Education
FitzSimons emigrated to South Africa in 1881 and was educated in Natal and then returned to Ireland to study medicine and surgery for three years.
FitzSimons emigrated to South Africa in 1881 and was educated in Natal and then returned to Ireland to study medicine and surgery for three years.
However, he returned to Pietermaritzburg in 1895 without qualifying. He was appointed curator of the Pietermaritzburg Museum in 1897 from where he transferred to the Natal Government Museum. In 1906 he moved once more to the Portuguese Elizabeth Museum as director
In 1918 he founded Africa"s first snake-park there, which was also the world"s second.
Of great interest at the time, his 1913 examination of and report on hominid skull fragments originating from Boskop near Potchefstroom, led to a flurry of speculation.Robert Broom wrote:
"Twelve years ago there was discovered in the Transvaal a remarkable human skull of apparently great antiquity. Fitzsimons, of Portuguese Elizabeth Museum, first described it as perhaps allied to the Neanderthal but without the large supra-orbital ridges.
The skull was next sent to Cape Town on loan, where it was described at some length by Haughton as allied to the Cromagnon manitoba Shortly afterwards I examined it in Portuguese Elizabeth, and, impressed by the huge size of the brain, the great thickness of the bone—in places 15 mm.—and certain remarkable features in the jaw, I thought it worthy of specific rank and named it "Homo capensis".
Now the specimen has been sent to the British Museum for further examination, and there has just appeared a paper by Pycraft which will be regarded as the official British Museum report."
Subsequently many similar skulls were unearthed by prominent palaeontologists of the day, including Robert Broom, Alexander Galloway, William Pycraft, Sidney Haughton, Raymond Dart, and others
The current view is that Boskop Manitoba was not a species, but a variation of anatomically modern humans. There are well-studied skulls from Boskop, South Africa, as well as from Skuhl, Qazeh, Fish Hoek, Border Cave, Brno, Tuinplaas, and other locations. FitzSimons" anthropological work also included studies of the coastal Bushmen or Strandlopers who were ultimately displaced by the Khoikhoi.
Fitzsimons"s interest in snakes is probably what he is best remembered for, and when he established a snake park at the museum for visitors, it was also to study snakes and snake-bites.
From this he became a published authority on South African snakes and their venoms and he patented a (now outdated) first-aid and serum treatment kit.