Goodall to appear virtually

Mar. 1—GREENSBURG- World renowned primatologist and personality Jane Goodall will stream "live" to 500 lucky budding sociologists from 12:30 to 2 p.m. on Wednesday, March 3 via live ZOOM. The event will be free to the first 500 email requests and will feature Ms. Goodall giving an uplifting talk about her work and other topics, and then will answer questions from the gallery audience.

Ms. Goodall will be speaking live from her home in England.

GCHS Educator John Pratt, responsible for local appearances of world-renowned personalities like television actor Ed Asner, Broadway starlet Kerry Butler, and human rights activist and third daughter of Robert F. Kennedy Mary Kerry Kennedy, is coy about his seemingly unnatural knack for bringing world-renowned personalities to small-town Indiana for in-person appearances.

And he admits that, after 26 years of producing the yearly Chautauqua effort, his name has become known in the appropriate circles.

"I have a system that works. I value the results, and I'm willing to work at it," Pratt said.

"And this one took 14 years," he said. "You have to get your foot in the door. And if you can work with the person directly, it makes all the difference. I met her very briefly 14 years ago, and since then, after 3 to 4 'appointment-handlers,' I think I found one that liked me."

It's all about personality and persistence.

He also admits that his constantly amazing luck of catching the attention of the world is, at this point, something that feeds upon itself.

"Others, after many rejection letters from agents and star representatives would most likely give up, but not me," Pratt said. I am persistent, and now, I have to admit, living here in 'small-town' Indiana is fascinating to many. They are interested about what goes on in the stereo-typical slice of of America, and they are often willing to come for that reason alone."

According to www.biography.com, Goodall first arrived at Gombe Stream Game Reserve in what's now Tanzania in 1960 when very little was known about the world of chimpanzees. But the 26-year-old secretary would go on to make groundbreaking discoveries through her immersive, unorthodox observations, even as her findings were scoffed at by scientists early on.

In fact, Goodall's approach — and lack of formal academic training — were key to her method of recording personality traits and naming her subjects, rather than numbering them as tradition dictated at the time.

Goodall couldn't afford college so she attended secretarial training.

Born in London, Goodall had long been fascinated by both Africa and animals, says Anita Silvey, author of Untamed: The Wild Life of Jane Goodall. Tarzan books, which, of course, featured a character named Jane, and Dr. Dolittle books were favorites.

"When I was 10, I dreamed of going to Africa, living with animals and writing books about them," Goodall told CNN in 2017. "Everybody laughed at me because I was just a girl, we didn't have any money and World War II was raging."

Unable to afford college and encouraged by her mother to learn typing and bookkeeping, Goodall sought steady employment by attending secretarial school.

"She needed to support herself and she and her family felt that with secretarial training, she'd always be able to get a job," Silvey says.

Leaky was drawn to Goodall's observational skills.

But Goodall found office work a bore, and when a friend invited her on an extended trip to her family's farm near Nairobi, Kenya, she spent time waitressing to earn money for the voyage. At 23, she arrived and soon after was offered a job working with famed paleoanthropologist Louis Leakey at a natural history museum. Leakey, according to National Geographic, believed Goodall's lack of formal scientific training, along with her passion for animals, would make her the right choice to study the social lives of chimpanzees at Gombe and Jane was enthralled by the idea.

"He wanted someone observant and not blinded by scientific theory," Shivey said. "When he took Jane around in a Jeep, he found she could see and name all the animals in the area."

Eventually, Goodall earned her Ph.D. in ethology and continued her research at Gombe for 20 more years.

Goodall continues her work today at the Jane Goodall Institute she established in 197. Her 1991 program "Roots & Shoots" encourages young people around the world to be agents of change by participating in projects that protect the environment, wildlife, or their communities. She meets with organizations key to the protection of places like Gombe Stream National Park and species such as her beloved chimpanzees.

Jane is still hard at work today raising awareness and money to protect the chimpanzees, their habitats, and the planet we all share. She travels about 300 days a year giving speeches, talking to government officials and business people around the world encouraging them to support wildlife conservation and protect critical habitats.

Participation in the live stream session is free and interested viewers should send an email request to jopratt@greensburg.k12.in.us. Pratt will respond with a ZOOM invitation.

Contact Bill Rethlake at 812-663-3111, ext 217011 or email bill.rethlake@greensburgdailynews.com