I bet you’ll like Hellen Keller’s story. Have you heard of her? Well, Hellen was born in the late 19th century, in a small town in Alabama, In the United States. Shortly after her one year old, she suffered from a very high fever that kept her between life and death for several weeks (current doctors believe it may have been meningitis or scarlet fever). Everyone thought he was going to die, but miraculously he recovered.
Happiness didn’t last long. Hellen was deaf and blind and the family asked several questions. What could be done for a little girl who could not hear or see?, How to break the barriers that presented a world of darkness and silence ?, What fate could someone who could not trust the senses have?
- The girl was agitated.
- All I did was scream.
- Cry and scream; bursts of anger and scenes of despair were going on day after day.
The good thing is that in your parents’ plans there was no idea of capitation, they looked for Alexander Graham Bell himself (inventor of the phone), who was doing various activities with deaf youth, advised them to contact the Perkins Institute for the Blind in Watertown, Massachusetts. This is where Hellen met the one who would light up his next 49 years of life: Anne Sullivan.
Sullivan was only 20 years old and willing to serve and help with frustration. I was ready to get Hellen out of this unstoppable world she was trapped in. With unspeakable patience, the new teacher did her best to help her control her character first, and for that, she demanded that Hellen be isolated from her family. He took her to live in a little house where he taught her the rules of discipline.
He soon taught her the first words through the gestures of her hands, waved her hand with her palms, and Hellen understood that this movement was a reference to water, so began the wonderful process of the world’s baptism, most importantly, the great barrier of non-communication that separated them had been broken.
The hardest part was getting the girl to learn to talk. The teacher used the Tadoma method to teach her. It was about touching people’s lips as they spoke or feeling their throats to feel the vibrations. Anne Sullivan spelled these sounds in her palm and learned the language of touch. Anne then taught him to read and write with the Braille system. That’s how the French, German, Greek and Latin girl learned.
Hellen Keller began a truly moving journey to overcome: not only did he become the first deafblind person to earn a college degree (with distinction), but he also became the most sought-after writer and lecturer of his time. The story of my life was one of the best-selling. With Anne, she traveled to more than 39 countries and became a personal friend of Charles Chaplin and Mark Twain. President Lyndon Johnson awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Hellen Keller was also an active socialist and fought tirelessly to improve the condition of the blind in her country and around the world. She passed away peacefully and happily at the age of 88. One of her most memorable phrases is: “Life is a daring adventure or nothing. “
Something unthinkable for a girl who seemed doomed to silence
Picture: Mikasi? Via Flickr