The late American novelist, speaker, and political activist Helen Adams Keller was a disability rights advocate. Despite being deaf and blind, she is renowned for overcoming all odds to do great things.

Helen Keller was miraculously taught how to interact by her teacher Anne Sullivan after a childhood illness robbed her of her capacity to see and hear. In addition to publishing her renowned autobiography “The Story of My Life” while in college, she went on to become the first deaf blind person to receive a bachelor’s degree.

Early Life

She was born on June 27, 1880, in Tuscumbia, Alabama, to Arthur Henley Keller and his second wife, Catherine Everett (Adams) Keller, also known as “Kate.”

Loss of Sight and Hearing

She developed an unidentified disease at the age of 19 months that was described by doctors as “an acute congestion of the stomach and the brain.” Modern medical professionals speculate that it may have been meningitis, a condition brought on by the bacterium Neisseria meningitidis (meningococcus), or maybe Haemophilus influenzae. This could have produced the same symptoms, but with a 97% juvenile mortality rate at the time, it is a less plausible cause.

Having lost her hearing and vision, Helen later described the situation as having lived “at sea in a dense fog” in her memoirs. By the time she was seven years old, she could recognize people by the vibration of their footsteps and could communicate with her family more easily.

Keller’s Teacher – Annie Sullivan

After reading in Charles Dickens‘ American Notes about the successful schooling of Laura Bridgman, a deaf and blind woman, her mother sent little Helen and her father to Baltimore to consult physician J. Julian Chisolm, an otolaryngologist, for assistance in 1886.

Alexander Graham Bell, who was assisting deaf youngsters at the time, was recommended to the Kellers by Chisholm. Bell suggested that they get in touch with the Perkins Institute for the Blind, the institution which Bridgman had attended. The director of the school, Michael Anagnos, asked 20-year-old visually impaired graduate Anne Sullivan to be Keller’s teacher.

This marked the start of a nearly 50-year bond, where Sullivan initially served as Keller’s governess and later became her lifelong companion. Sullivan’s dedication played a crucial role in Keller’s education and development, helping her overcome the challenges of her disabilities. Their relationship evolved from teacher and student to close companions, with Sullivan remaining by Keller’s side, supporting her personal and professional endeavors throughout her life.

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The influence Annie Sullivan had on Helen Keller

On March 5, 1887, Anne Sullivan arrived at Helen Keller’s home, a date Keller later called “my soul’s birthday.” Sullivan began teaching Keller to communicate by spelling words into her hand, starting with “d-o-l-l” for a doll she had brought as a gift.

Initially, Keller struggled to grasp that objects had corresponding words, leading to frustration, like when she broke a mug during a lesson. However, in April, a breakthrough occurred when Keller realized that the motions Sullivan made on her hand, while water ran over the other, symbolized the word “water.” This moment unlocked the mystery of language for Keller, who immediately began to demand the names of other familiar objects.

Despite being seen as isolated due to her disabilities, Keller connected deeply with the world through touch, feeling music’s rhythm and bonding with animals. Though delayed in learning language, she found her voice and communicated effectively, breaking through her isolation.

Formal Education

Helen Keller studied Braille throughout the winters of 1888 to 1890 at the Perkins Institution. Under Sarah Fuller at the Horace Mann School for the Deaf in Boston, she started a gradual process of learning to talk. She practiced lip-reading by putting her fingers on the speaker’s lips and throat as the words were simultaneously spelt out for her.

When she was 14 years old, she enrolled at the New York City Wright-Humason School for the Deaf, and when she was 16 years old, she enrolled in the Cambridge School for Young Ladies in Massachusetts. She was accepted to Radcliffe College in 1900 and received a degree with honors in 1904.

Helen Keller went on to become the first deaf-blind person to obtain a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1904 when she graduated from Radcliffe as a member of Phi Beta Kappa at the age of 24. She kept in touch with Austrian philosopher and educator Wilhelm Jerusalem, who was one of the first to recognize her writing prowess.

Writing

Her writing career, which would last 50 years on and off, started when she was still a Radcliffe student. She started writing about blindness, a topic that was then prohibited in women’s magazines due to the connection between many cases and venereal disease, having acquired abilities never attempted by any other disabled person of a similar nature. Her writings were accepted by Edward W. Bok for the Ladies’ Home Journal, and other prestigious publications including The Century, McClure’s, and The Atlantic Monthly soon followed.

She wrote several books on her life, including “The Story of My Life,” which was released in 1903, “Optimism,” “The World I Live In,” “Light in My Darkness and My Religion,” “Helen Keller’s Journal,” which was released in 1938, and “The Open Door,” which was released in 1908.

When she was 22 years old, “The Story of My Life” was released. Since then, it has had numerous publications and is still in print in more than fifty languages. It was transformed into the well-known William Gibson play “The Miracle Worker”, which won a Tony Award and ran for 719 performances on Broadway, as well as the 1962 Oscar-winning Hollywood film of the same name.

Lectures and Advocacy Works

With the help of an interpreter, she started lecturing in 1913, mostly on behalf of the American Foundation for the Blind, for which she ultimately created a $2 million endowment fund. Her lecture tours brought her all over the world on multiple occasions. Together with American civil rights campaigner Roger Nash Baldwin and others, she co founded the American Civil Liberties Union in 1920. Her advocacy for better care for the blind and deaf contributed to the exodus of the disabled from asylums. Additionally, by 1937, she played a role in the establishment of blind commissions in 30 states.

Public Speaking and Political Activities

She gained recognition as an author and public speaker worldwide. She supported several causes, including those for disabled persons. Her inspiring speeches about the plight of Deaf people were delivered in 25 different countries. She supported birth control, opposed Woodrow Wilson, was a pacifist, radical socialist, and advocate of suffrage.

She contributed to the founding of the American Civil Liberties Union in 1920. (ACLU). Along with Sullivan, she visited more than 40 different nations. She frequently visited Japan and won the hearts of the locals there. From Grover Cleveland to Lyndon B. Johnson, she had personal encounters with every U.S. president of her time. She also had friendships with a number of well-known people, such as Mark Twain, Charlie Chaplin, and Alexander Graham Bell. She and Twain were seen as political extremists associated with Marxist ideologies.

She joined the Socialist Party in 1909, and from that year until 1921, she actively fought and wrote in favor of the working class. She advocated against military intervention and spoke out frequently for women’s voting rights and the impacts of war in her writings and speeches. She had speech therapy to improve the clarity of her voice for the general audience. She protested until her articles were finally printed after the Rockefeller-owned press declined to publish them.

ACLU and NAACP

Together with nine other individuals, she co-founded the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). The ACLU first prioritized freedom of expression, but it rapidly broadened its focus to include other causes. It now boasts more than 500,000 members, is active in all 50 states, and continues to defend Americans’ individual rights and liberties. Along with these causes, she promoted socialism, anti-militarism, and equal rights for black people. She made a financial contribution to one of the most well-known African-American civil rights organizations, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

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Co-founder of Helen Keller International

The Helen Keller International (HKI) was established in 1915 by Helen Keller and American pioneering urban architect George Kessler. She had been an ardent follower and representative of the group her entire life. HKI works to tackle the causes and effects of blindness and malnutrition. Nutrition and Eye Health are two of its main specialties. Among its accomplishments include agricultural programs that aid families and villages in producing their own wholesome foods, addressing the primary causes of blindness worldwide, and leading successful campaigns to end malnutrition and blindness in Bangladesh. With its initiatives helping millions of people, HKI is one of the world’s most successful charities today and is engaged in 22 countries.

Honors

Helen won countless honors throughout her life that would take pages to list. The American Foundation for the Blind in New York City dedicates an entire floor to their preservation, calling it the Helen Keller Archives. The Order of the Southern Cross of Brazil, the Sacred Treasure of Japan, the Golden Heart of the Philippines, the Gold Medal of Merit of Lebanon, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom (1964) are among these honors. The National Women’s Hall of Fame inducted her in 1973.

Her Death

She suffered many strokes in 1961 and lived at home for the remainder of her life. At her residence, Arcan Ridge, she passed away peacefully in her sleep on June 1, 1968.