10/01/2026
https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=1567910362046288&set=a.224220809748590
Dr. Jane Goodall was famous not just for her incredible work researching chimpanzees, but for the compassion she held for nature as a whole.
It's been a year since her passing. Today we remember her as a pioneer in her field, and for her dedication to climate action.
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Dr. Goodall’s early interest in primates turned into a lifetime of studying chimpanzees. Her love for nature as a whole sparked later work on climate action.
She founded her eponymous institute in 1977 to promote wildlife conservation, and by 1986 she became a self-described climate activist.
Through Dr. Goodall’s extensive travels, she has noted locals’ descriptions of disrupted climate patterns and increasingly destructive weather events.
In a 2019 piece for Time, she lays out two of the major ways that we can slow climate change: by eliminating poverty and abolishing corruption.
Jane Goodall as a trailblazer for her body and breadth of work – and for doing so in a male-dominated field. Through her work, she pushed for a more just world.
This is true of her climate advocacy as well. She has long-pointed out that vulnerable populations often face climate impacts that they didn’t contribute to.
Despite an awareness of just how dire the climate crisis is, Dr. Goodall maintained an admirable optimism
for the future of our planet.
She credited this to many things but often specified the power that young people have to enact change, and the enduring force of compassion.
