Dian Fossey had a dream. She dreamt that one day she would visit the
mountains of Africa to study gorillas. In 1963 Dian made her dream come
true and left the United States behind to move to Africa. While there she
met other scientits who studied chimpanzees, but Dian wanted to study
gorillas. She hiked through jungles and climbed over huge mountains to get
to a family of gorillas deep in the Congo jungle.
No one had ever been able to get very close to these gorillas. They are
huge animals! But, Dian was not afraid. She learned to immitate gorilla
behavior so well that this family of gorillas accepted her as one of their
own. Dian
became very close to her new friends and even wrote a book about what she
had learned about gorilla families. She called her book, "Gorillas in the
Mist". This movie was eventually made into a movie.
Dian had to be very careful in Africa. Illegal hunters, called poachers,
wanted to capture the gorillas to either kill the animals (because their
hands and feet sell for high prices) or send them to zoos.
Dian fought to protect the gorillas, even though she was threatened
repeatedly by poachers.
Dian refused to be scared and continued to study the mountain
gorillas of Africa and publish all that she learned. Her bravery has
led to a new understanding of gorillas, one of our closest cousins
in the animal kingdom.
Dian was killed by poachers in 1985.
