System Mechanic - Clean, repair, protect, and speed up your PC!Helen Keller, Advocate for the blind & deaf
June 27, 1880 - June 01, 1968
Helen Keller was born July 27, 1880 in Tuscumbia, Alabama. Her father, Captain Arthur H. Keller, had fought with the Confederate army at Vicksburg. He edited newspaper, the North Alabamian and was periodically a US Marshall of North Alabama. Her mother was Captain Keller's second wife and had been raised in the social circles of Memphis. Both were consummate southerners.
Helen was a bright and lively infant, but at the age of 19 months she had a fever, which left her blind and deaf. The illness that struck the infant Helen Keller and left her deaf and blind, was diagnosed as brain fever at the time; perhaps it was scarlet fever. Helen Keller grew from infancy into childhood, wild, unruly, and with little real understanding of the world around her.
The Kellers sought advice and remedies for Helen. As she approached the age of 7, they visited Alexander Graham Bell in Washington D.C. because he was an activist in deaf education. Bell recommended the Perkins School for the Blind in Boston. A recent graduate of the school, Anne Sullivan, also known as Annie, was offered the position of tutor. In March, 1887, Anne Mansfield Sullivan. who had regained useful sight through a series of operations, arrived in Tuscumbia to live with the Kellers as governess. From that fateful day, the two--teacher and pupil--were inseparable until the death of the former in 1936.
Anne was strict, but she had a lot of energy. In just a few days, she taught Helen how to spell words with her hands (called the manual alphabet, which is part of the sign language that deaf people use.) The trouble was, Helen didn't understand what the words meant—until one morning at the water pump (like an outdoor water fountain) she got a whole new attitude. Anne had Helen hold one hand under the water. Then she spelled "W-A-T-E-R" into Helen's other hand. It was electric! The feeling turned into a word. Immediately, Helen bent down and tapped the ground; Anne spelled "earth." Helen's brain flew; that day, she learned 30 words. From then on, Helen's mind raced ahead. She learned to speak when she was ten by feeling her teacher's mouth when she talked. Often people found it hard to understand her, but she never gave up trying.
In 1890, when she was just 10, she expressed a desire to learn to speak. Somehow she had found out that a little deaf-blind girl in Norway had acquired that ability. Miss Sarah Fuller of the Horace Mann School was her first speech teacher. Meanwhile, she learned to read French, German, Greek, and Latin in braille! When she was 20, she entered Radcliffe College, the women's branch of Harvard University. She entered Radcliffe in the fall of 1900 and received her Bachelor of Arts degree cum laude in 1904. Throughout these years and until her own death in 1936, Anne Sullivan was always by Helen's side, laboriously spelling book after book and lecture after lecture, into her pupil's hand. Helen Keller's formal schooling ended when she received her B.A. degree, but throughout her life she continued to study and stayed informed on all matters of importance to modern people. In recognition of her wide knowledge and many scholarly achievements, she received honorary doctoral degrees from Temple University and Harvard University and from the Universities of Glasgow, Scotland; Berlin, Germany; Delhi, India; and Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. She was also an Honorary Fellow of the Educational Institute of Scotland.
Anne Sullivan's marriage, in 1905, to John Macy, an eminent critic and prominent socialist, caused no change in the teacher-pupil relationship. Helen went to live with the Macys and both husband and wife unstintingly gave their time to help her with her studies and other activities. While still a student at Radcliffe, Helen Keller began a writing career that was to continue on and off for 50 years. In 1902, The Story of My Life, which had first appeared in serial form in the Ladies Home Journal, appeared in book form. The Story of My Life, was translated into 50 languages. (She used two typewriters: one regular, one braille.) She wrote ten more books and a lot more articles!. She used a braille typewriter to prepare her manuscripts and then copied them on a regular typewriter.
In 1914, it was apparent that with Anne Sullivan's health failing, a new companion was needed for Helen. This was how Polly Thompson entered Helen's life. Polly was a young woman who had recently arrived from Scotland, and although she had no experience with the blind or deaf, she was hired to keep house. She was to become a life-long companion to Helen In 1921, the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) was organized. Helen was invited to be a spokesperson for the organization. She traveled extensively with Anne and Polly, giving speeches and raising funds for the blind and for related causes. Along with her many books and other writings, this was to become her life's work.
Beginning in 1930, Helen, Anne and Polly began a series of overseas trips. At first they went to the British Isles for summer vacations, but soon there were invitations from many places. In 1932 she received the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws from the University of Glascow. She met and visited the Queen at Buckingham Palace. There were visits to France, Yugoslavia, and Japan. However, throughout these years, Anne Sullivan Macy's health was failing. She lost her sight and there was an "internal disorder." In October, 1935, Helen's Teacher and her dearest friend died.
After Anne, Helen's work for the AFB and other worthy causes continued for many years. During the second World War, she visited disabled soldiers. After the war she went to Germany, Africa, Latin America, India and other places. Between trips she stayed at "Arcan Ridge" her home that was named after a favourite place in Scotland. She wrote volumes, including a book about Anne Sullivan Macy. Polly Thompson continued as her companion until Polly's death in 1960. After that, a devoted nurse-companion, Mrs. Winifred Corbally, assisted Helen until her last day. Helen died in the afternoon of June 1, 1968, during a nap, a few weeks short of her 88th birthday. Her ashes were placed next to her beloved companions, Anne Sullivan Macy and Polly Thomson, in the St. Joseph's Chapel of Washington Cathedral.
