Dian's Active Conservation | Dian Fossey: Secrets in the Mist

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WOMAN 1: For her time, Dian was very exceptional. Women wanted to get married and have kids. Setting up Karisoke, and studying the gorillas, and living that whole kind of life was completely not how she was brought up. She was not raised in an animal loving family. She followed her own path very soon in life.

MAN 1: She had aspirations to work with animals as a vet, but she didn't get the grades. So she ended up working with children, as an occupational therapist, which she did for, must have been, 10 years. So she'd already had a successful career before this complete change of direction.

MAN 2: She wasn't doing it to get academic credentials.

WOMAN 1: The paleoanthropologist, Louis Leakey, was looking for somebody to go start a long-term study of gorillas. He had helped launch Jane Goodall's career.

WOMAN 2: I'd already decided that I must study gorillas before first meeting Dr. Leakey. After a brief interview, he suggested that I become the gorilla girl he had been seeking. And our conversation ended with his assertion that I should have my appendix removed before venturing into the remote wilderness of Central Africa.

WOMAN 1: Leakey mentioned the possibility of having to have her appendix out, and she put herself right in for the operation. He was shocked, but, clearly, it convinced him that this one might stick. She was very determined.