Ralph Solecki

Ralph Stefan Solecki (October 15, 1917 – March 20, 2019) was an American archaeologist. Solecki was born in Brooklyn, New York in October 1917, the son of Polish immigrants – Mary (nee Tarnowska), a homemaker, and Casimir, an insurance salesman. From 1959 to 1988, he was a member of the faculty at Columbia University. His best-known excavations were at the Neanderthal site at Shanidar Cave, in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. His publications include early works on aerial photography and photo-interpretation as well as two volumes on Shanidar (1971, 1972).

He was married to fellow archaeologist Rose Solecki, and they were the parents of American geographer William Solecki and UNHCR official John Solecki. In 2013, he was interviewed about his work by The Wall Street Journal. He died in March 2019, at the age of 101.