Nick Pyenson

I think what we were trying to do was communicate with the chimps and let them learn something that we teach them so that we could have conversations and that sort of thing.

You know, I just was looking to communicate with a chimp.

Elise drove up in her van and she steps out of the van and goes around to the other side and opens the door and Lily steps out.

And Lily's a chimp.

And she's about six, seven years old at the time.

And she jumps up into Elise's arms and Elise carries her on, you know, on her hip and walks over and

We introduced ourselves, and Lily had been purchased by Elise when Elise was a teenager, I think 17 or 18 years old, out of the back of a magazine, which I thought was crazy.

I mean, COD, let's just order us a chimp.

And that's what she did, and that is how I met Elise and Lily.

About two months after I was there, I was essentially running the place.

Lily was with the other chimps.

During this period, she had started to stay with the chimps more.

Even at night, I thought it was really good for her.

It was growing up, you know.

She wasn't a kid anymore.

She was going into adolescence.

Life was good.

In September of 1977, Nim came from Columbia University with a group that was working with Nim in New York.

Later on that day, we actually went on a walk before the New York people left because it was going to be the last time they saw Nim.

And that's when it clicked in my head.