The Murder Of Dian Fossey Trivia Quiz

Answer: December 27, 1985

Wayne McGuire, a research worker, found the body of Dian Fossey on the morning of December 27, 1985. Dian was the world famous primatologist who brought the Mountain Gorillas' plight to the world's attention.

McGuire found that Dian's metal sheeting to her cabin was cut open. The opening allowed the murderer to gain access to Dian's bedroom. McGuire also found Dian's gun, unloaded, but with the bullets on the floor of her bedroom. Dian was killed by a machete. The machete actually split her skull and face open. Dian's frightened expression was frozen on her face. In her hands was human hair of European nature. Because of the hair, which was later identified as Fossey's own hair, the Rwandanese officials laid claim that a white person had murdered Dian.

Unfortunately for Wayne McGuire, he was he only white person, besides Dian, in camp at the time of her murder, so naturally he was accused of her murder. But did Wayne McGuire actually murder Dian? If not, then who did?

Answer: Rwanda

On December 19, 1966, Dian left America for Africa. She was supposed to study the majestic Mountain Gorillas for two years, but those two years ended up being almost twenty. At first, Dian spent a few days at the camp of Jane Goodall, the world famous primatologist who has been studying the Chimpanzee for nearly 30 years, where she learned how to run her camp. Then Dian went to Nairobi, from the Gombe Stream Reserve in Tanzania, to have a meeting with Dr. Leakey.

She arrived in the Congo in 1967, setting up her camp in the Kabara Meadow on the Congo side of the Virungas. However, Dian was only Kabara Meadow for six months before she was forced off the mountain by the Congolese military. The Congolese held her captive for nearly two weeks, during which she was repeatedly raped. She was the last white to get out of the eastern Congo alive after July 4, 1967. The Congolese military said that if Fossey ever tried to enter the Congo again, that she would be killed on sight. After her escape from the Congo, Dian then went to Rwanda and set up her Gorilla research center, called Karisoke Research Centre, which she named after the two mountains that she was in the center of, Mt. Karasimbi and Mt. Visoke.

It would be at Karisoke 18 years later that Dian would be murdered. Were the Congolese military involved in her murder?

Answer: Whipping the men about the genitals.

When Dian first set up the Karisoke Research Centre, she was just concerned with her study. But in 1969, when National Geographic photographer, Robert Campbell arrived to photograph Dian's interaction with the Gorillas, she had become fierce with the poachers. From 1969 until 1985, whenever a poacher was caught, they were brought back to her camp.

Once at Karisoke, Dian would yell obscenities at them in English, German, French, and Swahili. She would get right in their face and scream, her face distorting to show her rage. She would then whip the marauders about the genitals, which was her preferred method of torture. After that she would spread Gorilla dung on their faces. Finally ending with placing their own snares around their necks to act like she was going to hang them. Her students, staff, and friends were horrified at what she did to the poachers. But Dian felt that the survival of the Mountain Gorillas was her responsibility. And to that end, Dian did everything in her power to frighten the poachers away. Most stayed away, but some took their revenge on Dian out on the Gorillas. This made Dian even angrier, and when this woman was angry, her temper could equal that of the explosion of Mt. St. Helen's.

Answer: True

During Dian's time at Karisoke, she astonished to see herds of cattle trampling through the protected Virungas. The cattle herders didn't care that their cattle was eating up the vegetation that was meant for the Gorillas, but Dian cared. Dian frequently shot at the herd of cattle in order to drive them away. She would shoot over their heads, but when the cattle herders kidnapped her dog, Cindy, she held hostage eight head of cattle, and threatened to shoot one every day that Cindy was gone. After she killed one, her dog was returned.

Dian, who loved and adored children, kidnapped a child of one of the cattle herders when Cindy was kidnapped again. And when she spotted several poachers within the vicinity of the Gorillas, she and her staff chased after them. They caught a child, which Dian refused to return until she found out who it was exactly that was behind the poaching activities. The child was safely returned after Dian found out who was behind the poaching activities. Was this knowledge that Dian had responsible for her murder?

Answer: Karisoke Research Centre

After Dian established Karisoke, it became the host of a number of research students. Michael Burkhart was the first. Dian came to hate him because he had no idea what he was doing. Alan Goodall (no relation to Jane Goodall) also felt the wrath of Dian. Kelly Stewart, daughter of famed actor, Jimmy Stewart, and Alexander Harcourt were with Dian during some of the most troubling times at Karisoke.

They saw how she threatened poachers, cattle herders, and anyone who threatened the existence of the Mountain Gorillas. Stewart and Harcourt believe that Dian's actions during these years ultimately caused her death. Dian was a white woman in predominately black Rwanda, and the country was so overcrowded that the government began allotting land within the park boundaries to be used for cultivation. Fossey fought this and defended the Gorillas with her life.

Answer: Cundura

In 1970, Alan Goodall, a research student, arrived at Karisoke to study the Mountain Gorillas for his Ph.D. He was everything that Dian Fossey was looking for in a student, as she was about to leave for six weeks for the United States. During this time, Goodall would be in complete charge of the camp. Because of this, Dian showed Goodall her methods of dealing with poachers, but she told him to shoot over their heads, not shoot at them.

During the six weeks that she was away, six Gorillas were murdered in at the foot of Mt. Karasimbi in the small village of Cundura. The animals' heads and hands were hacked off, and the reason given for the slaughter was that one of the Gorillas had bitten a child. But the real reason that came out later was because of Dian's ways with a gun, and Goodall's shooting of the poachers.

Whatever the reason, this one event had an everlasting effect on Fossey. She became even more irate, more vindictive, and more antagonizing against the poachers. Little did she know, and in reality she did not know, that her actions would lead to her death.

Answer: Rwelekana

Rwelekana was Dian's tracker from the time he was 16 years old. In June 1986, 31-year-old Rwelekana was arrested for her murder. Although there wasn't any evidence to support this, he was placed in jail. Rwelekana proclaimed his innocence the entire time he was in custody. Sadly, the charges against him were dropped after he allegedly hung himself in his cell.

Answer: Wayne McGuire

It had taken Wayne McGuire four years to get Dian's consent to come to Karisoke. He was interested in the male parental care of the Mountain Gorillas, and that was the reason he wanted so desperately to work with Fossey.

McGuire was the only white person in camp at the time of her murder and upon hearing from the United States Embassy that he was going to be arrested for the murder of Dian Fossey he fled to America. The Rwanda government never bothered to try to extradite him. Instead, in a trial in absentia, McGuire was convicted of her murder. If he ever goes back to Rwanda, he will be hung. But did McGuire really kill Dian? If not, then who did?

Answer: Human hair clutched in her fists.

When Dian's body was found on that cold December morning, human hair was seen clenched in her fists. Although it was believed to be her own hair, it was still tested. But the tests didn't come back until after Wayne McGuire was tried and convicted in absentia.

The autopsy reports state that Ms. Fossey's death was not instantaneous. Dian suffered for quite awhile before death overcame this strong woman.

Answer: Protais Zigiranyirazo

On June 9, 2001, Protais Zigiranyirazo, the former Governor of the Ruhengeri province in Rwanda, brother-in-law of the assassinated Rwandan president, and one of the country's most wanted criminals for his creation of death squads, which killed 800,000 in 1994, was arrested on genocidal murder.

Zigiranyirazo murdered Dian because she had found out that he was the ringleader behind the poaching and endangered species smuggling ring, and she was going to turn him in to the authorities. Dian Fossey died for her beloved Mountain Gorillas, but she did not die in vain. In 2002, 385 Gorillas were reported alive and well in the Virungas. Maybe the spirit of Dian is still protecting them.

All information comes directly from the books "The Dark Romance of Dian Fossey" by Harold T. P. Hayes, "Woman in The Mist" by Farley Mowat, "Gorillas in The Mist" by Dian Fossey, and Animal Welfare Institute Quarterly.