J. L. B.

James Leonard Brierley Smith was a South African ichthyologist, organic chemist, and university professor. He taught at Rhodes University and became internationally known in 1939 after identifying a captured coelacanth, a fish long believed to have vanished from the fossil record.

That discovery made him one of the most recognizable scientific figures associated with 20th-century marine biology. He later wrote about the find for a wide audience, helping turn a specialist breakthrough into a story that captured public imagination as well as scientific interest.

Although he was a scientist rather than a literary author in the usual sense, his name has remained widely known through his writing on natural history and the lasting impact of his work on fish research in South Africa.