[My] excursions provided a unique opportunity for observing [the gorillas' behavior] in their natural habitat... Then, all too soon, the infants were demanded for their trip to the zoo. ... [H]appily the babies did not know they would never see their mountain home again

It was their individuality combined with the shyness of their behavior that remained the most captivating impression of this first encounter with the greatest of the great apes.

When you realize the value of all life, you dwell less on what is past and concentrate more on the preservation of the future.

I had this great urge... I had it the day I was born. Some may call it destiny. My parents and friends called it dismaying.

I feel more comfortable with gorillas than people. I can anticipate what a gorilla's going to do, and they're purely motivated.

None of the three great apes is considered ancestral to modern man, Homo sapiens, but they remain the only other type of extant primate with which human beings share such close physical characteristics. From them we may learn much concerning the behavior of our earliest primate prototypes, because behavior, unlike bones, teeth, or tools, does not fossilize.

[My] excursions provided a unique opportunity for observing [the gorillas' behavior] in their natural habitat... Then, all too soon, the infants were demanded for their trip to the zoo. ... [H]appily the babies did not know they would never see their mountain home again