In 1964, a chimpanzee named Lucy was born. With her birth came a remarkable study of chimpanzees' brain capacity, behavior, and language capabilities.
Two days after Lucy was born, Maurice and Jane Temerlin took Lucy from her parents. For the next ten years, Lucy was raised as a human being. She used the toilet, slept in a bed, wore clothes, and even served tea for guests. When she was four, Lucy began taking lessons to learn sign language. Through sign language, she learned to communicate with her parents and other people who would come to visit her. Lucy also developed emotions. She comforted her mother when she was sad and helped her when she was sick.
The fantasy could not last forever. Lucy began to get very aggressive, virtually tearing the Temerlin's house to shreds. In result of Lucy's violent actions, Maurice and Jane were forced to make a very difficult decision: what should they do with Lucy? Eventually, Lucy was taken to a nature reserve in Gambia. Lucy's emotional attachment to the Temerlins was evident when she began to lose hair and get skin infections after the Temerlins left her at the nature reserve. Janis Carter, a psychology graduate student, grew close with Lucy and eventually took Lucy and other emotionally damaged chimpanzees to a deserted island to live their lives independently. Janis stayed on the island with the chimpanzees for a long period of time, attempting to free Lucy into the wild. After Lucy successfully released Lucy to the wild, Janis returned to her life. Year later, when Janis went to check of Lucy, Lucy was missing. It is thought that Lucy was killed by poachers.
The story of Lucy the chimpanzee is very touching. She was a gifted chimpanzee and led the modern world of science to impressive new studies involving chimpanzees and language. Personally, it is very touching to hear such an emotional story. The idea of someone having a chimpanzee in their household that they interact with everyday is very abstract.
