Jane Goodall by Annie Wagner

“The least I can do is speak out for those who cannot speak for themselves.” - Jane Goodall.

Jane Goodall was born on the 3rd of April, 1934, in Hamstead, London. She loved animals and nature from a young age, and had a beloved dog called Rusty. After she graduated, she couldn't afford college so she went to secretarial school to learn typing skills. Jane Goodall took on many jobs, and saved to go to Africa. When she was 23, she finally traveled there to visit a friend.

In Africa, she met a famous paleoanthropologist called Dr Louis Seymour Bazett Leakey, and got offered a job at a local natural history museum. She worked there until Dr Leakey sent her to Tanzania to study wild chimpanzees. In 1958 Jane Goodall returned to England and they began to make arrangements for the journey, raising funds and getting permission.

In 1960, she finally arrived in Tanzania, and after weeks of searching, she found a chimpanzee. Jane Goodall named it David Greybeard, although naming the animal you were studying was unheard of. Watching him, she discovered something amazing- she saw him using tools. David Greybeard was sticking blades of stiff grass into termite holes to get termites out. She telegraphed Dr Leakey, telling him about her groundbreaking discovery.

Before, chimpanzees were thought to be herbivores, but Jane Goodall proved that they were actually omnivores, and even hunted their meat. She also found that they make and use their own tools, something that shocked the world, as making tools was a trait previously used to define humans.

Now, she raises money to protect chimpanzees and their habitats. Jane Goodall made many astonishing discoveries about chimpanzees, and challenged the way we view humanity.

Acknowledgments: https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/jane-goodall/