Leon Kelly plans to become an astronaut and to fly in space one day.
Right now, as the Duke junior completes his studies in earth and planetary sciences, he’s doing the next best things.
He’s studying Apollo 16 moon rocks with a focus on the lunar surface and preparing to showcase his research for NASA next spring.
And he’s begun climbing the world’s tallest mountains, the Seven Summits, including most recently Mount Aconcagua in Argentina. It ranks No. 2 in elevation of the seven and, at 22,837 feet, is the tallest peak in the Americas. He’s also climbed Kilimanjaro (19,341 feet) in Africa with plans to tackle Everest sometime in the next couple of years, hoping to become the youngest German to make the ascent.
Why choose this dangerous global hobby? Don’t his studies keep him busy enough?
“It’s the closest I can get to space, for now” says Kelly, 21, who grew up in a small town near Cologne, Germany.
Extreme sports and diverse interests run in his family. His American-born father, Joey Kelly, is a marathoner who held Ironman records, a prolific public speaker, and an author who once drove his family from Canada to the tip of South America, a journey that was chronicled for German television. His father is also well-known in Germany as a member of The Kelly Family, an intergenerational musical group that was not well-known in the U.S. but sold millions of records across Europe. Fun fact: Leon’s godfather is Till Lindemann, lead singer of the German industrial metal band Rammstein.
Kelly attended public schools and got the science bug in the Covid era. Prior to that, in early 2020, he had listened to a lecture by the German Space Agency that he said changed his life and pointed him toward space. During the pandemic, he had a lot of time on his hands, so he got a telescope, staying up late into the night to look at the stars. And dream.
“I’ve got a deep passion for space,” he said. “Nowadays, it’s everything I think of.”
His road to Duke was filled with early uncertainty. He applied to nine schools in the U.S., and Duke was the most high-profile one that accepted him. He was surprised – and emotionally unprepared for leaving Europe and the world he knew.
“I cried my eyes out on the plane coming over,” he says candidly. “I told myself I’d be back in a few months.”
But life in Durham welcomed him and his diverse interests. He joined the ROTC, which he says taught him discipline and leadership. And he’s now a resident assistant, a role that he loves. The transition, he adds, has been very smooth.
“I think what Duke stands for is passion, and I think that is the main reason Duke accepted me,” he says. “I tried to convey that in my application, on my essay.
“I was not the best student. I was good, yes. But I think I was the most passionate and I was the only one in my school to apply to colleges in the U.S.”
Most days, Kelly can be found spending hours on the stairclimbing machine at the gym and running, often carrying extra weight to simulate the bulk of his climbing gear. He has no fear of heights or extreme environments, noting that mountaineering is “50/50 mental and physical strength.”
“I have learned a lot about myself,” he said of climbing’s confidence-building. “There are so many things I couldn’t do, but I did them by pushing through my doubts. It’s the same for Duke. The same for touching moon rocks. It’s giving you so much motivation for your life. It makes lofty goals achievable.”
Kelly can also be found in his lab, working on those big goals under the tutelage of distinguished professor of soils and forest ecology Dan Richter, along with mentors Brian McAdoo, associate professor of earth and climate sciences, and geology professor Alex Glass. The three Duke educators have encouraged his ambitions and given him support for what he hopes is his future.
“I told professor McAdoo I wanted to be an astronaut,” Kelly noted. “He said, ‘I think you can do it!’ Do you know how much that meant? Professors here have given me so much. They have played a huge role in my development.”
Kelly is working toward an internship next summer at NASA and says he hopes to move on and earn a Ph.D. He is on track to finish his undergraduate degree in May 2027.
Over the holiday break this year, he’s hoping to squeeze in a climb in
Ecuador, up the famed Mount Chimborazo. This one, is symbolic.
“It’s the closet mountain to space – because of the curvature of the Earth.”