Dr Fitzgerald was born and educated in Melbourne. From a young age he was hooked on natural history and by the age of five had decided to become a zoologist. Meeting David Attenborough at the age of nine and collecting his first fossils in the field cemented this ambition.
Following completion of a B.Sc. at the University of Melbourne, Erich earned his Ph.D. in vertebrate palaeontology from Monash University where his co-advisors were Prof. Pat Vickers-Rich and Museum Victoria’s Dr Thomas Rich. Subsequently, Erich was awarded a prestigious Smithsonian Fellowship for postdoctoral research at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History. During his Smithsonian appointment Erich worked with eminent cetologist Dr James G. Mead.
Returning to Australia in September 2009, Dr Fitzgerald currently holds the Harold Mitchell Fellowship at Melbourne Museum and is a Research Associate of the Smithsonian Institution.