Dame Valerie Jane Morris Goodall ( GUUD-awl; née Morris-Goodall; 3 April 1934 – 1 October 2025) was an English primatologist and anthropologist. Regarded as a pioneer in primate ethology, and described by many publications as "the world's preeminent chimpanzee expert", she was best known for more than six decades of field research on the social and family life of wild chimpanzees in the Kasakela chimpanzee community at Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania. Beginning in 1960, under the mentorship of the palaeontologist Louis Leakey, Goodall's research demonstrated that chimpanzees share many key traits with humans, such as using tools, having complex emotions, forming lasting social bonds, engaging in organised warfare, and passing on knowledge across generations, which redefined the traditional view that humans are uniquely different from other animals. In 1965 Goodall was awarded a PhD in ethology from the University of Cambridge. In the 1960s Goodall published several accounts of her research in Tanzania, including a series of articles in National Geographic. Her first book-length study, In the Shadow of Man (1971), was later translated into 48 languages. She founded the Jane Goodall Institute in 1977 to promote wildlife conservation, followed by the Roots & Shoots youth programme in 1991, which grew into a global network. Goodall also established wildlife sanctuaries and reforestation projects in Africa and campaigned for the ethical treatment of animals in animal testing, animal husbandry and captivity. Goodall was appointed a United Nations Messenger of Peace in 2002, and advised organisations such as Save the Chimps and the Society for the Protection of Underground Networks. Throughout her career Goodall wrote 32 books, 15 of them for children, and was the subject of over 40 films. She remained an active lecturer, travelling extensively to promote conservation and climate action. Goodall was an honorary member of the World Future Council. Among other honours, she was a recipient of the National Geographic Society's Hubbard Medal, the Kyoto Prize, the Templeton Prize and the United States Presidential Medal of Freedom. In 2003 she was named a dame commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II. Goodall served on the board of the Nonhuman Rights Project from 2022 until her death.
Early life and education Valerie Jane Morris-Goodall was born in April 1934 in Hampstead, London, to Mortimer Herbert Morris-Goodall, a businessman, and Margaret Myfanwe Joseph, a novelist from Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire, who wrote under the pen name Vanne Morris-Goodall. After the family moved to Bournemouth, Goodall attended Uplands School, an independent school in nearby Poole. When she was a child, Goodall's father gave her a stuffed toy chimpanzee named Jubilee as an alternative to a teddy bear. Goodall had said her fondness for it sparked her early love of animals, commenting, "My mother's friends were horrified by this toy, thinking it would frighten me and give me nightmares." Jubilee was still on Goodall's dresser in London as of 2000.
Africa Goodall had always been drawn to animals and Africa, which brought her to the farm of a friend in the White Highlands in the Colony and Protectorate of Kenya in 1957. From there, she obtained work as a secretary, and acting on her friend's advice, she telephoned Louis Leakey, the Kenyan archaeologist and palaeontologist, with no other thought than to make an appointment to discuss animals. Leakey, believing that the study of existing great apes could provide indications of the behaviour of early hominids, was looking for a chimpanzee researcher, though he kept the idea to himself. Instead, he proposed that Goodall work for him as a secretary. After obtaining approval from his co-researcher and wife, the palaeoanthropologist Mary Leakey, Louis sent Goodall to Olduvai Gorge in Tanganyika (later part of Tanzania), where he laid out his plans.
Education In 1958 Leakey sent Goodall to London to study primate behaviour with Osman Hill and primate anatomy with John Napier. Leakey raised funds, and on 14 July 1960 Goodall went to Gombe Stream National Park, becoming the first of what would come to be called the Trimates. She was accompanied by her mother, whose presence was necessary to satisfy the requirements of David Anstey, chief warden, who was concerned for their safety. Goodall credits her mother with encouraging her to pursue a career in primatology, a male-dominated field at the time. Goodall said that women were not accepted in the field when she started her research in the late 1950s. As of 2019 the field of primatology is made up almost evenly of men and women, in part thanks to the trailblazing work of Goodall and her encouragement of young women to join the field. Louis Leakey arranged funding, and in 1962 he sent Goodall, who had no degree, to the University of Cambridge. She was the eighth person to be allowed to study for a PhD at Cambridge without first having obtained a bachelor's degree. She attended Newnham College, Cambridge, to pursue a Doctor of Philosophy degree in ethology. Her thesis was completed in 1966 under the supervision of Robert Hinde on the Behaviour of free-living chimpanzees, detailing her first five years of study at the Gombe Reserve. On 19 June 2006 the Open University of Tanzania awarded her an honorary Doctor of Science degree. She became an honorary fellow of both Newnham College (her alma mater) and Darwin College, Cambridge, in 2019, when she was also awarded an honorary doctorate.
Career
Research at Gombe Stream National Park
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