Elso Sterrenberg Barghoorn (1915, New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 -1984) was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 paleobotanist, called by his student Andrew Knoll, the present Fisher Professor of Natural History at Harvard, "the father of Pre-Cambrian palaeontology."

Barghoorn is best known for discovering in South Africa

South Africa

The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...

n rocks fossil

Fossil

Fossils are the preserved remains or traces of animals , plants, and other organisms from the remote past...

 evidence of life that is at least 3.4 billion years old. These fossils show that life was present on Earth comparatively soon after the Late Heavy Bombardment

Late Heavy Bombardment

The Late Heavy Bombardment is a period of time approximately 4.1 to 3.8 billion years ago during which a large number of impact craters are believed to have formed on the Moon, and by inference on Earth, Mercury, Venus, and Mars as well...

 (about 3.8 billion years ago).

After graduating from Miami University

Miami University

Miami University is a coeducational public research university located in Oxford, Ohio, United States. Founded in 1809, it is the 10th oldest public university in the United States and the second oldest university in Ohio, founded four years after Ohio University. In its 2012 edition, U.S...

, Barghoorn obtained his Ph.D. from Harvard in 1941. After teaching for five years at Amherst College

Amherst College

Amherst College is a private liberal arts college located in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States. Amherst is an exclusively undergraduate four-year institution and enrolled 1,744 students in the fall of 2009...

, he joined the Harvard faculty, becoming Fisher Professor of Natural History and Curator of the University's plant fossils collections. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

American Academy of Arts and Sciences

The American Academy of Arts and Sciences is an independent policy research center that conducts multidisciplinary studies of complex and emerging problems. The Academy’s elected members are leaders in the academic disciplines, the arts, business, and public affairs.James Bowdoin, John Adams, and...

 in 1950. In 1972 Barghoorn was awarded the Charles Doolittle Walcott Medal

Charles Doolittle Walcott Medal

Charles Doolittle Walcott Medal is an award presented by the National Academy of Sciences every five years to promote research and study in the fields of Precambrian and Cambrian life and history. The medal was established and endowed in 1934 by the Walcott Fund, a gift of Mary Vaux Walcott, in...

 from the National Academy of Sciences

United States National Academy of Sciences

The National Academy of Sciences is a corporation in the United States whose members serve pro bono as "advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine." As a national academy, new members of the organization are elected annually by current members, based on their distinguished and...

.

Barghoorn married Margaret Alden MaCleod in 1941, Teresa Joan LaCroix, and Dorothy Dellmer Osgood in 1964. The first two marriages ended in divorce.