Dian Fossey

Zoologist

• Born: January 16, 1932
• Birthplace: San Francisco, California
• Died: December 26, 1985
• Place of death: Virunga Mountains, Rwanda

American zoologist

American primatologist Dian Fossey gained international recognition for her groundbreaking studies of mountain gorillas in central Africa. She spent eighteen years living among the gorillas, dispelling myths of their aggressiveness and ferocity, and spurring conservation efforts to protect the endangered species.

Primary field: Biology

Specialty: Zoology

Early Life

Dian Fossey was born in San Francisco, California, on January 16, 1932. She was the only child of George Fossey III, an insurance salesman, and Kitty Fossey, a fashion model. When Dian was three years old, her parents divorced. Two years later, Kitty married Richard Price, a successful entrepreneur.

As a young girl, Fossey was shy and had a poor self-image, stemming partly from the fact that she stood over six feet tall at the age of fourteen. She was interested in animals at an early age, and she often turned to them for companionship.

Fossey graduated from Lowell High School in 1948. She enrolled as a pre-veterinary medical student at the University of California at Davis in 1950. Due to poor physics and chemistry grades, she changed her major to occupational therapy and transferred to San Jose State University in 1952. In 1954, Fossey earned her bachelor’s degree and was hired as director of the occupational therapy department at Kosair Crippled Children’s Hospital in Louisville, Kentucky. She worked there for eleven years.

In 1960, after listening to stories about a friend’s trip to Africa, Fossey decided to fulfill her dream of going on an African safari. She was influenced by the writings of George B. Schaller, an American zoologist, who was one of the first people to study mountain gorillas in the wild. On September 26, 1963, Fossey embarked on a six-week African safari to view gorillas in their natural habitat.

Fossey accomplished the two main goals of her trip: visiting the mountain gorillas of Mount Mikeno in the Congo, and meeting Louis Leakey, a British anthropologist and archaeologist, at his camp in Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania. Leakey was impressed with Fossey and her fascination with gorillas and Africa. Two weeks after breaking her ankle at Leakey’s camp, Fossey limped her way up the volcanic slopes of Mount Mikeno, where she caught her first glimpse of gorillas.

Life’s Work

After the safari ended, Fossey returned to Louisville, but she longed to return to Africa. Her opportunity came in 1966 when she attended a lecture given by Leakey at the University of Louisville. She spoke to him afterward, and he then hired her to lead a long-term research study of the gorillas living in the Virunga volcanic mountain range in the Congo, which had been renamed Zaire after a 1965 coup in that country.

With financial funding from the National Geographic Society and the L. S. B. Leakey and Wilkie Brothers foundations, Fossey departed for Africa on December 15, 1966. She journeyed to Kabara Meadow on Mount Mikeno in Zaire’s Parc National des Virungas. Along the way, she made a stop in Tanzania to meet with British anthropologist and zoologist Jane Goodall to learn techniques of fieldwork and data collection.

Fossey was accompanied to Kabara by Alan Root, a British wildlife photographer and filmmaker, who helped her set up camp with only a few tents, food supplies, and a used Land Rover. Root left by mid-January 1967, and Fossey was left alone to commence her investigation, even though she had little training in animal behavior and did not know any of the local dialects.

Fossey focused her research on the social behavior of mountain gorillas. She wanted to establish close contact with the gorillas and knew she had to live among them to eventually interact with them. As she sat in the forest, she recorded everything she observed. In order to gain the gorillas’ trust, she began to imitate their sounds and their eating and grooming habits.

Six months after Fossey’s arrival, her research was interrupted by civil war in Zaire. Fossey was ordered out of her camp in July 1967 and taken into custody for two weeks by Zairian soldiers. She managed to escape and flee to neighboring Uganda.

On September 24, 1967, Fossey moved to Rwanda and founded the Karisoke Research Center in the Virunga Mountains. Fossey developed her own field techniques for observing the gorillas. She watched them for entire days, mimicking their behavior and eventually identifying twenty-five different sounds and their meanings. Fossey fed on the foliage the gorillas ate, groomed herself as they did, and beat her chest. She named each of the fifty-one gorillas from the four family groups she was studying.

In 1970, Fossey’s persistence was rewarded when a gorilla she called Peanuts sat beside her and reached out to touch her hand. Over time, she earned the trust of the gorillas, playing with them and holding their children. Fossey’s research portrayed the gorillas as social, dignified, and curious creatures, each possessing a unique personality.

Fossey grew especially close to one gorilla she called Digit, and she spent years watching him mature. Digit would often sit next to Fossey, stroking her hair or examining her notebook and other equipment. Fossey recorded many moments with Digit and the other gorillas.

In order to continue receiving financial support for her work, Fossey left in 1970 to obtain her doctorate in zoology from England’s Cambridge University. Fossey had become well-known by this time, and a story about her and the gorillas appeared on the cover of the January 1970 issue of National Geographic.

Fossey’s objective for studying gorillas was altered when Digit was killed by poachers in December 1977. When Fossey had first arrived in Rwanda in 1967, she had noted a difference in Rwanda’s gorillas versus Zaire’s, even though Karisoke was located only five miles from her first camp. The Karisoke gorillas had initially ignored Fossey’s attempts to make contact because they had been frequently tormented by poachers. Traps and snares set for the gorillas resulted in mutilation and death. Their heads, hands, and feet were sold as souvenirs. Entire groups of gorillas were killed to capture one gorilla infant, which would be sold to a zoo.

After the death of Digit, Fossey was determined to protect the gorillas and preserve their natural habitat. She gave up her scientific studies and began a public campaign against poachers. Digit’s death was reported on the CBS Evening News and a story ran in the New York Times. Fossey established a nonprofit organization called the Digit Fund to support the protection of gorillas.

In 1980, Fossey accepted a position as a visiting professor at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, and began writing a book about her experiences with the mountain gorillas. The book, Gorillas in the Mist, was published in 1983 and made into a film in 1988. Fossey returned to Karisoke in 1983, where she continued her fight against poachers.

On December 27, 1985, fifty-three-year-old Fossey was found murdered by an unknown assailant in her cabin. Fossey was buried next to Digit in a cemetery for gorillas killed by poachers, which she had established at Karisoke.

Impact

Fossey dedicated her life to learning about and protecting the mountain gorillas of Africa. In addition to studying gorilla behavior, she became a pioneer in African conservation and wildlife management. Fossey’s research is largely responsible for scientists’ understanding of gorilla behavior and social structure, and her work is still studied by students of human and primate behavior.

Fossey’s practice of imitating the behavior and vocalizations of gorillas became a standard in the field. Subsequent primatologists, basing their work on the twenty-five gorilla language sounds and the gorilla body language signs that Fossey identified, have continued to study gorilla communication. To achieve a better understanding of primates and their similarities to humans, research projects have expanded to using sign language for interspecies communication. The best-known example of this is the Gorilla Language Project, also called Project Koko.

The Digit Fund, later called the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International, is an ongoing organization that raises and distributes money for gorilla research and protection. By calling attention to the gorilla’s plight, Fossey in turn helped raise awareness of the need to protect other endangered species and preserve their natural habitats.

Bibliography

de la Bédoyère, Camilla. Letters from the Mist: Dian Fossey—“No One Loved Gorillas More.” Washington: National Geographic, 2005. Print. A collection of Fossey’s letters. Includes foreward by Jane Goodall. Color photos.

Eckhart, Gene, and Annette Lanjouw. Mountain Gorillas: Biology, Conservation, and Coexistence. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2008. Print. A study of the endangered mountain gorillas of central Africa. Also covers how humans have affected gorillas and their habitats, and conservation efforts to protect them.

Fossey, Dian. Gorillas in the Mist. Boston: Houghton, 1983. Print. Fossey’s book about her experiences living with mountain gorillas and her research on them.

Mowat, Farley. Woman in the Mists: The Story of Dian Fossey and the Mountain Gorillas of Africa. New York: Warner, 1988. Print. Biography of Fossey and her work with gorillas, based on her personal writings and on interviews from people who knew her. Includes maps and excerpts from Fossey’s diaries.