BL-24 - Flipbook - Page 143
A TIME TO REMEMBER
He saw I was very tough and I could make do with very
simple things: every day we had just one cupful of water
for washing. He also realised I had an absolute passion for
animals.”
I presume?” she joked. Then she gave me a great bear hug
and invited me in for a cup of tea.
Anyone who has read Jane’s books, particularly In the
Shadow of Man, her account of her early years at Gombe,
will know how she 昀椀rst came here. But to hear her retell the
tale right there at Gombe made it especially piquant.
Brought up in Bournemouth after her parents’ divorce, Jane
left school at 18, took a secretarial course and a couple of
different jobs, before jumping at the chance to stay at a
school friend’s parents’ farm in Kenya. There, in Nairobi,
she met Dr Leakey, who was the curator of what is now the
Nairobi National Museum, and was offered, with one other
girl, the opportunity to accompany Leakey and his wife,
Mary, on one of their annual paleontological expeditions to
Olduvai Gorge in the Serengeti plains.
Jane Goodall and infant chimpanzee Flint, the 昀椀rst infant born at
Gombe after Jane arrived
Fifty years on, it’s hard to think of any long-term
wildlife research that has achieved such great worldwide
recognition. The fact that chimpanzees are our closest living
relatives, sharing 99% of our DNA, has made insights into
their behaviour and social structures especially relevant.
“They can be loving and compassionate, and yet they have
a dark side”, was Jane’s view.
Goodall has been criticised by the scienti昀椀c establishment
for giving the chimps names, not numbers; for distorting
their behaviour by feeding them bananas; and indeed for
having no scienti昀椀c training.
Her fans, however, argue that it was her fresh approach
and empathy that enabled her to make new discoveries in
the 昀椀eld. “There’s no sharp line dividing us from the rest
of the animal kingdom”, she maintains. It was she who
learnt that chimpanzees not only use tools but also make
them, for instance, stripping twigs to “昀椀sh” for termites.
This challenged many scientists’ belief that we humans are
unique in our tool-making abilities.
It was Leakey who told Jane about a chimpanzee population
at Gombe, suggesting that she might undertake an
unprecedented study of them in the wild. In those days
before women’s liberation, the proposal must have been
highly unusual. The (then colonial) authorities certainly felt
so. They were not happy about an unaccompanied white
woman camping for months in the bush. But Jane had
wanted to live with animals since reading the Tarzan books
as a child, and she had the support of her mother, Vanne,
who told her: “If you work hard and really want something
and never give up, you’ll 昀椀nd a way”.
“Louis Leakey helped 昀椀nd the funds to 昀椀nance my 昀椀rst 昀椀eld
work”, Jane recalled. “But the authorities wouldn’t let me
set up camp on my own”. Fortunately, Vanne was able to
come with her. Her presence at Gombe during Jane’s 昀椀rst
stint in 1960 was absolutely central. Vanne helped out in
many ways, looking after the camp while Jane was in the
hills, running a clinic for nearby villagers, above all just
being there. “I still have some of my mother’s ashes in a
dried-milk tin at the camp”, Jane con昀椀ded. “I’m planning to
scatter them in her favourite places at Gombe”.
I have seen chimpanzees in the wild in Kibale, in Uganda,
and in the Ngamba Island sanctuary on Lake Victoria. But
for me Gombe has long been some kind of Mecca. To track
Jane Goodall down was no mean feat. She travels for more
than 300 days a year, campaigning for conservation. So
when I learnt that she was to visit Gombe, I asked to meet
her there.
I 昀氀ew into Dar es Salaam, and after a night’s recuperation at
the magni昀椀cent Kilimanjaro Hotel Kempinski, I continued
on to Kigoma. And 昀椀nally, there she was, on the veranda
of the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI) headquarters. “Stanley,
Jane Goodall with palaeoanthropologist Dr. Louis Leakey
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