Jane Goodall, a chimpanzee researcher and animal rights advocate passed away at the age of 91, on October 1st, 2025. While she may have left this world, her legacy still lives on.

As a kid, animals fascinated her, developing a deep connection to animals that lived on. Jane began her journey to give insight on how chimps behave and interact; she believed that it could shine light on how similar humans and chimpanzees interact.

Before her, we had very little research on chimps and all monkeys in general. As it wasn’t a topic on interest, however chimps seemed to draw Goodall in.  In 1960, she went to Tanzania to start her study of chimps. On her trip she discovered that monkeys have struggles just like us. She observed that they form alliances, show affection, and have dominance struggles. Warfare between chimpanzee groups was another finding. Jane also discovered that they each have their own personalities and family bonds.

“Because once you break down this barrier that used to be perceived between humans on the one hand and all the animals on the other … and you start to think about other animals having personalities, minds and feelings, then it becomes harder to treat them the way we so often do.” said Goodall in an interview

As 50 years of research went on, Goodall was fascinated with her findings. She found that monkeys have complex relationships much like us humans, like loving and caring for one another.  Another finding was that chimps and monkeys had the ability to use tools, such as the use of sticks to reach termites deep in holes.

Thanks to Goodall’s work we learned a lot more about monkeys and how they work. To help fund more research on this topic you can donate on Donate – Jane Goodall Institute Global