Bob Leakey

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Bob Leakey
Born	Robert Dove Leakey (1914-06-23)23 June 1914 Kiganjo, Kenya
Died	22 April 2013(2013-04-22) (aged 98)
Known for	Cave exploration, discovery/mapping of Mossdale Cave
Spouse	Barbara Fidoe

Robert Dove Leakey (23 June 1914 – 22 April 2013) was a British inventor, potholer and cave diver. He has been described as the "Edmund Hillary of potholing". He stood for Parliament in 2005 and 2010; he is thought to be the oldest candidate ever in a UK general election, shortly before his 96th birthday in May 2010.

Early life and family

Leakey was born in Kenya, where his father (Arundell) Gray Leakey was a farmer. Through his great-grandfather James Shirley Leakey, one of the eleven children of the portrait painter James Leakey, he is related to the missionary Rev Henry Leakey, and so to his son and grandson the paleoanthropologists Louis Leakey and Richard Leakey.

His older brother Nigel Leakey was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross in 1945, for his actions in Ethiopia in 1941. Another relative Joshua Leakey was awarded the Victoria Cross in 2015, for his actions in Afghanistan in 2013. His younger brother Rea Leakey survived service in the Second World War, and became a major-general in the British Army. His sister Agnes Leakey (later Agnes Hofmeyr) worked for reconciliation in Kenya.

He was educated in Kenya and then at Weymouth College. He then studied at the Chelsea College of Aeronautical Engineering, and worked for Vickers.

Second World War

While working as an aircraft designer in the Second World War, a reserved occupation, he discovered the 9 kilometres (5.6 mi) long Mossdale Caverns north of Grassington in the Yorkshire Dales.^[1]

He was called up for military service in 1942, the year after his brother Nigel was killed in action, and served as a paratrooper in India and Burma. He failed in two attempts to become the first person to climb the 6,316 metres (20,722 ft) Bandarpunch in the Himalayas.

Later life

After the war, Leakey lived in Settle and then Giggleswick in North Yorkshire. He married his wife Barbara (née Fidoe) in 1947. They had two sons and two daughters.

He became an inventor, securing 20 patents, including one for a folding lobster pot. He also sold fishing equipment, including so-called "Leakey boats". He also served as a magistrate in Settle, and as a governor at Bentham Grammar School.

He continued caving and potholing into the 1960s, and he explored Bar Pot and Disappointment Pot in the Gaping Gill cave system. He was noted for his ability to survive with little or no protective gear, occasionally diving naked into sumps deep underground, and has been described as "seemingly oblivious to the cold".

Political career

Leakey wrote many letters of complaint to different politicians and government departments, but denied that he was eccentric. He founded a political party, the Virtue Currency Cognitive Appraisal Party. He stood as a candidate in local council elections, and stood for Parliament in Skipton and Ripon in the 2005 and 2010 UK general elections. As a result, he is thought to be the oldest candidate ever in a UK general election.

He was survived by his wife, three of his four children, seven grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

Leakey family tree

James Leakey
(1775–1865)^[i]

Eliza Hubbard Woolmer
(1793–1855)^[ii]

James Shirley Leakey
(1824–1871) ^{[citation needed]}

Caroline Woolmer Leakey
(1827–1881)^[ii]

9 others^[ii]

Rev. Arundell Leakey
(1853–1924)

Rev. Harry Leakey
(1868–1940)

Elizabeth Laing
(1873–1925)^[iii]^[iv]

Arundell Gray Arundell Leakey
(1885–1954)^[iii]^[iv]

5 others

Henrietta Wilfrida Avern
(1902–1993)

Louis Seymour Bazett Leakey^[iv]
(1903–1972)

Mary Douglas Nicol
(1913–1996)

3 others

Nigel Gray Leakey
(1913–1941)^[iii]^[iv]

Robert Dove Leakey
(1914–2013)

Maj. Gen. Arundell Rea Leakey
(1915–1999)

Agnes Florence Leakey
(1917–2006)^[iv]

Colin Louis Avern Leakey
(1933–2018)

Meave Epps
(b. 1942)

Richard Erskine Frere Leakey
(1944–2022)

Margaret Cropper

Jonathan Harry Erskine Leakey
(1940–2021)

Philip Leakey
(b. 1949)

Lt. Gen. Arundell David Leakey
(b. 1952)

Louise Leakey
(b. 1972)

Emmanuel,
Prince de Mérode
(b. 1970)

Notes:

^ O'Donoghue, F. M.; Remington, V. (revised) (2004). "Leakey, James (1775–1865), miniature painter". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/16244. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
^ ^a ^b ^c "Eliza Hubbard Woolmer, wife of James Leakey". Artsandculture.google.com. Archived from the original on 2022-04-06. Retrieved 6 April 2022. Elizabeth Hubbard Woolmer was born on 20 December 1793. ... On 28 August 1815 she married the artist James Leakey (1775-1865) at St. Sidwell's Church, Exeter (2). They had eleven children. ... Caroline Woolmer Leakey (1827-1881)
^ ^a ^b ^c "Serjeant Nigel Gray Leakey | War Casualty Details". cwgc.org. Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Archived from the original on 2022-04-08. Retrieved 8 April 2022. NIGEL GRAY LEAKEY ... Died 19 May 1941 Age 28 years old ... Son of Arundell Gray A. and Elizabeth Leakey, of Kiganjo, Kenya.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e Lean, Mary (26 January 2007). "Agnes Hofmeyr, Worker for reconciliation in Africa". The Independent. Archived from the original on 2012-09-22. Retrieved 8 April 2022. Agnes Leakey, worker for reconciliation: born Limuru, Kenya 8 May 1917; married 1946 Bremer Hofmeyr (died 1993; one son, and one son deceased); died Johannesburg 1 December 2006. ... Agnes Leakey was born in Limuru, Kenya, in 1917, the youngest child of Gray Leakey, cousin of the anthropologist Louis Leakey, and his first wife, Elizabeth. ... in 1926, when Elizabeth died ... She married a South African colleague, Bremer Hofmeyr, in 1946. ... in ... 1954 ... Mau Mau fighters ... attacked her father's farm, killed her stepmother and abducted her father. ... [he was] buried alive, in a shallow grave on Mount Kenya. ... she lost her eldest brother, Nigel Leakey, in 1941 at Colito, where he won the Victoria Cross. Three years after Bremer's death, in 1993, their elder son, Murray, was killed in a car accident in Johannesburg.