear it.

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I watched Don watching people take their
seats, and he turned to me and he said,

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we’ve got to try something different
to get this science to more people.

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In that moment I thought.

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The Leakey Foundation
should have a podcast

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I was in love with, what was then a
pretty new medium of narrative podcasts.

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I spent my commuting hours on the 1 0
1 listening to shows like this American

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Life, snap Judgment, love, and Radio.

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The design show, 99% Invisible, and a San
Francisco history show called Sparkletack.

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I thought there should be something like
99% invisible, but for human evolution.

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I pitched the idea to our
executive director, Sharal Camisa

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Smith, and we wrote a proposal.

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In 2014, Don Dana gave us
funding for six pilot episodes.

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So I started to hunt for someone who could
make the show, and that’s when Sharal said

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she thought I should be the one to do it.

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The problem was I didn’t know how,
so I got to work learning everything

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I could about audio storytelling.

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I built myself a crash course in
science writing, audio production,

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sound design, interviewing.

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I got a microphone and a digital recorder
and I took them with me everywhere.

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SFX: Okay, test, test, test, testing.

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No, that’s the problem.

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Okay,

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Meredith Johnson: recording
walks in the forest.

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SFX: I see a squirrel looking right at me.

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Meredith Johnson: Sounds around the house.

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SFX: What do you have to say kitty?

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Meredith Johnson: And
my friends at parties.

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SFX: Toast.

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Yeah, let’s

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do the toast.

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Meredith Johnson: I did some awkward
first interviews with scientists.

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Okay.

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I’m gonna check the levels.

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Can you tell me what you
had for breakfast today?

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scientist: I had a Star Wars
low carb, death star waffle

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Meredith Johnson: and eventually
after hundreds of hours of work

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and a lot of help from a lot of
people, we had our first episode.

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A 13 minute story from a
paleoanthropologist named

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Carol Ward about how and why
humans walk around on two feet.

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It was released in the spring of 2015, and
I loved the way Carol told the story of

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how she first fell in love with her field.

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Carol Ward: I. I remember walking in
and my professor, who’s a man named

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Dr. Milford Wolpoff who was one of the
leaders in the field, he said, I’m a

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paleoanthropologist, and he wrote that
word on the board and he turned to us

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and he said, the Earth is a disc riding
on the back of the giant turtle, and

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the stars are painted in the canopy
high above us and he just looked at us

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and we argued about it for two days.

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No, it’s a sphere.

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We know that.

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And he would say, how do you know?

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How do you know?

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And it took me about 20 years or so to
realize he was talking about how science

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works and testing hypotheses and trying
to falsify ideas and how it all worked.

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How can you learn things?

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How do we know and how do we
know about human evolution?

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I got excited in the process of
learning as much as I got excited

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about the actual fossils themselves.

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Then I was hooked

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Meredith Johnson: listening back to this
first part of this very first episode.

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I feel excited because what Carol said
here is exactly the purpose of this show.

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To explore together how science works
and to learn how we know what we

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know about our shared human story.

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And to me, another core mission of
Origin Stories is to connect you

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with scientists so you can hear
their stories and the curiosity and

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questions behind their research.

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To show the human side of science and
make it personal because after all,

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the science is about us as humans.

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Carol was the perfect person for
our first episode because she’s a

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natural storyteller and teacher.

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She’s great at explaining things,
and her work was looking at one of

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the fundamental questions about what
makes us human, which I thought was

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a great starting point for the show.

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Carol Ward: Darwin, pretty
good evolutionary thinker.

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Thought that we stood up right on two feet
to free our hands from making and using

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tools, and that’s why we had big brains.

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Well, that was a pretty good idea, but the
fossil record shows us that our ancestors

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stood up right on two feet, maybe as
early as four or 6 million years ago.

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We didn’t probably start using tools
regularly or stone tools until around

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3 million years ago, or even more
recently, and our brains didn’t get

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very big until 2 million years ago.

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So knowing that standing upright
set the stage for all of these

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things that happened later.

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Means that we can start understanding
how it happened and then asking

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the important and interesting
questions, which is why it happened.

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Meredith Johnson: I said earlier, this
story took a really long time and a lot

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of help to make, and it did about a year
from recording the interview to actually

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getting the podcast up and published.

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This was the first piece I made
as a producer and sound designer

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with Audrey Quinn as story editor.

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This piece was also a first for
Audrey in her career move from

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reporting and producing to editing.

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Now, 10 years later, she has a
Pulitzer Prize for her editorial work.

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She teaches audio journalism at NYU,
and she’s still the editor for our show.

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A journalist named Lisa Morehouse also
played a major role in this episode.

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She came with me to interview Carol
to help manage the recording so I

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could focus on asking questions.

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Without worrying if I forgot
to turn the recorder on.

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One of my favorite moments in the
story came from a question Lisa asked.

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It’s one of the surprising
kind of moments that make this

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show so much fun to produce.

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Here’s that question and Carol’s answer.

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Lisa Morehouse: My question really,
I’m just avoiding getting to my

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slightly embarrassing question, which
is I feel like we, this term knuckle

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dragger is out there in the world.

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Carol Ward: Oh, sure.

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Lisa Morehouse: Does this mean that
there weren’t actually knuckle draggers?

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Carol Ward: Oh, this is a great question.

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This is what the whole lecture
gonna be at seven o’clock.

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Um.

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Well, the question people always
ask about human evolution is, why

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did we stand up from all fours?

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And if you watch a chimpanzee or a gorilla
moving across the ground, you’ll see them

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walking on their feet, but also on the
knuckles of their hands because their

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hands are so big and long and hooked, and
their arms are so big and their backs are

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so stiff they can’t really walk upright
because they’re so specialized for being

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able to hang below branches to get.

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To the fruits at the ends
of the branches of trees.

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If we look back at the fossil record
and dial back the clock earlier than

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earliest hominids, so around maybe nine,
10 million years ago, what we see is the

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fossil apes that seemed to be closely
related to what our ancestors might have

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been, certainly hung below branches.

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They held themselves upright in the trees
and they climbed and they swung below

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branches, but they weren’t as specialized
anatomically as chimpanzees and gorillas.

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And animals will move how they move.

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If they were upright in the trees,
they’ll tend to be upright on the ground.

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So probably these animals just also
just stayed upright and moved on

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the ground, whereas our ancestors
just never dropped down all fours.

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So I think the right question to be
asking now is not why did we stand up

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from all fours, but why did we never
drop down on all fours to begin with?

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Yeah.

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How about that?

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Huh?

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That’s my new schtick.

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The next story I wanna share is from
an early episode called Ancestor.

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It was about a discovery that made
headlines around the world, but more

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importantly, this story was about
the extraordinary person behind it.

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Isaiah Nengo, a primate
paleontologist from Kenya.

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Whose impact on the world
extends far beyond his research.

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The story starts at the end of a long,
frustrating day in the Turkana Basin.

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Isaiah Nengo team had been searching
for weeks at their field site,

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a place called Napudet, and they
hadn’t really found anything.

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Isaiah Nengo: Nothing.

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We didn’t find a single thing, and so
it’s time to go back to the camp and

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everybody’s kind of in a foul mood.

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One of the field assistants, Johnny
Ekusi, uh, pulls out a tobacco

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to roll a tobacco cigarette.

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So we chase him and we say, Hey man,
you’re gonna kill us without smoke.

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Go and smoke somewhere
else far away from us.

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So he walks up, uh, ahead of us
about maybe, you know, a couple

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hundred yards, and then we see him,
uh, walking around the same spot.

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We talk to each other, say, well,
what did you find something?

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Why does he keep going around
the same, in the same spot?

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So we pick up pace.

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As we get closer, we yell at him,
John, Hey, did you find something?

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And he goes, oh yeah, I
think I found something.

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We ask, what is it?

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He says, oh, I think it’s
the knee of an elephant.

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So we, we go and, Cyprian Nyete
the supervisor pulls out a

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brush, he brushes the, the top.

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And instantly we knew.

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It was a primate skull, and we,
we started shouting and screaming

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and, and jumping up and down.

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Meredith Johnson: What
they’d found was incredible.

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A 13 million year old fossil skull
of a baby ape, they nicknamed Alesi.

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It was tiny, beautiful,
and nearly complete.

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The oldest and most well-preserved
fossil ape skull yet found.

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And it showed what the face of
the last common ancestor of apes

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and humans would’ve looked like.

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I first learned about Alesi
during one of Isaiah’s visits

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to the Leakey Foundation office.

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He was teaching at a community college
not too far away, so he’d sometimes

00:12:37.275 –> 00:12:40.814
come to have lunch with us, sharing
stories about what he’d been up to.

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He told us about the fossil
they’d found in Napudet.

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He said it would soon be
published in the Journal Nature.

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And when he asked if I wanted
to help publicize the discovery,

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I jumped at the chance.

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By then, I’d moved from planning
lectures to doing communications

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work and collaborating with Isaiah on
sharing the Alesi story was one of the

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most exciting projects I’d worked on.

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As we worked together, I learned about
him and his story, and we became friends.

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Isaiah Nengo died suddenly in
January, 2022 after a short illness.

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His passing was a great loss
to everyone who knew him and

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to the scientific community.

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He was here for too short a
time, but he left a legacy that’s

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continuing to change people’s lives.

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Isaiah Nengo grew up in Nairobi, and
he was first introduced to the idea of

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evolution during a high school field trip.

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To hear Richard Leakey speak at
the National Museums of Kenya.

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Isaiah Nengo: We matched
into this auditorium.

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There were several high schools.

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It was packed capacity.

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And um, then this tall white gentleman
draws in and introduces himself

00:13:49.215 –> 00:13:55.875
as Richard Leakey, and he gave us
a talk on plate tectonics, which

00:13:55.875 –> 00:13:58.065
was still a brand new hypothesis.

00:13:58.665 –> 00:14:02.685
And he talked about evolution,
and I was just fascinated.

00:14:02.955 –> 00:14:06.855
It was just something that resonated,
the stories that he was telling, and I

00:14:07.305 –> 00:14:11.385
began to take an interest in evolution in
general, and I thought this makes sense.

00:14:11.955 –> 00:14:14.835
Meredith Johnson: That fascination stayed
with him through high school where he

00:14:14.835 –> 00:14:17.505
studied chemistry, biology, and physics.

00:14:18.015 –> 00:14:22.005
He went on to college and after graduating
with a degree in zoology from the

00:14:22.005 –> 00:14:26.715
University of Nairobi, Isaiah went to
Richard and Maeve Leakey asking for a

00:14:26.715 –> 00:14:28.665
job at the National Museums of Kenya.

00:14:29.415 –> 00:14:33.165
When they turned him down, he
volunteered and Maeve gave him the

00:14:33.165 –> 00:14:37.875
task of curating and organizing a
fossil collection of mammals from a

00:14:37.875 –> 00:14:42.315
time period called the Miocene, which
stretched from around 23 million years

00:14:42.315 –> 00:14:44.385
ago to about 5 million years ago.

00:14:45.465 –> 00:14:47.385
Isaiah Nengo: I volunteered
for three months.

00:14:47.390 –> 00:14:50.145
I was the first person in, I
was the last person out, and

00:14:50.145 –> 00:14:52.395
I, I, I just had so much fun.

00:14:52.395 –> 00:14:53.665
It was, it was the Miocene.

00:14:53.685 –> 00:15:00.074
She introduced me to the Miocene and she
turned me loose in the Miocene collection.

00:15:00.735 –> 00:15:06.975
So I went through every single
one of the Miocene mammals in

00:15:06.975 –> 00:15:09.015
the museum collection one by one.

00:15:09.645 –> 00:15:13.334
You know, I was just learning about
these things that were extinct, and I

00:15:13.334 –> 00:15:17.800
remember I would meet with my friends
after work and I would, I would regale

00:15:17.800 –> 00:15:22.605
them with tales about these wonderful
creatures of the past, and many of them

00:15:22.605 –> 00:15:24.314
didn’t understand why I was so excited.

00:15:24.944 –> 00:15:26.985
Meredith Johnson: Isaiah
had found his calling.

00:15:28.080 –> 00:15:32.400
He fell in love with the Miocene and he
wanted to make it the focus of his career.

00:15:32.820 –> 00:15:37.560
The Leakeys encouraged him to apply
to graduate school and get a PhD. He

00:15:37.560 –> 00:15:42.150
ended up at Harvard where he excelled,
earned a doctorate and formed questions

00:15:42.150 –> 00:15:43.890
that drove his later research.

00:15:44.730 –> 00:15:46.050
Here’s what he said in the episode.

00:15:46.620 –> 00:15:49.290
Isaiah Nengo: So the, the, the
key question has been, you know,

00:15:49.620 –> 00:15:51.330
what is man’s place in nature?

00:15:51.990 –> 00:15:52.860
It’s what we wanna know.

00:15:53.460 –> 00:15:55.410
So you cannot answer that
question without what.

00:15:55.515 –> 00:16:00.535
Without looking at the apes you cannot
answer the question of humans place

00:16:00.535 –> 00:16:03.435
in nature, just by looking at humans.

00:16:04.574 –> 00:16:10.405
So if we are looking for the missing
links or the ancestors that connect

00:16:10.425 –> 00:16:16.935
humans to chimpanzees, to the lesser
apes, the gibbons, all of that,

00:16:16.935 –> 00:16:19.665
are to be found in the Miocene.

00:16:20.835 –> 00:16:26.370
My interest in evolution is to
address these types of big questions.

00:16:28.200 –> 00:16:31.560
Meredith Johnson: After earning his
PhD, Isaiah became a professor and a

00:16:31.560 –> 00:16:35.730
research scientist with funding from
the Leakey Foundation and other sources.

00:16:36.450 –> 00:16:39.960
He led field work and he joined
Richard and me Leakey as a colleague

00:16:40.200 –> 00:16:43.950
and eventually associate director
at the Chana Basin Institute.

00:16:44.550 –> 00:16:48.275
In 2017, he became a professor
at Stony Brook University.

00:16:48.870 –> 00:16:53.459
Throughout his career, Isaiah was a
dedicated teacher and mentor to so

00:16:53.459 –> 00:16:55.439
many students and fellow researchers.

00:16:56.250 –> 00:17:00.060
He sought to open doorways, so
the other aspiring scientists

00:17:00.060 –> 00:17:04.230
might experience the same sense
of wonder he felt as a volunteer

00:17:04.230 –> 00:17:05.760
at the National Museums of Kenya.

00:17:05.810 –> 00:17:09.500
Not long after joining Stony Brook’s
faculty, Isaiah helped create

00:17:09.500 –> 00:17:14.270
Africa’s first master’s degree
program in human evolutionary biology.

00:17:14.540 –> 00:17:18.710
He designed the program specifically
to help build up a new generation

00:17:18.950 –> 00:17:20.839
of African scientific leaders.

00:17:21.244 –> 00:17:23.704
The impact was immediate and dramatic.

00:17:24.155 –> 00:17:27.454
The Leakey Foundation’s Baldwin
Fellowship program, which supports

00:17:27.454 –> 00:17:31.565
graduate students from places with
fewer resources for advanced education

00:17:31.565 –> 00:17:36.275
in human origins, had been giving six
to 10 scholarships a year since 1978.

00:17:37.145 –> 00:17:40.715
Because of Isaiah’s mentorship
and the program, he started

00:17:41.105 –> 00:17:43.145
that number more than doubled.

00:17:43.640 –> 00:17:48.860
Each year since Isaiah’s passing, we’ve
awarded on an average more than 20 Baldwin

00:17:48.860 –> 00:17:51.410
fellowships, many to Kenyan students.

00:17:51.410 –> 00:17:52.850
Isaiah directly mentored.

00:17:53.210 –> 00:17:57.500
Each of these scholars will ask their own
questions, make their own discoveries.

00:17:58.050 –> 00:17:59.840
And mentor their own students.

00:18:03.890 –> 00:18:09.800
Now to our last featured story and
a really exciting update in April,

00:18:09.800 –> 00:18:13.970
2020, during the early months of the
COVID Pandemic, we did a story about a

00:18:13.970 –> 00:18:18.200
community of indigenous people called
the Punan Batu, the last traditional

00:18:18.200 –> 00:18:20.090
hunter gatherer community in Borneo.

00:18:21.065 –> 00:18:25.175
I first learned about them in 2019
when the Leakey Foundation gave a grant

00:18:25.175 –> 00:18:27.125
to anthropologist, Stephen Lansing.

00:18:27.365 –> 00:18:30.995
Steve had been working with Indonesian
colleagues on the genetics and

00:18:30.995 –> 00:18:32.825
languages of the Indonesian people.

00:18:33.605 –> 00:18:37.355
They were working among other things
to figure out where the indigenous

00:18:37.355 –> 00:18:41.465
people of Indonesia’s ancestors
came from, because the people didn’t

00:18:41.465 –> 00:18:43.240
know and they wanted to find out.

00:18:44.225 –> 00:18:48.005
As they were doing some of this work and
hosting a medical clinic in a remote part

00:18:48.005 –> 00:18:52.505
of Borneo, Steve was approached by the
elected leader of a resettled community.

00:18:53.225 –> 00:18:56.735
The leader asked Steve if he wanted
to meet a group of people who

00:18:56.735 –> 00:19:00.815
were still living as mobile hunter
gatherers in caves in the forest.

00:19:01.685 –> 00:19:03.185
He quickly said, yes.

00:19:03.695 –> 00:19:06.905
They made arrangements, and a few
months later, they made the journey

00:19:06.905 –> 00:19:10.625
by boat and then on foot through
the forest to meet the pun, Batu.

00:19:11.705 –> 00:19:12.875
Here’s a bit of that story.

00:19:18.035 –> 00:19:20.555
Steve Lansing: We walk for a few
hours in the jungle, and then

00:19:20.555 –> 00:19:23.885
we come to an overhanging cave.

00:19:24.185 –> 00:19:29.075
It’s kind of a jagged limestone cave
in lowland forest, very dense forest,

00:19:29.465 –> 00:19:35.315
and there were some people sitting on
bamboo platforms underneath the overhang.

00:19:35.495 –> 00:19:38.915
So we came up and began to talk to them.

00:19:39.755 –> 00:19:45.305
There was a young mother there and
an older man, and then I realized

00:19:45.305 –> 00:19:50.015
that he was speaking Malay, which is
a language that I speak, so I asked.

00:19:51.260 –> 00:19:52.430
A couple of questions.

00:19:52.910 –> 00:19:54.890
Turned out they speak quite fluent Malay.

00:19:55.250 –> 00:20:00.320
So to my astonishment and delight, I
could carry on a conversation with Marni.

00:20:00.320 –> 00:20:01.160
I know her very well.

00:20:01.160 –> 00:20:02.870
Now, Marni and her daughter Nin.

00:20:07.520 –> 00:20:11.360
I asked about hunting and gathering
and is it true that, how do you know?

00:20:11.360 –> 00:20:13.790
How do you, what do you do with,
how do you support yourselves?

00:20:13.790 –> 00:20:14.420
How can you live?

00:20:15.170 –> 00:20:20.199
And Marni says, well,
men hunt, women gather

00:20:23.255 –> 00:20:25.145
This is right outta the
anthropology textbook.

00:20:25.970 –> 00:20:27.379
And we share the food.

00:20:27.379 –> 00:20:27.440
Wow.

00:20:28.460 –> 00:20:28.820
Really?

00:20:28.820 –> 00:20:31.940
They must be reading the anthropology
textbook to give that answer,

00:20:32.210 –> 00:20:33.350
but in fact, that’s the case.

00:20:33.350 –> 00:20:37.670
Anyway, so, so we started to talk and they
were very friendly and it turned out to be

00:20:41.595 –> 00:20:43.340
when they were, came to talk to me.

00:20:43.700 –> 00:20:45.470
So I can’t by the cave.

00:20:46.340 –> 00:20:48.980
And at night I heard singing.

00:20:50.855 –> 00:20:51.665
Happy singing.

00:20:51.814 –> 00:20:52.774
It’s kind of a duet.

00:20:53.225 –> 00:20:56.135
It went on for a long time and
it didn’t sound like any of the

00:20:56.135 –> 00:20:59.885
austronesian languages that I,
that I know that I recognize.

00:21:06.629 –> 00:21:08.945
So the next day I asked them.

00:21:10.580 –> 00:21:11.030
What is it?

00:21:11.030 –> 00:21:12.620
And they said, well,
that’s the song language.

00:21:13.370 –> 00:21:16.250
And I said, well, could
I record some of it?

00:21:16.280 –> 00:21:18.350
Could I record some of the,
you know, the video recorder?

00:21:19.160 –> 00:21:23.360
And they said, yes, but we have to be
lying down and we should be in the cave.

00:21:24.650 –> 00:21:25.580
It’s usually done at night.

00:21:25.580 –> 00:21:26.510
We need to be lying down.

00:21:26.930 –> 00:21:28.010
So we recorded that.

00:21:28.430 –> 00:21:30.110
We recorded the song language.

00:21:30.710 –> 00:21:31.070
Uh.

00:21:31.400 –> 00:21:35.240
And that turned out to be a very
interesting language, and I’ve

00:21:35.240 –> 00:21:40.040
been pursuing what that language
means, what it’s about since then.

00:21:46.235 –> 00:21:48.905
This is one of Steve’s
recordings of the song language.

00:21:49.475 –> 00:21:53.675
It’s sung by a young man named
Marut who sang it in a place the

00:21:53.675 –> 00:21:55.415
cave pun called The Great Cave.

00:21:56.645 –> 00:22:00.275
This is the first time this recording
has been shared publicly, so you are

00:22:00.275 –> 00:22:01.865
one of the first people to hear it.

00:22:09.005 –> 00:22:13.580
The singer tells of how he used to
be invincible, like a porcupine, but

00:22:13.580 –> 00:22:15.945
now he says it seems that I am weak.

00:22:16.835 –> 00:22:20.555
Yet, even though I may no longer have
the strength to travel far into distant

00:22:20.555 –> 00:22:23.105
places, I hope that will be my destiny.

00:22:26.435 –> 00:22:28.325
I asked for my journey to be successful.

00:22:34.085 –> 00:22:36.605
Meredith Johnson: This song
language turned out to be completely

00:22:36.605 –> 00:22:40.175
different than the language the
Punan Batu spoke during the daytime.

00:22:40.564 –> 00:22:44.945
Actually different than any known
language, and they had another amazing

00:22:44.945 –> 00:22:49.294
language using sticks and leaves to
share information and send messages

00:22:49.294 –> 00:22:51.274
over long distances in the forest.

00:22:51.784 –> 00:22:56.044
In the episode we dug deep into the Punan
Batu’s way of life, how they share with

00:22:56.044 –> 00:23:00.215
each other, their languages, and the
scientific work that came after Steve’s

00:23:00.215 –> 00:23:01.625
first meeting with the Punan Batu.

00:23:01.955 –> 00:23:05.044
This next clip introduces
what I wanna catch you up on.

00:23:05.570 –> 00:23:09.110
The Punan Batu had welcomed Steve
and the other scientists because

00:23:09.110 –> 00:23:11.510
they had an urgent need for help.

00:23:12.169 –> 00:23:16.940
The forest was being cut down for oil
palm plantations, and those plantations

00:23:16.970 –> 00:23:18.889
were coming closer and closer.

00:23:19.100 –> 00:23:22.100
They were worried that there would be
no future for them or their children.

00:23:22.790 –> 00:23:26.510
They wanted Steve and his colleagues to
get the word out about their situation

00:23:26.990 –> 00:23:30.440
and to help stop the destruction of
their forest before it was too late.

00:23:30.830 –> 00:23:33.139
Steve Lansing: Um, that’s what they want.

00:23:34.220 –> 00:23:36.710
And it’s not a lot, I mean,
it’s not a very large area.

00:23:36.830 –> 00:23:39.530
It’s maybe 50, 60 families,
something like that.

00:23:39.530 –> 00:23:40.610
So it’s not enormous.

00:23:41.210 –> 00:23:43.490
There’s a lot of Borneo, there
are plenty of oil palms elsewhere.

00:23:43.490 –> 00:23:43.850
We think.

00:23:43.880 –> 00:23:46.310
We think it’s very doable,
but it needs to be done.

00:23:46.310 –> 00:23:48.440
And the Punan have no
clue how it could be done.

00:23:49.070 –> 00:23:50.510
I mean, they need help to set that up.

00:23:50.750 –> 00:23:54.200
There are good, uh, NGOs in, in Indonesia.

00:23:54.890 –> 00:23:57.740
I think it’s, I think it’s just a
question of putting the pieces together.

00:24:00.050 –> 00:24:01.700
So they travel mostly.

00:24:01.820 –> 00:24:05.190
If they’re not on foot, then
they’re in little, um, dugout canoes

00:24:05.210 –> 00:24:06.290
that go up and down the river.

00:24:06.350 –> 00:24:10.220
And it would, it would be pretty
easy to make it possible for

00:24:10.220 –> 00:24:11.720
the kids to get some education.

00:24:11.960 –> 00:24:15.320
All this should be chosen by
the Punan, but step one is to

00:24:15.320 –> 00:24:16.430
give them the option, right?

00:24:16.430 –> 00:24:19.490
I mean, the first thing to do is to
create the opportunity so that they can

00:24:19.490 –> 00:24:25.005
make their case for, um, their forest
and preserving their way of life.

00:24:40.535 –> 00:24:41.725
Meredith Johnson: Steve
recorded this song.

00:24:42.465 –> 00:24:45.585
That’s a message from the Cave
Punan people to all who might help.

00:24:46.275 –> 00:24:49.125
It was sung by an elder,
well-respected member of the

00:24:49.125 –> 00:24:58.855
community by the name of Ogat,

00:24:58.930 –> 00:25:02.595
Steve Lansing: and he sang it in,
in the Great Cave, the cave that is

00:25:02.595 –> 00:25:03.825
sort of the origin cave for them.

00:25:04.515 –> 00:25:07.665
And his song, I can’t quote it
completely, but what he said

00:25:07.665 –> 00:25:10.270
is we, you’ve been coming and.

00:25:11.435 –> 00:25:12.695
We have spent much time with you.

00:25:12.695 –> 00:25:17.135
We’ve had many visits, and we hope
that you will be able to help us, that

00:25:17.135 –> 00:25:22.955
this will bear fruit, that you’ll be
able to help us, uh, retain our forest,

00:25:22.955 –> 00:25:24.695
get our forest, keep our forest.

00:25:40.715 –> 00:25:42.665
Otherwise, they say quite
simply, we don’t know.

00:25:43.655 –> 00:25:45.335
Um, our children could starve.

00:25:45.410 –> 00:25:48.380
I mean, they, they think their
fate is dire if they can’t fix it.

00:25:49.730 –> 00:25:52.580
Meredith Johnson: So after we recorded
our first interview for this story in

00:25:52.580 –> 00:25:57.080
2019, the Leakey Foundation’s executive
director, Cheryl Camisa Smith, and

00:25:57.080 –> 00:26:01.460
I stayed in touch with Steve and
before this episode even came out,

00:26:01.880 –> 00:26:05.630
he connected us with the Asia Pacific
Branch of the Nature Conservancy,

00:26:05.990 –> 00:26:09.560
who let us know how the Leakey
Foundation and our donors could help.

00:26:10.020 –> 00:26:13.679
By raising money for the additional
scientific research needed to

00:26:13.679 –> 00:26:17.669
make the case for the Punan Batu’s
rights to their land, which we did.

00:26:18.120 –> 00:26:22.200
And through the work of the Punan Batu,
the scientists, the Nature Conservancy,

00:26:22.350 –> 00:26:27.210
a local environmental organization called
YKAN, leaders in the Indonesian government

00:26:27.389 –> 00:26:31.830
and others the Punan Batu, are now on
the cusp of having full protections

00:26:32.070 –> 00:26:36.090
and acknowledgement as a traditional
community with rights to their lands.

00:26:36.980 –> 00:26:40.760
Well, I’m just really, really happy
to see you again and to have a chance

00:26:40.760 –> 00:26:42.590
to talk ’cause it’s been a while.

00:26:42.740 –> 00:26:43.400
Steve Lansing: Likewise.

00:26:43.970 –> 00:26:44.870
Likewise, Meredith.

00:26:45.050 –> 00:26:48.230
Meredith Johnson: I met with Steve over
Zoom from his home in Hawaii to catch

00:26:48.230 –> 00:26:52.550
up on what’s happened with the Punan
Batu since this story aired in 2020,

00:26:52.940 –> 00:26:54.690
Steve Lansing: good things
happened for the Punan

00:26:54.710 –> 00:26:55.700
Thanks to this.

00:26:55.790 –> 00:26:56.480
It’s true.

00:26:56.840 –> 00:26:57.200
Yeah.

00:26:57.260 –> 00:27:03.034
Good things that happen simply by bringing
attention to the Punan Thanks to you.

00:27:03.245 –> 00:27:09.965
Thanks to Leakey we were able to get some
international attention and as a result,

00:27:09.965 –> 00:27:16.294
Eddie Game, the Head for Science for
the Nature Conservancy for Asia Pacific.

00:27:16.785 –> 00:27:20.895
Eddie became very interested and so
thanks to the help of Leakey Foundation,

00:27:20.895 –> 00:27:26.325
we organized some meetings, right,
some presentations to tell the story.

00:27:26.715 –> 00:27:29.355
Meredith Johnson: We collaborated
on a series of Zoom presentations

00:27:29.625 –> 00:27:33.615
with Steve and Eddie Game and The
Nature Conservancy to share the story

00:27:33.615 –> 00:27:35.955
internationally with donors eager to help.

00:27:36.075 –> 00:27:39.555
It was also important to raise
awareness within Indonesia, so

00:27:39.555 –> 00:27:42.255
Steve and his Indonesian colleagues
worked with a journalist.

00:27:42.560 –> 00:27:48.000
A science writer named Akhmed Ahreef
from Indonesia’s Main Newspaper Kompas.

00:27:48.230 –> 00:27:54.990
So Ahreef came several times with us
and wrote eloquently about the Punan.

00:27:55.250 –> 00:28:00.620
And those published in the Kompas
newspaper were very influential.

00:28:00.890 –> 00:28:03.980
And this quickly came
to the attention of the.

00:28:04.295 –> 00:28:08.735
Director General for Forestry
and Environment in Jakarta,

00:28:08.945 –> 00:28:10.985
the director general was a key ally.

00:28:11.555 –> 00:28:15.035
He was in charge of making government
recommendations for how forest

00:28:15.035 –> 00:28:17.255
lands in Borneo should be used.

00:28:17.795 –> 00:28:20.555
He could decide if the land rights
should be put up for auction for

00:28:20.555 –> 00:28:25.295
logging or palm oil plantations, or
he could recommend that there was

00:28:25.295 –> 00:28:29.765
a case to be made that these lands
are ancestral lands for people.

00:28:30.050 –> 00:28:30.980
For the Punan Batu.

00:28:31.280 –> 00:28:35.000
But that would require evidence
exactly the kind of evidence Steve and

00:28:35.000 –> 00:28:36.320
his colleagues had been collecting.

00:28:36.770 –> 00:28:40.220
One line of evidence was about how
the Punan Batu used the forest.

00:28:40.970 –> 00:28:43.940
Could they prove they were
nomadic mobile hunter gatherers?

00:28:44.180 –> 00:28:46.730
And what exactly was the
range of their territory?

00:28:47.510 –> 00:28:52.825
Steve Lansing: We easily persuaded
the pun on to wear GPS uh, receivers.

00:28:54.020 –> 00:28:54.860
On little belts.

00:28:54.860 –> 00:28:58.130
My wife created some cloth
belts that were easy to wear.

00:28:58.670 –> 00:29:00.980
So they go around the forest
and they eventually bring them

00:29:00.980 –> 00:29:05.180
back, change the batteries, and
we’d find out are they nomads?

00:29:05.990 –> 00:29:07.670
This is all published information now.

00:29:07.730 –> 00:29:09.920
They are, they are indeed nomadic people.

00:29:10.490 –> 00:29:11.870
Uh, there’s no doubt about it.

00:29:11.960 –> 00:29:16.700
It varies from time to time, but they
move roughly four or five kilometers

00:29:16.910 –> 00:29:19.010
per week average, constantly moving.

00:29:20.060 –> 00:29:23.000
Meredith Johnson: Next, and very
importantly, the researchers had to

00:29:23.000 –> 00:29:27.650
prove that the Punan Batu were truly
indigenous people, not descendants

00:29:27.650 –> 00:29:31.640
of Indonesian farmers who had taken
up a hunting and gathering lifestyle.

00:29:32.210 –> 00:29:33.860
Steve Lansing: Are they
really original inhabitants?

00:29:33.860 –> 00:29:35.720
What’s this got to do with
the genetic history, the

00:29:35.720 –> 00:29:37.160
population history of Indonesia?

00:29:37.370 –> 00:29:42.050
We had the genetic information showing
that they’re an isolated population

00:29:42.140 –> 00:29:43.850
and have been so for a very long time.

00:29:44.390 –> 00:29:45.170
They’re not.

00:29:45.544 –> 00:29:48.875
Uh, a mere subgroup of
the local ordinary people.

00:29:48.875 –> 00:29:51.665
They are a separate group with
long history, a very long history.

00:29:51.725 –> 00:29:55.175
It goes back at least 7,000 years.

00:29:56.210 –> 00:29:57.440
How much further than that?

00:29:57.440 –> 00:29:59.600
We don’t know, but we know
that it goes back a long way.

00:29:59.600 –> 00:30:03.560
So this gave the director general
the information that he needed

00:30:03.980 –> 00:30:09.260
to say the Punan Batu, the Cave
Punan, they are ancestral people

00:30:09.410 –> 00:30:10.910
and these lands are their lands.

00:30:10.910 –> 00:30:12.320
These are their ancestral lands.

00:30:12.530 –> 00:30:15.260
If it’s the ancestral home of these
people, then it’s part of our heritage.

00:30:15.260 –> 00:30:16.460
This is what he needed, right?

00:30:16.760 –> 00:30:17.510
This is what he needed.

00:30:17.900 –> 00:30:18.890
Things had changed overnight.

00:30:18.950 –> 00:30:22.460
All of a sudden the nan were
very much in the eye of the,

00:30:22.460 –> 00:30:23.810
of the government, so to our.

00:30:24.230 –> 00:30:25.790
Delight and surprise.

00:30:26.090 –> 00:30:31.520
The government came up with a beautiful
map showing their lens and saying, these

00:30:31.520 –> 00:30:38.480
are the, the lens of the, of the, uh,
ku means, uh, traditional community of

00:30:38.930 –> 00:30:40.880
traditional society, of the pun, batu.

00:30:41.180 –> 00:30:44.030
Meredith Johnson: All of a sudden
the pun, batu had a map and the

00:30:44.030 –> 00:30:48.320
map showed them in their lands, and
it showed their lands bordered by

00:30:48.320 –> 00:30:50.360
logging and palm oil concessions.

00:30:50.360 –> 00:30:51.275
Steve Lansing: So what happens then?

00:30:51.625 –> 00:30:56.335
There’s a lot of land in Borneo
and, um, the Nature Conservancy

00:30:56.335 –> 00:30:57.385
was taking an interest.

00:30:57.415 –> 00:30:59.304
The Director general
was taking an interest.

00:30:59.335 –> 00:31:00.385
We were taking an interest.

00:31:00.564 –> 00:31:03.264
This is probably not a good
place to continue logging.

00:31:03.985 –> 00:31:04.855
So that happened.

00:31:05.395 –> 00:31:06.145
That happened.

00:31:06.294 –> 00:31:08.335
So that’s where, that’s
where we are today.

00:31:08.754 –> 00:31:12.235
There’s no immediate threat of more
logging and oil palm development

00:31:12.235 –> 00:31:16.675
in their lens, but still from that
to actually getting their lens.

00:31:17.540 –> 00:31:22.460
In their name that, that, that’s the step
we keep hoping that is about to happen,

00:31:22.970 –> 00:31:30.200
and surely it will so, so grateful to
The Leakey Foundation for supporting us.

00:31:30.230 –> 00:31:33.050
Without your support, we probably
couldn’t have done this research.

00:31:33.710 –> 00:31:37.370
Meredith Johnson: Now the Punan Batu
are even closer to full land rights.

00:31:37.760 –> 00:31:42.140
Just a few days ago, Steve emailed me
with the exciting news at the Indonesian

00:31:42.170 –> 00:31:47.659
Ministry of Forestry is sending a formal
verification team to visit the Punan Batu

00:31:47.659 –> 00:31:53.000
this summer, the final step in validating
their claims to their ancestral forest.

00:31:54.605 –> 00:31:58.475
Thank you so much for being part
of all of these stories, and

00:31:58.475 –> 00:32:01.865
thank you for listening, sharing,
reviewing, and supporting this show.

00:32:02.075 –> 00:32:06.755
It’s been a joy and an honor to make
Origin Stories for the past 10 years.

00:32:06.785 –> 00:32:11.105
We have so many more stories to explore
together and I’m just so grateful.

00:32:11.405 –> 00:32:14.345
I wanna shout out the many people
who’ve helped make this show

00:32:14.375 –> 00:32:15.705
what it is.

00:32:15.725 –> 00:32:19.835
Thanks to all our donors and sponsors,
thanks to the amazing Origin Stories

00:32:19.865 –> 00:32:25.145
team Ray Pang and Audrey Quinn, and the
many producers and creative contributors

00:32:25.145 –> 00:32:26.795
to this podcast over the years.

00:32:27.215 –> 00:32:31.055
Thanks to Sharal Camisa Smith and all of
my colleagues at the Leakey Foundation.

00:32:31.655 –> 00:32:33.455
Thanks to our president, Jeanne Newman.

00:32:33.935 –> 00:32:37.625
Thanks to our Board of Directors
and Science Advisors, and thanks to

00:32:37.715 –> 00:32:41.045
all the researchers who’ve shared
their stories and their work.

00:32:41.510 –> 00:32:45.050
As a storyteller, I appreciate
the connecting thread here with

00:32:45.050 –> 00:32:48.490
our generous 10th anniversary
episode sponsor, Don Dana.

00:32:49.610 –> 00:32:52.820
Thank you, Don, for your
leadership, vision and support.

00:32:53.330 –> 00:32:57.500
You’ve literally made this show possible
and through it you’ve shared science with

00:32:57.500 –> 00:32:59.450
millions of listeners around the world.

00:32:59.855 –> 00:33:03.665
Thank you for everything including
sponsoring today’s episode.

00:33:04.625 –> 00:33:08.765
In addition to Don, this episode was made
possible thanks to our generous listener

00:33:08.765 –> 00:33:13.565
supporters, as well as Jeanne Newman, the
Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation, and the

00:33:13.565 –> 00:33:15.695
Joan and Arnold Travis Education Fund.

00:33:16.205 –> 00:33:19.295
We’ll be back next month
with another new episode.

00:33:19.805 –> 00:33:21.755
As always, thanks for listening.