In Memoriam: Jane Goodall

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In Memoriam: Dr. Jane Goodall, 1934 - 2025

Jane Goodall speaking
Jane shaking hands with NhRP Founder

A pioneering ethologist and cherished member of the NhRP’s Board of Directors, Dr. Jane Goodall forever changed how the world understands the minds and lives of nonhuman animals. Beginning with her groundbreaking 1960 research in Gombe, where she documented chimpanzees making and using tools, she challenged long-held scientific assumptions and insisted on recognizing animals as individuals with intelligence, emotion, and agency.

Over decades of global conservation leadership, her voice helped reshape how nonhuman animals are viewed and treated in the scientific community and public consciousness. At the NhRP, we were honored to benefit from her insight, clarity, and unwavering moral conviction in the pursuit of legal rights for nonhuman beings. Though widely celebrated—including as a UN Messenger of Peace, a Kyoto Prize laureate, and a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire—her most enduring legacy is the shift in empathy she sparked worldwide, urging us to confront a simple truth: we are not the only beings who matter.

Jane Goodall’s Everlasting Legacy

In reflecting on Jane’s profound impact on animals, science, and our organization, we’ve also remarked on how her legacy influenced our own life and career paths. Here are a few reflections from NhRP team members:

Rebecca Garverman, Director of Strategic Initiatives

I worked on a research project about Jane Goodall during my senior year in high school and it had a formative impact on my career trajectory and aspirations. Dr. Goodall’s passion, empathy, and determination inspired so many people and I am proud to count myself amongst them. What has stayed with me most of all is her eternal hope and optimism that we will one day live in a world where justice and empathy are extended to all beings, regardless of species. It is this hope for a better world, and her persistence in working to achieve it, that makes Dr. Goodall’s legacy so remarkable, and so lasting.

 

Christopher Berry, Executive Director

Reading In the Shadow of Man was my entry point into animal rights. It had a profound influence on my personal and career path.

 

Gail Price-Wise, Board Chair

Jane and Steve (our founder) met around 1989, and she was one of the earliest board members of what would become the Nonhuman Rights Project. Steve was deeply honored to know that she admired and supported his work. In writing the forward to his book, Rattling the Cage, Jane called it, “The Animals’ Magna Carta, Declaration of Independence, and Universal Declaration of Rights, all in one.”

Steve and Jane corresponded frequently over the years. She often sent short messages of encouragement. She was extremely kind to me after Steve died.

 

Michelle Blake, Development Director

Jane is the earliest example I can remember of a woman scientist. She not only entered a traditionally male-dominated field, but dared to change the field as well. Long before I understood how visionary and impactful her work was for animals, I was in awe of this young woman and her mother who lived in the forest among wild chimpanzees. She definitely influenced my ideas about what’s possible for all of us.

You fuel our work with your donations, your messages of solidarity, and the time you take to advocate for our clients. Thank you for the compassion and passion you invest in the fight for nonhuman rights. You’re the reason this work is possible.