Who is Dr. Leakey from Gorillas in the Mist and what is their importance? Gorillas-in-the-Mist English & Literature Dr. Leakey | Gorillas in the Mist

A researcher working in Africa when Fossey makes her first trip there, Dr. Leakey inadvertently plants the idea that Fossey might be able to return to African for a long-term study of gorilla's. Fossey says that Leakey is working on a dig and has discovered a giraffe fossil when she first meets him and she's delighted when he offers to let her go to the excavation site. There, she is running and falls, stumbling in a hole in the dig site. Leakey is fully aware that Fossey falls right onto the fossil and that the pain is so severe that she vomits into the site. Fossey says that Leakey and his wife tell her that she should give up her plans for the rest of her trip and go home, but she doesn't, choosing instead to continue her journey.