Knowing your American Heroes ~ HELEN ADAMS KELLER (1880-1968) ~ by rldubour

Friday!! Time for an American Hero!  Today is:

 

Knowing your American Heroes

HELEN ADAMS KELLER (1880-1968)

When Captain Arthur H. Keller
Took his vows with Ms. Kate Adams.
Kate gave birth to a baby girl
More famous than they could fathom.

In Tuscumbia, Alabama
At an estate called Ivy Green
Named her Helen Adams Keller
All was perfect ’till month nineteen.

Helen came down with illness
All the doctors tried to find
Scarlet fever or meningitis
The result left her deaf and blind.

Learning how to communicate
She invented different signs.
Over sixty she had learned
Now more determined she refines.

Mother Keller was inspired
With a girl named Laura Bridgman.
She was another deaf blind child
For Helen it had all began.

A specialist in Baltimore
The type of doctor that could tell.
Told to seek the local expert
His name Alexander Graham Bell.

He spoke of a school in Boston
Perkins Institute for the Blind.
Was there they met Ann Sullivan
To Helen was more than kind.

A relationship had started
That would last for forty-nine years
Ann taught the Tadoma method
Success inspires it appears.

Ann combined the “finger spelling”
Knowledge taught they did not curtail.
On her palm characters inscribed
Five languages she learned in Braille.

She went to New York City attending
Wright-Humason School for the Deaf.
Then returned to Massachusetts
Like cooking with words she was a chef.

The Cambridge School for Young Ladies
Then in Radcliffe College at age two-four
Graduating magna cum laude
No deaf blind person had done that before!

Her love for the Akita dog
Seemed to give her a special lift.
In nineteen-hundred-thirty-nine
This was Japan’s official gift.

Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan
With the utmost dedication
Helen learned to see in darkness
Both are heroines in our Nation.

AUTHOR NOTES* Born; June 27, 1880 Tuscumbia Alabama Died; June 01, 1968 Easton, Connecticut Tadoma method (touching the lips and throat of others as they speak) Helen Keller would also learn to read English, French, German, Greek, and Latin in k) combined with alphabetical characters on the palm of Helen’s hand. In Braille Helen and Anne Sullivan traveled all over the world to over 39 countries, and made several trips to Japan, becoming a favorite of the Japanese people. Helen Keller met every U.S. President from Grover Cleveland to Lyndon B. Johnson and was friends with many famous figures including Alexander Graham Bell, Charlie Chapin and Mark Twain. On September 14, 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson awarded Helen Keller the Presidential Medal of Freedom, one of the United States’ top two highest civilian honors. Keller devoted much of her later life to raise funds for the American Foundation for the Blind.. She died on June 1, 1968 passing away 26 days before her 88th birthday, in her Easton, Connecticut home. In 2003, the state of Alabama honored Keller, a native of the state on its state quarter. The Helen Keller Hospital is also dedicated to her. There is also a book called Helen Keller’s teacher ANNE SULLIVAN; BIRTHDATE: April 14, 1866 NAME: Johanna (Anne) Sullivan Macy or Anne Mansfield Sullivan Macy, special educator BIRTHPLACE: Feeding Hills, Massachusetts DIED: October 20, 1936 PLACE OF DEATH: Forest Hills, NY