Jane Goodall draws large crowd for ‘peace day’ celebration in San Pedro

22.09.2024 04:14

DailyNews.com

Dr. Jane Goodall, who recently turned 90, spoke at Pt Fermin Park in San Pedro Saturday Sept. 21, 2024. Goodall was celebrating the UN International Day of Peace the global event started in 2002 when Goodall was named a UN Messenger of Peace by Kofi Annan. (Photo by Chuck Bennett, Contributing Photographer)

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Renowned primatologist Jane Goodall drew large crowds Saturday, Sept. 21, at the celebration of the United Nations International Day of Peace in San Pedro.

The daylong festivities at Point Fermin Park overlooking the ocean featured music, celebrity guests, a live-stream of the Concert for Peace II: From Harm to Harmony, arts and crafts projects, pet adoptions, food trucks — and, a special highlight, a parade of giant peace dove puppets — made at the event — followed by comments from Goodall, who also was honored for her 90th birthday celebrated recently.

Sponsors included Roots & Shoots with Rotary District 5280.

Designed to “celebrate all that is good, kind, and positive” by organizers, the U.N. events began in 2002 when Goodall was named a United Nations Messenger of Peace by Kofi Annan (1938-2018), a Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh secretary-general of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006. The “puppets” were debuted by Goodall after a farm in Northern California created a giant peace dove puppet made with bamboo poles, chickenwire and topped with old sheets that had a 20-foot wingspan. Goodall “flew” one of the puppets at the U.N. meeting on Sept. 21, 2002.

That year, Goodall sent out letters to her “Roots & Shoots” basecamps around the world sharing her inspiration to set aside one day to display the giant peace dove puppets in hopes they could someday be seen from outer space.

According to Goodall’s biography, she was just 26 years old in July 1960 when she traveled from her native England to what is now Tanzania, venturing into the little-known world of wild chimpanzees. She was armed with binoculars, a notebook and a fascination for wildlife.

Her interest began in early childhood when she would observe native birds and animals, making extensive notes and sketches. Her reading focused on the literature of zoology and ethology and she dreamed of traveling to Africa to see animals in their natural habitats.

After receiving her school certificate in 1952, she worked as a secretary at Oxford University and also at a London-based documentary film company in order to save money for the dreamed-about trip to Africa.

She visited South Kinangop, Kenya, in the late 1950s and through friends met the famed anthropologist Louis Leakey, then curator of the Corndon Museum in Nairobi. Leakey hired her as a secretary and invited her to participate in an anthropological dig.

Leakey saw in the young protege a temperament that could endure long-term isolation in the wild and she agreed to embark on a study, despite lacking formal scientific education or a college degree.

That began what was to be a lifelong study of chimpanzees as Goodall learned how to observe the animals in a non-treating way, appearing at the same time each morning as the animals began to tolerate her presence.

Eventually, they showed no fear and would come to her in search of bananas.

Goodall went on to earn a reputation in the field, receiving a Ph.D. in ethology from Cambridge University in 1965, only the eighth person in the university’s history to allowed to pursue a Ph.D. without first earning a bachelor’s degree.

She held a visiting professorship in psychiatry at Stanford University from 1970-75 and was appointed in 1973 to her longtime position of honorary visiting professor of zoology at the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania.