Chomsky is also somewhat unique in that he would communicate with literally anyone who wanted to talk to him. I remember seeing Manufacturing Consent for the first time in 9th grade in 1999, and I sent him an email, and he responded within the hour.

His Wikipedia article [0] gives a good summary of the connection they had.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky#Friendship_with_J...