Vidhisha Nepal
Grade: XII 'D'
Underrated by deafness and blindness, Helen Keller rose to become a major 20th century humanitarian, educator and writer. She advocated for the blind and for women's suffrage. Meanwhile, she co-founded the American Civil Liberties Union. She was born on 27th June 1880 in Pon Tuscumbia, Alabama. Helen was the older of two daughters of Arthur H. Keller, a farmer, newspaper editor and confederate army veteran. His second wife Katherine Adams Keller, an educated woman was from Memphis. Several months before Helen's second birthday, due to her serious illness, possibly meningitis or scarlet fever - left her deaf and blind. She had no formal education even when she was seven years old. Since she could not speak, she developed a system for communicating with her family by feeling the facial expressions of others.
Recognizing their daughter's intelligence, Keller's mother sought help from experts including inventor Alexander Graham Bell, who had become involved with deaf children. Ultimately, she was referred to Anne Sullivan, a graduate of the Perkins School for the Blind, who became Keller’s lifelong teacher and mentor. Although Helen initially resisted her, Sullivan persevered. She used to teach alphabets and to make words by spelling them with her fingers on Keller's palm. Within a few weeks Keller caught on the technique. A year later, Sullivan brought Keller to the Perkins School in Boston, where she learned to read Braille with a specially made typewriter. Newspaper chronicled Keller’s progress at the age of fourteen. Later she went to New York for two years where she improved her speaking ability.