October 8, 2025
https://www.colorado.edu/coloradan/2015/12/01/jane-goodall-can-draw-crowd
Photo credit: Morten Bjarnhof
Photo credit: Morten Bjarnhof
By Paula Posas, Deputy Director, Maryland Chapter of the Sierra Club
I know I'm not alone in saying Jane Goodall was one of my heroes.
In my teens, I closely guarded a children's book my mom shared with me that Jane Goodall had written, My Life with the Chimpanzees.
I reread it several times over the years and took it with me when studying abroad.
Later I read and treasured Jane Goodall's Reason for Hope and even got a chance to meet her and talk to her at an event in Washington, DC.
She changed how I see the world.
Many of us see animals and the world differently thanks to Jane Goodall.
This photo is on the inside cover of her book Reason for Hope. It has stayed with me as a reminder to see the world always a little bit through Jane's eyes. Photo credit: Steve Bloom
Her pioneering research and her example also inspired me and many other girls, women, and young people to take the road less traveled in science, environmental advocacy, and more.
Dr. Jane Goodall passed away in her sleep at the age of 91 a week ago on October 1. She was on a speaking tour in California. Still sharing, still inspiring. Read more about Jane's life here in the tribute from the institute bearing her name. Remembering Jane - Jane Goodall Institute USA
For Jane's own words about her life and perspective, I recommend this interview. “It is important to be optimistic” – Swiss Life
Jane Goodall spent most of the days of the year for many years working to wake people up and inspire them to take action, see themselves as protagonists. She said,
“You can’t give up. There’s all this horror, but with our backs to the wall we’ve always done pretty well as a species. So we either go under—but we’ll jolly well go under fighting—or we’ll get enough people woken in time to turn it around.”
"People say you can’t change the culture. Well, you can. You have to start somewhere and hope that it spreads."
(Source: https://www.sierraclub.org/Sierra/jane-goodall-together-we-can-change-the-world)“We have the choice to use the gift of our life to make the world a better place.” (Source: https://janegoodall.org/)
These are all things we are lucky to know and that resonate strongly with Sierra Club staff and volunteers, who are dedicated to organizing and working to protect the planet and our environment and communities.
With Jane Goodall's passing, we are poorer.
But also with her living as she did—with uncommon integrity, determination, and purpose and with sharing so widely her passion and insights and hope—we are better for it.
Jane Goodall's passing brings to mind the last lines of Maya Angelou's beautiful poem "When Great Trees Fall."
And when great souls die,
after a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregularly. Spaces fill
with a kind of
soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whisper to us.
They existed. They existed.
We can be. Be and be
better. For they existed.
after a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregularly. Spaces fill
with a kind of
soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whisper to us.
They existed. They existed.
We can be. Be and be
better. For they existed.