MESSAGE OF EMPOWERMENT
Goodall wrote dozens of books, appeared in documentaries, and earned numerous honours, among them being made a Dame Commander by Britain and receiving the US Presidential Medal of Freedom from then-president Joe Biden.
She was also immortalised as both a Lego figure and a Barbie doll, and was famously referenced in a Gary Larson cartoon depicting two chimps grooming.
“Conducting a little more ‘research’ with that Jane Goodall tramp?” one chimp asks the other, after finding blonde hair. Her institute had its lawyers draft a threatening letter, but Goodall herself waved them off, saying she found it amusing.
“The time for words and false promises is past if we want to save the planet,” she told AFP in an interview last year.
Her message was also one of empowerment.
“Each individual has a role to play, and every one of us makes some impact on the planet every single day, and we can choose what sort of impact we make.”
Goodall said she never doubted the planet’s resilience or human ability to overcome environmental challenges.
“Yes, there is hope … It’s in our hands, it’s in your hands and my hands and those of our children. It’s really up to us,” she said in 2002, urging people to “leave the lightest possible ecological footprints.”Â