David Attenborough has now lived on Earth for a century.
In that stretch of time, he’s journeyed via forests and oceans, bonded with a family of gorillas, collected fossils, visited hidden tribes, overseen the primary colour TV broadcasts in Europe, narrated inspiring documentaries to lots of of tens of millions of viewers, collected quite a few accolades, had dozens of species named after him and sounded the alarm on local weather change.
Here are some key highlights from the famend environmental broadcaster’s busy and extraordinary life, which he has spent with people, animals and crops alike.
Prince, princess and a parrot
The TV persona developed his hallmark charismatic type of light humor, heat and curiosity in his well-known 1954 “Zoo Quest” sequence, which made him a recognizable determine. In 1958, Attenborough launched a 3-year-old cockatoo, named Cocky, which he captured throughout his final “Zoo Quest” expedition, to little one members of the British royal household – a younger Prince Charles and Anne, Princess Royal.
Recounting the expertise in an interview with the BBC forward of Charles’ coronation in 2023, Attenborough mentioned that the cockatoo was sitting on the prince’s hand and the animal had a “very powerful beak and a very powerful bite. And, although I was fairly confident about Cocky, it could actually have removed Charles’ little finger.”
Attenborough’s profession at the BBC solely catapulted from there, and he turned controller of the BBC’s newly-launched second channel, BBC 2, in 1965. He launched a variety of modern productions, even introducing audiences to the unconventional comedy sequence “Monty Python’s Flying Circus.”
The broadcaster then served as director of tv programming from 1968 to 1972, later resigning to make his personal tv packages.
During an expedition in a distant a part of New Guinea, aired in 1971, Attenborough and his BBC crew made contact with the beforehand unknown Biami tribe. Attenborough communicated with the tribe utilizing gestures, appeared at their private ornaments and enquired concerning the pegs within the ritual punctures within the nostril of one of many males.
Reflecting on that second in an interview with NCS’s Christiane Amanpour in 2016, Attenborough mentioned, “It is a remarkable thing. Surprisingly, how eloquent you can be to somebody who doesn’t know a single word of your language, or indeed hasn’t met your kind before.”
The personable presenter not solely obtained on with folks however managed to befriend a household of gorillas within the forests of Rwanda’s Virunga Mountains. While filming “Life on Earth” in 1978, a 3-year-old Gorilla named Pablo took a liking to Attenborough and playfully laid on him.
The scene captured hearts globally, later resulting in “one of the greatest conservation success stories that I’ve witnessed,” Attenborough mentioned within the April 2026 movie “A Gorilla Story,” through which he tells the story of the identical group of gorillas from the Seventies to the current day. He added that his reference to gorillas is “a connection that has stayed with me my whole life. And it all began with one special little gorilla.”
The naturalist’s keenness to interact with the animals he observes can be evident in his interplay with a blind child rhino at Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya in episode six of the 2013 BBC documentary sequence “Africa.”
After being approached by the rhino throughout filming, Attenborough obtained down on all fours, appeared at the rhino within the face and commenced exchanging squeaks with the animal. Attenborough went on to explain the rhino as an “enchanting creature.”
Attenborough and his brother, the late actor and movie producer Richard Attenborough, grew up dwelling on the campus of the UK’s University of Leicester, since their father was a principal there.
Richard Attenborough as soon as mischievously locked his brother inside a padded cell in a constructing on campus that was as soon as a Victorian lunatic asylum, in accordance with the college. In 2006, the establishment awarded the brothers its highest honor, Distinguished Honorary Fellowships.
Attenborough’s work rose to world prominence within the 2000s, after he explored the world’s oceans in “The Blue Planet,” in addition to wildlife throughout numerous waters, forests, caves, mountains and icy terrains in “Planet Earth.”
The attraction of his inspiring nature packages has earned him three Emmys – the primary one being in 2018 for Outstanding Narrator for “Blue Planet II.” The identical sequence received him a BAFTA.
Attenborough was first knighted by Britain’s late Queen Elizabeth II in 1985 for his companies to tv broadcasting. King Charles III then awarded him a second knighthood – the distinguished Knight Grand Cross – in 2022 for his companies to tv broadcasting and conservation.
Attenborough holds the longest profession as a TV presenter, spanning greater than seven a long time, in accordance with Guinness World Records. Along with William, Prince of Wales, Attenborough helped to arrange in 2019 the Earthshot Prize, which celebrates modern environmental options.
Attenborough had an extended friendship with Queen Elizabeth. He produced a few of her Christmas Day broadcasts for a number of years and the monarch was comfy sufficient to crack jokes with him throughout a stroll via Buckingham Palace Garden for a TV documentary aired in 2018.
“I suppose the most precious things were hearing her laugh,” Attenborough mentioned of the Queen in an interview with ITV News after her passing in 2022.
Attenborough’s voice made its Netflix debut with “Our Planet” in 2019. Again, his narration for the eight-part sequence, which used charming cinematography and informed dramatic tales of animals traversing the pure world, received an Emmy.
At the premiere of the sequence at London’s Natural History Museum, Prince Charles paid tribute to Attenborough “for all he has done over so many years to bring the wonder, the fascination and, increasingly, the desperate plight of the natural world to our attention.”