R.I.P. Washoe

2007’s been a bad year for animal research. First, Alex the parrot dies, and now Washoe, the first sign language chimp has brachiated off this mortal coil:

Washoe, who first learned a bit of American Sign Language in a research project in Nevada, had been living on Central Washington University’s Ellensburg campus since 1980. She had a vocabulary of about 250 words.

She died Tuesday night, according to Roger and Deborah Fouts, co-founders of The Chimpanzee and Human Communications Institute on the campus. She was born in Africa about 1965.

She’s survived by Tatu, 31, Loulis, 29, and Dar, 31.

Posted on timeOctober 31st, 2007 by userSimon Greenhill



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