[dramatic music]
-[Janis] Do you think this is navy? -[woman] No.
[man] I would say it is, actually, yeah.
[Janis] Jesus, really?
-[woman chuckles] -Yeah.
No, honest to God, I think it's black.
Never would I have said navy.
I think Lucy recognized that there were chimps
and that chimps were a different category,
but I don't think she put herself in that other category.
I think she saw herself as a human.
[gentle piano music]
I was 25 when I first met Lucy.
I was a graduate student at the University of Oklahoma.
[crowd cheering]
Norman was a really nice little university town.
-[crowd cheering] -[gentle orchestral music]
I was really happy there,
working in the primate studies group
that had many chimps,
and we used those chimps in our research.
[narrator] This animal study complex
is where chimpanzees are being taught to communicate
with the same sign language used by deaf persons.
[gentle orchestral music]
-[audience reacting] -[Johnny Carson] Aww.
[audience laughing]
Oh, excuse me, I don't mean to laugh at your face,
it's a very sweet face.
[Janis] I was just looking for some part-time work
to help put myself through school.
I thought it was appropriate
that it would have something to do with chimps.
[upbeat dramatic music]
She had a little bit of a reputation of being aggressive.
[upbeat dramatic music]
I had already heard the story
about her jumping through a glass window
at the previous person who had had the job
that I was going to apply for.
[Janis sighs]
Before we can go any further,
there are a few rules about this job
that we have to make clear.
We know that you would have had--
[Janis] Jane and Maury both made it crystal clear to me
that this job was not to get to know Lucy,
that if I thought it was something like that,
I was in the wrong place.
You would be here to clean Lucy's cage and to feed her.
That is all.
We cannot allow any physical contact with Lucy
such as leaning against her cage
or putting fingers through the wires
because she is dangerous.
[cage clatters]
There wasn't any niceties in her greeting with me.
-[cage clatters] -[Lucy chattering]
I would say she was formidable.
-Our little girl... -[Lucy chattering aggressively]
will be fine.
[Lucy chattering aggressively]
[Janis] If she'd had physical contact with me,
she definitely would have put me in my place.
She would have mashed me down there.
[gentle orchestral music]
[Maurice] Well, she was born at a roadside zoo in Florida
where the main attractions were chimps
they trained to box with humans.
Jane went down to collect her
when she was only two days old.
The mother was fed some Coca Cola,
spiked with a strong tranquilizer
and when she'd fallen into a deep sleep,
the baby was taken from her arms and handed to Jane...
who named her Lucy.
They flew home on a commercial airline
and covered by a blanket,
Lucy slept the whole way on Jane's shoulder.
And once Lucy got home, our scientific adventure began.
[cheerful orchestral music]
Being so young, she couldn't have learned
any animal behavior from her real mom.
We wondered how chimp would she turn out to be...
...or how human.
Would she be well-behaved or rebellious?
Clever or stupid?
What human emotions would she have?
Would she, perhaps, be able to tell us that she loves us?
[Janis] I very rarely had contact with the Temerlins.
95% of my time, when I was there, no one was there.
There was always a note left for me on the table.
Oh, clean this, do that, Lucy's gonna have this for lunch.
It was just a normal list that probably a maid would have
or somebody that was taking care of your kids for you.
Lucy had been part of the sign language project
and she had 120 words in her vocabulary.
-[cage rattling] -[Lucy chattering]
She did try communicating with me...
...but my sign language was not up to the point
where I could understand.
Um...
I mean, I had some isolated words.
You scared?
Blanket. Hungry.
Apple. Food.
Oh. [sighs]
But I couldn't really put them together.
Um...
Lucy was pretty well-known
in the sign language world.
She was a very precise signer.
She was a little bit of a perfectionist.
Okay, slow.
So when I asked her to repeat it...
...you know, she'd kinda like roll her eyes
like I was really dumb.
She was very arrogant.
Just very, um, condescending.
And then I called my major professor.
[professor] So she's saying Lucy is cold.
Lucy wants a hot cup of tea.
[Janis] Oh.
[gentle orchestral music]
[Maurice] Raising Lucy,
we've given her every human comfort possible.
After eight hours' sleep
on a king-sized Beautyrest mattress,
she'll have breakfast of coffee, oatmeal with raisins
and a glass of orange Tang.
[Jane laughs]
Sometimes we'll drive around town, going to Dairy Queen
and one time, we went to a drive-in movie
that was playing Planet of the Apes.
Lucy paid no attention whatsoever.
[gentle orchestral music]
In the evenings,
she'll sit around studying herself
with her favorite mirror...
...and occasionally fix a gin and tonic,
squeezing the lime with her teeth.
[gentle orchestral music]
Although raised human,
Lucy still shows some natural behavior.
She grooms us...
...the way chimps in Africa do.
Her way of saying that we're special.
It's as important that we groom her back...
...solidifying the bonds between all of us.
It wasn't long before Lucy
was no longer our experimental subject...
...but our daughter...
...and we were all a family.
[Janis] On the day-to-day basis that I saw her,
I just accepted everything was on Lucy's terms
and I never knew what was gonna happen.
[Lucy chattering]
Very gradually, she started making movements...
[playful orchestral music]
...as if she wanted to groom me.
I knew this was a no-no.
Maury and Jane had said, "Do not lean against there,
she will grab you."
Many people who study chimps
have lost joints of their fingers.
[Lucy chattering]
I remember thinking,
"Do I trust my own judgment right now,
or do I do what they say?"
[playful orchestral music]
I must have just decided I was gonna go with it.
Then when she asked me to groom her,
it was a very special moment for me...
...and had nothing to do with theories of psychology
or learning or anything.
It was our moment.
Sure, I was cleaning up shit in the cage,
but I also was getting to know Lucy.
[gentle orchestral music]
[Lucy chattering]
It was exciting me just the little bit that I got.
I cherished it for what it was as long as I could
because I assumed, once Jane and Maury knew about it,
I would be fired.
[gentle orchestral music]
[crickets chirping]
[static buzzing]
[distorted theme music]
Dr. Temerlin's book, Lucy: Growing Up Human
is indeed, a fascinating study.
It's a definite first, isn't it, Doctor?
I think so, never done this long,
to raise the chimp past sexual maturity,
starting so early.
[static buzzes]
[Jane] Lucy, give me my glasses.
Lucy,
give me my glasses.
Give me my glasses.
[Maurice] Hormones have changed Lucy.
[Jane] Leave that alone, please.
[Maurice] She regularly turns our living room
into pure chaos within minutes.
-[upbeat music] -[Lucy chattering]
And if she gets our keys,
she can easily select the right one
to open the door and escape.
[Jane] Lucy, where are you going?
Won't you come back in here, please?
[Maurice] One time, she was eventually
discovered going through the neighbor's refrigerator.
Come on, Lucy, sit down here and have breakfast,
come on.
Come on, Luc.
When Lucy comes into estrous,
when a wild chimp is ready to mate,
she shows interest in any human male outside the family.
It started affecting her social life
because friends and family
have become intimidated by her size and strength.
[upbeat music]
[cow moos]
Most have stopped visiting all together.
[upbeat music]
[interviewer] We have only a few more moments.
Why did you do this and do you think you've missed anything
as a result of concentrating so heavily,
your life, your family life, with a chimp?
I think Lucy may have missed something,
not knowing chimpanzees, but I don't think we have.
[Janis] The grooming sessions between us
became a regular event
and it was kind of a norm for Lucy and a norm for me.
There was this overwhelming fear
that I was gonna have to tell Maury and Jane
that I couldn't keep this a secret forever.
So the best thing for me to do was be upfront and tell them.
[door closes]
Maurice, there's something
I've been wanting to tell you about Lucy.
It was much easier to talk to Maury
about what I'd done than Jane.
I mean definitely, it wouldn't have been Jane
to discuss this with.
[Janis] I'm really sorry that this has happened
and I hope that you won't think I've been disrespectful to you.
[Janis] He listened to me without interrupting,
without saying a word.
But please don't fire me, I really wanna keep the job.
He said that he was surprised,
happily surprised, and then he said--
Do you wanna meet her outside the cage?
[Janis] I never dreamed that he would say something like that.
I mean, grooming through the wire,
that is totally different
than a face-to-face with an adult chimp.
I'll be right there, so if anything starts to go wrong,
I'll put Lucy right back into the cage.
It'll all be fine.
I don't know.
[Janis] I never thought that there was
anything positive to come of this.
I don't know.
He just talked me into it.
-[cage rattling] -[Lucy chattering]
Maury did nothing that he promised that he was gonna do.
[Lucy shrieking]
I was scared to death.
I couldn't breath because her mouth was covering mine.
All I could do is pray that it wasn't gonna go any further.
[Lucy panting]
And then she sat to the side, panting,
and really frantically grooming me.
I think she was very excited by the opportunity
for us to have full physical contact.
-[quiet chattering] -[gentle music]
[laughs]
She was happy, she was really happy.
[dog barks]
I became the friend from outside of the nuclear family.
And she brought me in.
It was at a time in her emotional development
that she needed more than just her mom and dad all the time.
One day when I went to work, there was a note.
In all the months that I'd been there,
there had never been a request to see me, never.
The last few years have been difficult for us.
Having to put our daughter into a cage...
[Janis] Maury's the one that did the talking.
He spoke very emotionally
about what they had been going through with Lucy.
[clattering]
[Maurice] Fully grown,
Lucy has become unpredictable around strangers.
[object clatters]
[Jane] No no, no, no, no no, sit down.
[Maurice] Lucy, sit down.
Lucy, sit down right here.
-Lucy-- -Lucy, sit down.
[Lucy chattering]
[Maurice] Recently, she bit someone and threatened others.
Is this her nature, overtaking our nurture?
We no longer go anywhere there could be people.
And she's spending more and more time in her cage.
Growing up, we gave Lucy a loving family home...
...but it's now an impossible place
for her to live as an adult.
Jane and I have had to make
one of the toughest decisions of our lives...
...to find Lucy a new home...
...one where she doesn't have her freedoms taken away
and can be her own person.
It'll mean losing our daughter.
But it's the best thing for Lucy.
They were in a predicament of their own making
and they were fully aware of it,
but at the time that they brought Lucy home
and conceptualization of this program,
I don't think that anyone knew the downside of it.
I know they didn't.
We've been searching all over Europe and the U.S.
to find her a new home,
but nothing has even come close to being good enough.
[Janis] He recounted all the pros and cons of each place.
Nothing was satisfactory.
And then his whole demeanor changed.
He got a little bit of a sparkle back in his eyes
and he said that they had heard about a project.
That takes chimpanzees and teaches them
how to live in the wild.
And so, we're taking Lucy to Africa.
[Janis] It kind of hit me,
gee, Lucy's gonna go all the way to Africa?
And it just seemed so far-fetched
and so out of left field.
[Maurice] We're gonna go over with her to settle her in
and we want you to come with us too.
It was a real shock to me, a big shock to me.
Um...
I had never been to Africa.
It wasn't on my list of places to go either.
But there was no way that I could say no.
I needed to go to give Lucy the support.
[dramatic music]
Maury and Jane were gonna stay for two weeks,
and I would stay one week after they left.
Packing for the trip, everything was about Lucy.
I was overloaded with dry fruit,
her mirror [laughs]
and all of her stuff was priority.
I took a couple of outfits to wear,
three paperback books,
and I feel like I had a flute.
I do recall one of the cabin attendants coming up
and saying that people in first class
were hearing Lucy screaming.
I think she thought that she was enhancing our journey
by telling us that, but I just can imagine
Maury and Jane, for sure, would not wanna hear that.
[dramatic orchestral music]
[Man] Here, in the Gambia, West Africa,
is the Abuko Nature Reserve where captive chimpanzees,
both young and adult, are being returned to the wild.
[birds chirping]
[gentle music]
[animals chattering]
[Jane] No one had taken a chimp
that had been born in the States
and taken it back to the wild,
and particularly one that had been deprived
of growing up with chimpanzees.
The hope was that she would be free,
she would be part of a chimpanzee community
and bond with them,
but many, many steps and many, many hazards
between the idea and the reality of that.
[Janis] They had found an option
that they felt had high risks,
but you know, if it worked, it was paradise
and that's what they wanted for her.
And so that's the road that they took,
but it doesn't mean that it was an easy road for them.
Often they couldn't speak.
Words couldn't come out even if they wanted to
because, you know, the emotion was all the way up to there.
And I'm sure they were counting the days
until the final goodbye.
[gentle music]
[Jane] We were saying goodbye to a daughter.
She was a very intimate part of our lives for over a decade.
A long time.
[gentle music]
Maury and I were going to leave
and we said, as we always did, "Goodnight, Lucy."
And she said her goodnight,
which was a lovely low, soft panting.
It was a loving goodbye, it was.
She didn't realize she wouldn't see us in the morning,
but we did.
I can still hear that.
[low, soft panting]
[Janis] Lucy had a million physical reasons
for being depressed
and then she had the whopping emotional one
of, "What in the world am I doing here?"
"What is this about, where is Maury and Jane?"
And I had no way to explain this to Lucy.
[Lucy chattering]
So, I mean, why act like life is great?
It wasn't for her.
[quiet music]
She didn't have any friends,
she was clearly dependent on me.
So I extended by two weeks...
...and still, she was not giving indicators
that we were even moving in the right direction on this.
Not long after that, I remember...
...setting my last extension to three months.
After that, I really had to get moving
with my own life's plans because
I had an assistantship at the university, I was teaching.
I had a dog.
I had a boyfriend.
So that was to be the final decision.
Not long after that, finances became an issue.
And I moved from the hotel...
...into a tree house in the Abuko Nature Reserve.
I think everyone had the expectation
that I knew what I was getting myself into
and that I had experience.
But I didn't know anything.
I don't think I ever really used matches before
that I can remember.
Everything was always electricity.
A lot of things that I didn't even think about
until I was presented with a situation.
It never even occurred to me that there was no water.
But the strong point was,
I was gonna be 100 meters away from Lucy...
...and I could be going back and forth at great ease.
[Lucy chattering]
She lost tremendous amounts of weight,
mostly because of parasites,
and started to lose patches of hair.
I think a lot of it had to do with
the unfamiliarity of the food and the climate.
She was just like barely hanging on.
Lucy only had me and her memories.
So I tried to stay with her as long as I could.
And we would play these little games
where I would go Lucy's nose, Janis' nose,
Lucy's ear, Janis' ear, and you know,
she would sit there very in tune with what I was doing
and concentrating like it was the most important thing to her.
[gentle music]
And I became the focal point for her social contact
and she was, for me.
[gentle music]
I think that we began to know each other
as people during that era.
There was no more chimpanzee, human...
...it was Janis and Lucy.
[Jane] It was clear, at that point,
this is gonna be a much longer,
much more difficult task than any of us imagined.
A growing understanding of what I'm asking of her...
...to give up her life in the States
and the path that she was on
and stay there under those circumstances.
I pleaded with her to come back.
But she was steadfast.
She wouldn't do it.
[Janis] I wasn't even aware
of the depth of my feeling for Lucy
until I was faced with the question,
was I able to leave her in that kind of a situation?
Or did I have an allegiance
to my love for her to stay with her?
Which, that's what I decided to do.
[announcer] Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom.
Our special report today takes us to the Gambia
where the fundamental elements of survival,
which were never learned by these chimps,
are being taught to them now
in a very comprehensive program by Janis Carter.
[energetic music]
They must be taught the essential skills
such as how to find food and water,
how to recognize and avoid predators,
and even how to communicate with another chimpanzee.
I wasn't a professional, nobody had taught me how to do it.
It was just trial and error,
learning whatever I thought a chimp would have done,
I would try to do that myself.
[grunting]
Already, Dash has reacted to my food grunting
and has accepted the idea of this new food source.
When I took the smaller chimps out,
I would take a bag with me
and I would collect extra
and I would take it back for Lucy.
She couldn't go out of the cage
because she was much too large and potentially dangerous.
And tourists walked through this reserve.
The idea was, it would be a gradual transition
from a diet that she was familiar with and that she liked
to a diet that she would be eating in the wild.
-[Lucy chattering] -Mm.
But even with me eating it,
and giving really exaggerated food grunts
like I just loved it...
...she would pretend like it wasn't there.
She just wasn't willing to try and
my concerns that, you know, the next stage was gonna be
the real world for Lucy and what was that going to be like
if she couldn't even adjust at this stage.
-[birds chirping] -[gentle music]
[door closes]
I knew that this was the next step in the whole process,
but I really loved Abuko.
I couldn't imagine leaving this beautiful Garden of Eden
to go up to this wild area.
It frightened me, it really did scare me.
[man] While the majority of the journey is by Land Rover,
the final stage is by boat, handled by the director of
Gambia's Wildlife Conservation Department, Eddie Brewer.
[Janis] I was dropped off, alone,
and initially, I didn't even have a boat...
...and not a radio, nothing.
I felt abandoned then.
-[birds chirping] -[animals chittering]
But I couldn't really show this in front of the chimps
because I was supposed to be the brave one
and I was the leader,
but I did not know what we were doing.
[chimps chittering]
We were gonna be in a world that we didn't know...
...that we had to begin to get to know together.
[energetic, dramatic music]
There's always something spiritual about a forest.
Sometimes my skin gets kind of tingly,
depending on what I'm walking through.
The periphery of the island was gallery forest.
[dramatic music]
Then there was woodland savanna and the interior was swamp.
[dramatic music]
I had snakes around me all the time,
a lot of cobras and puff adders.
-[dramatic music] -[chimps chittering]
There were hippos and there were hyenas
on the island as well.
Well, I don't think anyone told me about the leopards.
I had a cage that had been constructed
by the British Army.
It wasn't for me to be protected from the environment,
it was so that my things could be protected from the chimps.
In the beginning, it was a bed,
a mosquito net,
the gas burner for heating water and cooking,
which I rarely did.
It didn't occur to me that I should have filtered water.
I would just take water from the river and then
the dirt would settle down to the bottom
and that's what I drank.
[flies buzzing]
One time was a rat
and I had been drinking out of that bucket.
[insects chirping]
At night, the chimps, they were going to sleep outside,
I was going to sleep inside.
But they wanted to be as close as they possibly could to me,
so they slept on the roof, just above my bed.
-[animals shrieking] -[cage rattling]
For all of us, there were a lot of vocalizations
that we hadn't heard in Abuko.
[animals shrieking]
Every time there was some foreign sound
that woke them up,
they would immediately urinate or defecate.
[animals shrieking]
And it would come down on my bed.
There was no way that I could stop them.
I just had to accept that this is the way it was going to be.
[chimps chittering]
I did think to myself, "Jesus, what am I doing?"
[animals shrieking]
I did advertise for somebody to come to work for me.
And a couple of people answered.
Neither one of the people ever even got out of the boat
on the jetty, the chimps just went nuts.
[gentle music]
This was a stranger to our little world
and they didn't want anyone there at all.
That left me alone,
completely alone with them.
There was no one that could kinda take over in my absence.
There was no way that I could even think about going away
for an extended period of time.
It was emotionally difficult.
-[chimps shrieking] -[cage rattling]
[typewriter clicking]
I suppose part of what made it harder
was that I didn't have anyone to confer with.
Everything was on me and my gut.
In terms of written communication,
it could be six months before I would get a response
with the feedback from someone to reassure me that, "Yes,
you're doing the right thing."
[typewriter clanks]
[Jane] She was clear about the struggles.
She was clear about how hard it was.
You know, waiting for every letter from her.
What's going to be next?
Is Lucy gonna be hurt? Is Lucy gonna be sick?
How about Janis,
is she going to be overwhelmed by what she's dealing with?
I worried about her health and her well-being every day,
every day.
[typewriter clanks]
[typewriter clicking]
[birds chirping]
[Janis] The others were okay.
I knew that they would make it.
They would forage, they would go off together.
[dramatic music]
But Lucy was a different case altogether.
Well, Lucy's smart enough to respond to modeling behavior
and she knew what I was trying to do.
[Janis] Lucy,
food, get.
[Janis] She just wasn't gonna bend an inch,
it seemed like, and forage for herself.
[Janis] Lucy, food, get.
Her accepting that wild fruits and leaves
were going to be a major part of her diet
was really important.
Lucy, food, get.
She needed to do this in order to survive
and in order for me to leave.
Lucy, food, get.
Where I really began to ponder...
Lucy, food, get.
...we've gotta find some other kind of option for Lucy.
This isn't gonna work.
[dramatic music]
I wrote to the Temerlins, saying that,
you know, she just won't, she won't do this.
She's just, I don't know what we're gonna do about it.
[typewriter clicking]
[interviewer] And do you think, in the back of your mind,
you're thinking, "I've come all this way,
I've given up everything for you
and you're not doing what--"
I never thought, it never went through my head,
"You owe me. [laughs]
I've given everything up."
That idea never went through my head at all,
through any of it.
I knew that she could do it
and I just couldn't figure out
why she wouldn't just give in and do it.
And this went on and on and on.
Lucy, eat the food!
Understand!
Lucy, eat food.
[Janis] This particular day,
I had gotten angry at her and yelled at her.
Lucy, eat food!
I probably expressed exasperation
like I had never expressed it before.
Mmm, mmm, mmm.
[Janis] I'm not even gonna try anymore,
just forget it.
Lucy, eat food!
[birds chirping]
I don't know if I just passed out
or if I actually went to sleep.
But when I woke up, the world had changed.
[Lucy chittering]
[gentle music]
[Lucy chittering]
She was eating leaves.
[laughing]
Lucy knew me very well.
She was very sensitive to people's moods.
It's possible that she understood
I had reached my limit that day.
It was, perhaps, a breaking point for her
that she finally had to give in.
It was an immense relief.
I had lost hope, but it really gave me hope.
[chimps chittering]
[interviewer] It strikes me
that relief was the turning point.
But it was only on the feeding front,
it wasn't on anything else.
-[insects chirping] -[gentle music]
Even if Lucy acquired her foraging skills,
she couldn't have survived on the island totally alone.
She had to integrate socially
with the rest of the chimps.
But she wanted all of her emotional needs
and social needs met by me and it prevented her
from interacting with anyone else in the group.
[chimps chittering]
So I had to withdraw for her to feel empty
to the point that she would look to somebody else
to fulfill those needs.
[crying]
I knew how it was impacting on Lucy,
that she was feeling ignored and left out
and forgotten and unloved.
But if I gave in,
she wouldn't be able to realize what we had all hoped
that she would, which was to be independent,
free and have choice.
[animals chittering]
I had been so afraid to go to the island,
but the longer that I stayed, the less I wanted to leave.
It was the perfect paradise that I was so lucky
to have found that.
But it was a different kind of paradise.
There were some unusual things that happened at night.
[animals chittering]
[dramatic music]
[animals chittering]
I would see a light.
It would go back and forth and back.
[animals chittering]
I could feel this really strong pull,
trying to pull me into it.
[suspenseful music]
[birds chirping]
And it always happened the same way, just like that.
I believe that there were spirits
that were taking care of me when I was there
and that's why I survived it all those years.
I was never harmed.
[animals chittering]
I suppose those are the layers of mystery
that really enhanced how I feel about the island.
[boat engine humming]
I tried to keep a balance
between communicating with the outside world
and living a life that I was on the island.
But it was very difficult.
[playful music]
I would read letters with great excitement
and be happy with it.
And then in a very short period of time,
it was like some sentence was kinda highlighted,
going across [laughs] my brain, what's this mean?
"Maybe now we can start thinking about
returning to your life back here."
[muttering quietly]
Could it mean this? Could it mean that?
And I was really preoccupied with it.
It was actually making me unbalanced.
[muttering] "Back here now."
[muttering]
There was just no way that I could be totally immersed
in this world with the chimps
and also immersed in a human world.
I couldn't live in both worlds.
I just gradually drifted away
from family and friends.
I stopped writing
and I stopped receiving letters as well.
I don't remember being lonely.
I remember sometimes feeling like I had too much
human stimuli from the chimps and I would just scream,
"Can't you just leave me alone for a minute?"
They fulfilled all those human needs
that I had for social contact.
Lucy and I had more of a friendship.
My feelings for Dash...
...it was more mother- offspring type of feeling.
He manipulated me, just like all little boys do
with their mothers.
Especially if they're an only child.
But we just loved each other's company.
[interviewer] So you were sort of
reaching another level of being with them.
Were you, essentially, one of them?
I don't know, I don't...
I don't know if I ever became
a chimp, so to speak.
But I do think that our personalities
and our cultural tendencies all met together
at some point and we were just who we were.
And things changed for Lucy as well.
She developed a different kind of aura about herself,
one that was more peaceful.
She didn't have patches of hair missing anymore
and she didn't express such neediness
as she had in the early years.
She could go out and forage with the group without me.
She interacted with the other chimps.
I just thought of us as beings,
that it was Dash and Janis
and Lucy and Lakey,
not Janis with a group of chimps.
And we were on a mission.
I learned a lot more about families...
...living with the chimps than I think I did
with my own human family.
[insects chirping]
Sunset was a really important moment of reflection
for all of us.
You know, we would always go out on the jetty.
No matter who was mad at who during the day
or who had bitten who or was holding a grudge or whatever,
it all washed away as the sun went down.
And we'd hang our hands in the river.
I don't know why that makes me emotional.
[gentle music]
It just seemed...
...so genuine.
Every second of it was just so genuine and we were...
appreciative of what life had given us that day.
Feeling that all of these vile forces of civilization
just did not impact us.
It was...
...just us.
[birds chirping]
[insects chirping]
I didn't think about going back at that point.
Time had a different schedule for me then.
I mean, I would have indicators of seasons
by the date palm putting out its new fruits
and you know that a whole year has passed.
I was...
I suppose you call it living in the moment, don't you?
I was living in the moment.
This particular day, it was a hot day.
[chimps chittering]
We were all walking the forest.
And I was in the back and I probably wasn't even thinking
about what I was doing.
[chimps chittering]
I suddenly heard everybody scream and scatter.
[chimps shrieking]
And there was Dash, he had his hair up.
He was all pumped up and he was like bouncing on his toes.
I was gonna get it that day.
I was the leader in the beginning.
He was young when we first went there,
but he respected the dominance hierarchy.
But he was the oldest male,
so it was inevitable that he was going to be the one
that was gonna take over leadership of the group.
But for some reason,
I never thought that this was gonna happen.
[chimps screaming]
I just stood there and he charged me.
This is it.
[chimps screaming]
He grabbed my leg.
And he just dragged me everywhere he was going.
[chimps screaming]
And then he dragged me through this thorn bush,
and my body got caught.
[dramatic music]
-[labored breathing] -[running footsteps]
-[chimps screaming] -[cage rattling]
[labored breathing]
I was no longer the leader, I was number two,
but a number two that wasn't gonna be tolerated.
Dash would have slammed me if I tried to stay.
This was his place now.
[gentle music]
It was very strange, leaving the island.
I wanted the feeling that I was a part of something
and I didn't have it.
I really missed the fullness of my life
and kind of purpose that I felt when I woke up.
[horn honking]
[people chattering]
[Jane] She had a hard time adjusting.
How do you go back to living
primarily in a world of human beings?
And you're having to live an everyday life,
negotiating human structures,
human customs, human food.
[people chattering]
It was incredibly stressful for her.
-[radio blasting] -[horn honks]
-[gentle music] -[birds chirping]
[Janis] I knew that she was getting better,
but there was still this,
the overall concern on my part that Lucy was not going to
be able to survive without me there
kind of orchestrating or monitoring what was going on.
I took some of her human objects
that had been so important to her before.
She picked them up, looked at them
and put them back down again.
Nothing that had been important to her before,
that mirror was just like her very favorite object,
it meant nothing.
[gentle music]
After that, we groomed each other and talked a little bit.
And then she suddenly,
um, really without any indication, grabbed me...
...and just pulled me really tight.
It was very intense,
it was not like any other embrace we had ever had.
It signified the life that we had shared together.
At the end of it,
she just got up, turned around
and walked back to the other chimps.
I was really, really surprised
that she initiated the separation.
Honestly, it had been so hard for so long,
I just never thought that she would walk away from me.
But Lucy had finally made it.
She was comfortable within herself
and that she was in control of her own life,
which is what we'd all wanted.
Lucy still loved me, that was very, very clear,
but she didn't need me in the way that she had
for so many years.
Eventually, I felt comfortable enough
to take my first real vacation,
leaving Lucy behind in her new life.
I always had wanted to go to Bali.
[gentle music]
I had this dream one night
about Lucy getting on an airplane
and she had a bag with her
and she was going up the ladder of the plane.
I knew that she...
...she was dead.
[birds chirping]
There was no indication
of what might have been the cause of death.
But the more that we talked about it,
the more it just remains a mystery what happened to her.
I wanted her buried on the island.
So she's there on the island.
[interviewer] That's the right place
for her to be, though, isn't it?
Yeah.
That was her final home.
[Jane] I was always just waiting.
When were we gonna get the call?
And it was a very, very difficult thing to hear.
It was a terrible loss for all of us.
I was so grateful to Janis
for giving Lucy this chance after her time with us.
She had some really good years.
And she had freedom and she wasn't in a cage.
She was protected, she was loved.
She had Janis.
But I wouldn't take a chimp
from its chimpanzee mother again.
Lucy's death had a certain finality
to the rest of what I was doing with my life.
I did go through a lot of thinking
as to whether I had achieved everything
that I had set out to do.
Was it time to start thinking about returning to the U.S.?
Do I need to be here anymore?
[inspirational music]
For years, after I left the island,
I used to have a ritual of watching the sun go down.
It didn't really matter where I was.
It was a sacred moment.
I guess that was the beauty of that period of my life
was that I did have that feeling.
I mean, how often do you get a chance
to live like that today?
[gentle music]