![]() ![]() In all her adventures, she had a delightful companion in Rusty, a black mongrel from her neighbourhood. Curious about the natural world, she watched a hen lay eggs for hours. When she was just a year old, she was given a stuffed toy chimpanzee that she named Jubilee and carried with her everywhere (the scruffy toy continues to have a place in her home even now). Photo:The Jane Goodall Institute Early Yearsīorn on Apin London, England, Valerie Jane Morris-Goodall adored animals as a child. He was impressed with her natural history knowledge and passion to understand animals and believed her non-academic background would provide a fresh perspective. Louis Leakey, a legendary paleo-anthropologist, who offered her the opportunity to begin a study of chimpanzees on the edge of Lake Tanganyika, Tanzania. And her story, though undeniably about scientific observations of chimpanzees, also became the story of the collective power of individual action. She would go on to transform the way the world viewed species behaviour and conservation. Little was known of chimpanzees then and to document what was the first instance of a non-human making and using a tool was truly trailblazing. Jane knew she was witnessing something incredible but even she could not have imagined how involved her life would become with the amazing apes whose lives she was studying. Peering through her binoculars, she watched in amazement as he bent a twig, stripped it off its leaves and pushed it into a termite mound and then using it as a tool, began to spoon the insects into his mouth. One day, as she walked through the rainforest of Gombe, western Tanzania, she observed a large, male chimpanzee at a distance, foraging for food. All she had was an unrelenting passion to be a naturalist, an innate compassion for animals and the willingness to dedicate her life to them. She had no academic credentials or relevant field experience. ![]() She had been sent on an assignment to observe chimpanzees by the legendary paleo-anthropologist Dr. Nearly 62 years ago, a young woman made her first visit to the Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania. Jane Goodall’s Statement in Defense Of The Endangered Species Act. “Surely, we do not want to live in a world without the great apes, our closest living relatives in the animal kingdom? A world where we can no longer marvel at the magnificent flight of Bald Eagles or hear the howl of wolves under the moon? A world not enhanced by the sight of a grizzly bear and her cubs hunting for berries in the wilderness? What would our grandchildren think if these magical images were only to be found in books?” ![]()
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