Braille Monitor, 6/92

Braille Monitor, 6/92

The Braille

Monitor

Vol. 35, No.

6June

1992

Barbara Pierce,

Editor

Published in inkprint, in Braille,

on cassette and

the World Wide Web and FTP on the Internet

The National Federation

of the Blind

Marc Maurer, President

National Office

1800 Johnson Street

Baltimore, Maryland 21230

NFB Net BBS: (612) 696-1975

Web Page Address: http//www.nfb.org

Letters to the president,

address changes,

subscription requests, orders for NFB literature,

articles for the Monitor, and letters to the editor

should be sent to the National Office.

Monitor subscriptions

cost the Federation about twenty-five dollars per year.

Members are invited, and non-members are requested, to cover

the subscription cost. Donations should be made payable to

National Federation of the Blind and sent to:

National Federation of the Blind

1800 Johnson Street

Baltimore, Maryland 21230

THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF

THE BLIND IS NOT

AN ORGANIZATION

SPEAKING FOR THE BLIND--IT IS

THE BLIND SPEAKING FOR THEMSELVES

ISSN 0006-8829

Contents

Vol. 35, No. 6June 1992

THE EASTERN EUROPEAN CONFERENCE ON DISABILITIES

by Kenneth Jernigan

EQUALITY, DISABILITY, AND EMPOWERMENT

by Kenneth Jernigan

BLINDNESS: IS HISTORY AGAINST US?

by Kenneth Jernigan

BRAILLE BILLS: WHAT ARE THEY AND WHAT DO THEY MEAN?

by Fred Schroeder

BRAILLE BILL UPDATE

REACTION TO AMERICAN FOUNDATION FOR THE BLIND ARTICLE ON TEXAS

BRAILLE BILL

VARIATIONS ON A THEME: ILLINOIS FEDERATIONISTS FIGHT FOR THE

RIGHT TO BRAILLE LITERACY

REFLECTIONS FROM IDAHO: THE ROLE OF BRAILLE LITERACY

DIRTY TRICKS AND PRESSURE TACTICS IN OHIO

by Barbara Pierce

MISSISSIPPI GOVERNOR REDEFINES BLINDNESS

by Kenneth Jernigan

THE FEDERATION ON PARADE

by Kimberly McCutcheon

FEDERATIONIST HONORED BY LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

RECIPES

MONITOR MINIATURES

Copyright National Federation of the Blind, Inc., 1992

[3 LEAD PHOTOS/CAPTION: On May 6, 1992, nearly 200 librarians

attending the Biennial Conference of Librarians Serving Blind and

Physically Handicapped Individuals visited the National Center

for the Blind for a tour and luncheon. They arrived in five buses

(above) and poured through the Johnson Street building to gather

in the International Braille and Technology Center for the Blind

for a brief welcome from President Maurer and Dr. Jernigan. Then

they were divided into six groups for tours of the National

Center. With only a little over an hour to devote to these tours,

they were forced almost to trot, but many took the time to pick

up order forms and literature. One of the most popular stops was

the Technology Center (lower left). Everyone was in the dining

room by 12:30 (lower right), ready for a delicious lunch prepared

by Marie Cobb with help from several members of the Center staff.

We were delighted to welcome the librarians. The entire staff

worked hard to get ready for the visit and to display our

wonderful facility. Many librarians took an opportunity to tell

members of the staff how impressed they were and how surprising

it was that so few people could entertain them with such

efficiency and graciousness.]

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Dr. and Mrs. Jernigan found a little time for

sightseeing while they were in Czechoslovakia. They are pictured

here in Prague's famous Wenceslaus Square.]

THE EASTERN EUROPEAN

CONFERENCE ON DISABILITIES

by Kenneth Jernigan

Sometime toward the middle of March this year, Sandra

Parrino (who is the chairman of the National Council on

Disability and who spoke at our 1990 convention in Dallas) called

to ask me to participate in a conference on disability which was

to be held in Prague, Czechoslovakia, April 13-15. She said that

the conference would be called the Eastern European Conference on

Disabilities and that it would include Czechoslovakia, Hungary,

and Poland. She wanted me to represent the blind and,

particularly, to speak about empowerment and the Americans with

Disabilities Act.

I told her I would, so on April 10 Mrs. Jernigan and I

headed for Prague. We arrived on the afternoon of the 11th, and I

had some preliminary conversations with blind persons. The next

day (Sunday, April 12) we met with leaders of the Federation of

the Blind and Partially Sighted of Czechoslovakia. These were

truly the leaders of the blind of the country. Present were the

only blind member of the Czech Parliament; a college professor,

who teaches interpreting and whose English was at least as good

as mine; and seven or eight other people who were equally

impressive. They told me that during the 1930s and

'40s the blind of

Czechoslovakia had made great progress in establishing

independent organizations of the blind. They said that when the

Communists took control in 1949, the organizations of the blind

were required to dissolve and merge with all other disability

groups into what was called "The Union of Invalids," or (to put

it more politely) "The Association of the Handicapped." The

organizations of the blind apparently had a good bit of property

(including the building where Parliament now meets), and this

property was largely confiscated. It was clear that the people

with whom I was meeting were tough, knowledgeable, and self-

reliant. They said that when the Communists were overthrown in

1989 (in what they called the "velvet revolution"), they

immediately re-established their independent organizations--

probably before it was legal to do so. They gave me a Braille

summary of facts about the Federation, which said in part:

The Federation of the Blind and Partially Sighted of

Czechoslovakia is a collegiate, incorporating three nation-based

member organizations: Society of the Blind and Partially Sighted

in Czechoslovakia (claiming 12,000 members), Czech Blind and

Partially Sighted Union (with approximately 3,000 members), and

Union of the Blind and Partially Sighted in Slovakia (having

approximately 4,500 members). These organizations cultivate

everyday contacts with their membership and provide various

special services.

The fundamental mission of the Federation lies in the

following: (1) To represent the blind and partially sighted

community in dealings with both the federal administration and

the federal parliament; (2) To coordinate international

relations; (3) To gather, process, and disseminate relevant

information on blindness and visual impairment from home and

abroad; (4) Effectively to influence the newly created

legislation related to the handicapped in general and the blind

in particular.

The Federation is governed by the Executive Council,

consisting of an equal number of representatives from each member

organization. The Council is headed by the president. The

Executive Council appoints the Federation's executive secretary--

who, together with his secretariat, runs the day-to-day business

of the organization. The head office of the Federation is located

in Prague. The Federation represents organizations of the

Czechoslovak blind in matters outside of Czechoslovakia, which is

a member country of both the European Blind Union and the World

Blind Union.

The Federation leaders with whom I talked elaborated on this

outline. They said that although they had formed independent

organizations in 1989, they had not come together as a Federation

until July 1, 1991. It is clear that they are proud of what they

have accomplished, and they have reason to be. They told me that

the old Union of Invalids (or Association of the Handicapped)

still exists and that the same bunch that has always run it still

pretty much does. It still includes blind people, but they and

their interests seem to be submerged in the larger entity. The

leaders of the Federation said they were getting back some of

their property, but they doubted that they would get it all,

especially the building where Parliament meets.

As to the Eastern European Conference on Disabilities, the

leaders of the Federation had some interesting things to say.

They said that many months ago the Czech government had told the

various disability groups that a private American organization

would be making funds available for certain projects in

Czechoslovakia and that the various groups should submit

proposals. They said that sometime later the organizations were

unofficially and individually told that instead of funding

projects, the Americans would be funding the Eastern European

Conference on Disabilities. One of them remarked that this was a

disappointment to them, more what they would have expected from

the former regime. I explained to them that although the

conference was being held under the auspices of the National

Council on Disability (a government agency), it was being

privately funded. They indicated that they would send

representatives to monitor the conference.

Subsequently at the conference I met a representative of the

Association for the Handicapped and was asked by him for an

interview for the magazine of that organization. The Federation

leaders advised me to give the interview, and I did. As

to the conference itself, Sandra Parrino organized and chaired it with real

efficiency. Most of those who made

presentations were either government officials or representatives

of the disabled. There was simultaneous translation into English,

Czech, Hungarian, and Polish; and there was also interpretation

for the deaf. There was not, however, any Braille, a fact which

caused some remark. Besides appearing on a panel, I gave a brief

address entitled "Equality, Disability, and Empowerment."

We are printing my address immediately after this article,

and Federationists will recognize portions of it from other

speeches I have made. However, much of the material is new, and

in any case I thought Monitor readers might like to know what I

said and how I said it.

There are other things about the visit to Prague that I

think Federationists will find of interest. One of the people who

took part throughout the entire meeting and made at least one

formal presentation was the wife of Lech Walesa, the Polish

leader. Also the conference participants were invited to the

Palace for dinner on Tuesday evening, April 14, at which time we

were addressed by Vaclav Havel, the President of Czechoslovakia.

Mrs. Jernigan and I found this to be an extremely interesting

experience. The Palace (which is not always so in such cases) is

exactly what the name implies--a magnificent building beautifully

and ornately furnished. In view of the 1973 NFB

banquet speech, "Blindness: Is

History Against Us," there is at least one other experience that

we had in Prague that cannot go unmentioned. Zisca is the

national hero of Czechoslovakia--and placed in a prominent

position on a hill atop an impressive stone column, under which

is the grave of Czechoslovakia's unknown soldier, there is a huge

bronze statue of Zisca riding a horse. As you would expect, I

went to visit the statue and tried my best to get at it for a

touch. Alas! The stone column was surrounded by a high metal

fence, and even though I tried, there was simply no way to get

over or through it. If I could have got past the fence, it was my

intention to try to find a way to get up the column to the

statue; but since I didn't get past the first hurdle, there was

no point in worrying about the second. I know that

many Federationists have read or heard "Blindness: Is History Against Us," but in the context of the

Prague visit I think it is worth reprinting in this issue of the

Monitor. It follows immediately after the speech on "Equality,

Disability, and Empowerment."

Incidentally, I shared the history speech with the Czech

leaders of the blind, and they said that even though they all

knew Zisca as a national hero and a blind person, they had never

thought of using him to promote their own organization or self-

image. I think that will change. They said they would send me

additional material on Zisca, and I certainly hope they will.

Because of the timing of the conference program and the

airline schedules, I was unable to come straight from Prague to

Baltimore, so Mrs. Jernigan and I spent one night in Amsterdam.

That, too, was a worthwhile experience. In fact, except for the

problems I have with flying (which are not inconsiderable) the

entire trip was both enjoyable and productive. As to flying, I

have found myself compelled to do much more of it of late than I

care to think about. However, I can only repeat that the Prague

experience was productive and helpful in forwarding our goals.

[PHOTO: Inside of Prague palace dining room--some conference

attendees are taking photos. CAPTION: The Eastern European

Conference on Disabilities was held in the medieval palace which

serves today as the home of the President of Czechoslovakia and

the seat of government. Pictured here is the state dining room,

known as the Spanish Gallery, where conference participants were

entertained to dinner by President Vaclav Havel (far left).]

[PHOTO: Kenneth Jernigan stands in the reception area of the

Prague palace with eight other gentlemen. CAPTION: Dr. Jernigan

(center) is pictured here with the Polish delegation to the

Eastern European Conference on Disabilities. Standing immediately

to Dr. Jernigan's right (third from left), is Zygmunt Lenyk, who

is a member of the Polish Parliament and who is blind.]

EQUALITY,

DISABILITY, AND EMPOWERMENT

An Address Delivered By

Kenneth Jernigan, Executive Director

National Federation of the Blind

at the Eastern European Conference on Disabilities

Prague, Czechoslovakia

April 14, 1992

The man was old and senile, and he ate without manners or

grace. His daughter was ashamed and ordered him to eat in a

corner apart from the others. There came a day when he broke his

plate, and the daughter was angry. "My son shall not see such

disgusting behavior," she said. "Since you eat like a pig, you

shall be treated like a pig. In the future you shall eat in the

yard from a trough." Her son was five, the thing in life she

loved most. He asked for a hammer and boards.

"For what purpose?" she asked. "To build you a trough," he said, "so

that I may feed you

when you are old."

So it has been through the generations, each teaching the

next and then doubling back on itself for reinforcement--change

coming slow and learning difficult. Yet, there come bends in the

road, shifts in direction. It is not inevitable that each

generation take hammer and boards to build troughs for the next.

Among times there is a time that turns a corner, and everything

this side of it is new. Times do not go backward.1 For people

with disabilities the corner has been turned, and the time is

now.

Today I want to talk with you about the Americans with

Disabilities Act, the first truly comprehensive piece of

legislation enacted in the current climate of social upheaval by

any country to help those with disabilities achieve full

membership in society. But I want to talk with you about more

than that. I want to talk about the true meaning of empowerment--

the method by which a group or segment of the population moves

from second-class citizenship to first-class status in society. No

issue is of greater urgency to persons with disabilities anywhere in the

world than erasing the stigma of inequality--the

devastating imagery of what a sociologist once called "spoiled

identity"--which in varying degree descends upon all of us who

present a different appearance to the world, a visage or behavior

that departs in some observable way from what is regarded as

"normal." When that difference corresponds to a stereotype

already in place--such as the "helpless blind," the "deaf and

dumb," the "senile oldster," or the "pathetic cripple"--the

result traditionally has been abrupt dismissal from the ranks of

the so-called "normal" and forced exile (psychologically if not

physically) to the outer margins of the social order--the dumping

ground of public consciousness, wherein are confined the

unacceptable, the unfortunate, the unlike, and the unequal.

Inequality, now as in the past, is an ascribed attribute--a

stigmatic condition attached to the disabled by virtue of their

perceived difference. This inequality is not a product of the

disability itself but of the labeling, as one theory has it. Or,

to put it another way, the condition of inequality is not a

feature of the disability but of the handicap. That verbal

distinction is a crucial one. For while the disability is

physical in origin, lodged in the body of the person, the

handicap is social, lodged in the body of society.

If we are to deal realistically with our problems, we must

go to basics. So let us consider the nature of disability--or, in

my case, let me talk with you about the nature of blindness; for

that is the disability I know most about. Keep in mind, however,

that what I say about blindness could be said about many (if not

most) other disabilities--for very often the problems are the

same. The first thing I would say is that with all

of our efforts

to educate the public, we still have a long way to go. The

average citizen's notions about blindness (whether in the United

States or elsewhere) are still predominantly negative. In 1976 a

Gallup poll showed that in my country blindness was the second

most feared condition which might occur to an individual. Only

cancer came ahead of it. Blindness was more feared than deafness,

more feared than mental illness, more feared than heart attack,

or anything else. But that was sixteen years ago. What about

today? Well, there has been a change--and one which at first

glance might seem to be positive. Blindness has now dropped to

the third most feared condition. But before we begin to cheer,

perhaps we had better consider what outranks it--AIDS and

cancer. And this general verdict is confirmed in specifics. A

few years ago a teacher wrote to me: "Dear Sir," he said, "I can

find no criminal statistics in the Annual Uniform Crime Report in

which blind people are a part. I have assumed for twenty-five

years that blind people cannot become criminals due to this sight

limitation. "I teach a course in the correction

and prevention of delinquency and crime. A twenty-six-year investigation

of

criminal phenomena has confirmed the Bible's statement that, 'If

ye were blind ye should have no sin (crime): John 9:41'... "If

you have any statistics relative to either delinquent or criminal behavior

among the blind, I shall greatly appreciate a

review of them." By way of answer I sent this

teacher a newspaper headlined, "Blind Man Kills Landlady." I don't

know what his reaction was.

Not long ago the project coordinator for the National

Council of Teachers of English in the United States wrote to me

asking that I send material about blindness so that English

teachers throughout the country could help their students learn

proper attitudes. Naturally I was pleased. However, my enthusiasm

cooled when she went on to say that she felt it was important for

children to learn compassion while they were young.

A few weeks ago I received from a blind man a letter, which

said in part:

My niece's teacher (my niece is thirteen and sighted) gave

the class a homework assignment of blindfolding themselves for

half an hour that evening. The stated purpose of the assignment

was to provide the children with some idea of what it would be

like to be blind. As background information the teacher explained

that some of the things blind people are unable to do include the

following:

1. Blind people are unable to have children because they are

unable to cope with bringing them up.

2. Blind people are unable to travel alone or live alone.

3. They cannot watch or enjoy television.

4. They cannot tell the time.

Furthermore, the teacher said, blind people would experience

difficulty achieving academic success. Therefore, good jobs are

largely out of their reach. The teacher also mentioned (and here

quite correctly, but not for the reasons she gave) that the blind

experience high levels of unemployment.

This is the letter, but I don't have to depend on letters to

confirm the truth of what I have been telling you. It happens

every day in my own experience. At the annual conventions of the

National Federation of the Blind when we go to the newspapers to

talk about blindness as a problem of civil rights and try to get

coverage, we are more often than not referred to the medical

reporter; and when I go to the washroom in a restaurant, someone

usually tries to show me to the toilet stall for the handicapped.

Likewise, when I register at a hotel, the person at the desk

tries with increasing frequency to give me the room especially

designed for the handicapped.

This points up a problem which we must recognize and try to

solve as we deal with the Americans with Disabilities Act and

with other attempts around the world to help people with

disabilities gain empowerment. There is, of course, nothing wrong

with having toilet stalls specially designed for the handicapped

or rooms for the handicapped in hotels. Quite the contrary. But

there is a great deal wrong with assuming that every person with

a so-called handicap needs exactly what every other person with a

handicap needs. When the Americans with Disabilities Act was

being considered by Congress, we of the National Federation of

the Blind insisted that it be amended to provide that no person

could be required to use the specially designed facilities,

devices, or alternatives required by the Act. Thus, certain seats

on buses or trains may be reserved for people with disabilities,

but persons with disabilities may not be forced to use those

seats. Rooms in hotels may be altered to meet the needs of

certain portions of the population with disabilities, but no

person with a disability may be denied the right to use other

rooms in the hotel.

The Americans with Disabilities Act (though it is the most

far-reaching) is not the first attempt by the government of the

United States or by the private sector to deal with the problems

of the disabled. The experience we have had with the airlines is

a case in point, and it is instructive as to what we should try

to avoid as we implement the Americans with Disabilities Act and

similar legislation in other countries.

Before the early 1970s people with disabilities in the

United States (when they wanted to travel by air) had

comparatively few problems with airline personnel. Some segments

of the population with disabilities had problems with the

physical configuration of airplanes and airports, but in general

not with airline personnel. Then came the stirrings of federal

legislation to give empowerment to the disabled, and there was a

great deal of talk about affirmative action.

One would have thought that affirmative action would have

been a positive step, but it wasn't--at least, not for the blind

in dealing with the airlines. Airline personnel did not become

knowledgeable overnight or lose their prejudices just because

somebody told them to engage in affirmative action. Mostly (with

respect to air travel) the blind didn't need any affirmative

action. We were doing fine just as it was. But the airlines were

into affirmative action, so they had to think up something to do

to help us--whether we needed it or not and, for that matter,

whether we wanted it or not. They began by lumping

all of what they perceived to be the handicapped together--wheelchair users,

the blind, the deaf, the

quadriplegic, the cerebral palsied, and everybody else they could

think of--including, very often, small children. Next they

cataloged what they believed to be the problems, needs, and

characteristics of each of these groups, and then assumed that

each item on the list applied to every member of every group they

had included in the category of the handicapped. The resulting

mythical composite was a monstrosity--totally helpless, totally

in need of custody, and totally nonexistent except in the minds

of the airline officials. There is not now (nor was there ever)

any such person as the "airlines' standardized handicapped air

traveler," and the problem comes from the fact that the airlines

(and, to some extent, the federal regulators) persist in acting

as if there is.

So even though we have had in the United States almost two

decades of accelerated attempts to help people with disabilities

gain empowerment, culminating in the passage of the Americans

with Disabilities Act, problems with the airlines have not

stopped. In fact, it can be convincingly argued that they have

increased. The shameful treatment (as recently reported in the

New York Times) of Justin Dart, Chairman of the President's

Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities, is a

striking case in point. Mr. Dart, who uses a wheelchair, was (in

violation of public policy and federal law) denied the right to

board an airplane despite the fact that he protested vehemently

and was thoroughly articulate and knowledgeable about his rights

under the law. The Dart case underscores the fact that the

passage of a law is not enough. Even the determined

implementation of that law is not enough. There must be vigorous

public education, leading to a change in the attitudes of society

as a whole. And, above all, we must reject the sophistry which

would lump all segments of the disabled population together, the

sophistry which assumes that the problems of each are the

problems of all, the sophistry which then uses this fallacy as an

excuse to keep old attitudes intact by arguing that people with

disabilities are not capable of competing.

Let me not be misunderstood. The Americans with Disabilities

Act can be a positive step forward--but it is not the total

solution to our problems. It (and similar legislation in other

countries) is only the foundation upon which we can and must

build. The real solution to our problems cannot be achieved until

there is a widespread change in public attitudes.

Let me give you an illustration. The legal doctrine of

Contributory Negligence, as applied to the blind in the United

States, holds that if a blind person travels outside his or her

home and becomes involved in an accident, the blind person

(simply by being present) is automatically considered to be

negligent regardless of the circumstances of the accident. For

example, if a blind person were to cross a street in a pedestrian

crosswalk in accord with the traffic signal and were to be hit by

a car, the driver of that car might not be held responsible even

though the driver had disobeyed the traffic signal.

That was the law in most parts of the country until the

blind (acting through the National Federation of the Blind)

secured passage by state legislatures of what is called the White

Cane Law, which specifically strikes down the doctrine of

Contributory Negligence. Every state in the nation now has such a

white cane law. Yet, hear the testimony of Barbara Pierce, the

president of the National Federation of the Blind of Ohio. "Having the White Cane Law on the books," she says, "is

not

enough. I am reminded of this truth every time a motorist leans

out of a passing car to inquire of me when I am walking along a

street in my small town, 'Where are you trying to go?' First of

all, it is none of his or her business. Second, I am not trying

to go; I am going. When I am lost (if that should occur), I take

responsibility for asking directions. "There is," she goes on, "still

a malignant manifestation of the contributory negligence doctrine floating

around in the

public mind. It may have vanished from the law books with the

passage of the White Cane statutes, but there are plenty of

people who have not yet got the word. "Early in March of this year," Barbara Pierce continues, "an

Ohio Federationist who uses a guide dog was crossing a busy

street in her small town. She had the green light, so she and her

dog stepped out boldly to cross the intersection. A young man,

who was not watching carefully, turned right on the red light and

struck both the woman and the dog. Neither was hurt badly, but

the woman was taken to the emergency room, where her husband (a

physician) eventually found her. "The attitude

of the officials who dealt with the case is demonstrated by one question

the police officer who wrote up the

accident report asked the victim's husband: 'Can the dog read

traffic signs?' No one from the district attorney's office ever

contacted the woman to determine how serious her injuries were.

All of this should have prepared her for what happened in Mayor's

Court a few weeks later. "Pronouncing it as

his opinion that no blind person could independently cross streets safely,

the mayor fined the driver a

nominal $10 and warned the blind woman not to travel alone in the

future. No one knew or cared about white cane laws or their

protection. It was obvious to the mayor, the district attorney,

and the defendant that somehow the blind woman had caused the

accident just by being on the street even though she had the

right of way and the legal right to be there. She is herself an

attorney by training, and you can be sure that she did not remain

silent. "She attempted to interest area newspapers

in her story. They were not interested. She and the National Federation of

the

Blind of Ohio wrote letters to the mayor, the district attorney,

and the police urging in-service education programs for public

officials. They could not be bothered."

So says Barbara Pierce, president of the Ohio affiliate of

the National Federation of the Blind, and her testimony is an

unpleasant reminder to all of us that it is not enough to be in

the right. Sometimes it is not even enough to have the law on

your side. It is important to keep in mind that we are farther

along the road to freedom than we have ever been--but it is

equally important to remember that we are not yet there.

As with many so-called disabilities, the real problem of

blindness is not the physical loss of sight but the

misunderstanding and misconceptions which exist in the public

mind. It is not conjecture but fact that the blind (given equal

training and opportunity) can compete on terms of equality with

others. In short, the average blind child can hold his or her own

with the average sighted child; the average blind adult can do

the average job in the average place of business and do it as

well as a sighted person similarly situated; the average blind

grandmother of eighty-four can do what the average sighted

grandmother of that age can do. Of course, the above average can

compete with the above average, and the below average will

compete at that level. The techniques may be different, but the

overall performance and the ability to live a full life are

comparable. There are blind mathematicians, blind factory

workers, blind dishwashers, and tens of thousands of just

ordinary blind citizens to prove it. If the blind have reasonable

training and opportunity, blindness can be reduced to the level

of a mere nuisance.

This is what I as a blind person representing the largest

organization of blind persons in the United States know, and I

repeat that much of what I have said about blindness also applies

to broad segments of the population of people with disabilities.

Yet, people with disabilities have traditionally and consistently

been excluded from the main channels of economic and social

participation in our society. With monotonous sameness we have

been put down and kept out. This is why we have found it

necessary to organize for collective action. This is why it was

important that the Americans with Disabilities Act (as amended)

be passed; why similar legislation in other countries should be

passed; and why these laws must be implemented, discussed, and

brought home to the conscience of the decision-makers and the

public at large. But this type of legislation is not a cure-all.

At best it is a catalyst and a foundation on which we can build.

We have turned a corner of time, and there is a newness, a

window of opportunity for action. We must use the current period

of social change and re-examination of values as a means of

focusing public education and changing public attitudes--but

unless we act decisively and imaginatively, the window will

close. What good will the elimination of architectural barriers

do if we cannot eliminate the barriers in the minds and hearts of

our fellow citizens? It is a natural tendency for human beings to

resist change by rationalizing and building troughs, but it must

be our task to overcome that tendency. With the passage of the

Americans with Disabilities Act and similar legislation in other

countries and with the accompanying climate of inquiry and new

beginnings, I believe we will succeed. Surely the hope which has

been kindled in millions of hearts will not permit it to be

otherwise.

As we approach the beginning of the twenty-first century, we

throughout the world who have disabilities confidently look

forward to a day at hand when we can truly have first-class

citizenship and real equality in society, just like the rest--

when we can have a good-paying job and the joys of a home and a

family of our own, just like the rest--when we can hold our heads

high in self-respect and the respect of others, just like the

rest--when we can earn our way and pay our dues and live our

freedom, just like the rest--when we can wake in the morning

without fear or poverty, just like the rest--when we can hope and

believe and dream, just like the rest--and especially when

whatever we have is ours as a matter of right, whether it be

great or small, not a dole portioned out to us by agencies of

government or private charities. We look forward to that day, and

we intend to have it because we have found the power of

collective action. And one thing more: We are absolutely

determined to put behind us forever any notions of second-class

status and custodial care. We are no longer prepared to eat from

troughs.

But this is not a dream which we have for ourselves alone.

It can only come true if it is shared by those who are not

classified as disabled--by you in this room who do not have

disabilities and by others like you throughout the world. It is a

dream of a better, more caring, more just society than we have

ever known--and it is a dream that can come true. Let us look to

the future in partnership; let us live in mutual respect; let us

work together to make real the promise of equal opportunity for

all. This is the true meaning of empowerment. This is also the

true meaning of humanity.

FOOTNOTES

1. C. S. Lewis, Perelandra (Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.,

1944), page 62.

[PHOTO: Statue of Zisca, seated on horse. CAPTION: This

equestrian statue of Zisca, Czechoslovakia's national hero, is a

famous landmark in Prague. Mrs. Jernigan took this picture when

the Jernigans visited the popular tourist attraction.]

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Dr. Jernigan made an effort to reach the statue

of Zisca. He got to the top of the wall, but the metal fence

proved to be unscalable. He is pictured here on the wall with the

statue of Zisca visible over his left shoulder.]

BLINDNESS:

IS HISTORY AGAINST US?

An Address Delivered by

KENNETH JERNIGAN

President, National Federation of the Blind

At the Banquet of the Annual Convention

New York City, July 5, 1973

Experts in the field, as well as members of the general

public, have differed greatly as to what the future may hold for

the blind. Some, seeking to tell it like it is, see us blundering

on forever in roles of economic dependency and second-class

citizenship. Others, more hopefully, predict a slow but steady

progress toward independence, equality, and full membership in

society. My own view is that this is not a matter for prediction

at all, but for decision. I believe that neither of these

possible outcomes is certain or foreseeable, for the simple

reason that the choices we make and the actions we take are

themselves factors in the determination of the future. In short,

we the blind (like all people) confront alternative futures: one

future in which we will live our own lives, or another future in

which our lives will be lived for us.

But if the future is open and contingent, surely the past is

closed and final. Whatever disputes men and women may have about

the shape of things to come, there can be no doubt about the

shape of things gone by--the permanent record of history. Or can

there? Is there such a thing as an alternative past?

We all know what the historical record tells us. It tells us

that, until only yesterday, blind people were completely excluded

from the ranks of the normal community. In early societies they

were reputedly abandoned, exterminated, or left to fend for

themselves as beggars on the lunatic fringe of the community. In

the late Middle Ages, so we are told, provision began to be made

for their care and protection in almshouses and other sheltered

institutions. Only lately, it would seem, have blind people begun

stealthily to emerge from the shadows, and to move in the

direction of independence and self-sufficiency.

This is what history tells us--or, rather, that is what

histories and the historians have told us. And the lesson

commonly derived from these histories is that the blind have

always been dependent upon the wills and the mercies of others.

We have been the people things were done to--and,

occasionally, the people things were done for--but never the

people who did for themselves. In effect, according to this

account, we have no history of our own--no record of active

participation or adventure or accomplishment, but only (until

almost our own day) an empty and unbroken continuum of desolation

and dependency. It would seem that the blind have moved through

time and the world not only sightless but faceless--a people

without distinguishing features, anonymous and insignificant--not

so much as rippling the stream of history.

Nonsense! That is not fact but fable. That is not truth but

a lie. In reality the accomplishments of blind people through the

centuries have been out of all proportion to their numbers. There

are genius, and fame, and adventure, and enormous versatility of

achievement--not just once in a great while but again and again,

over and over. To be sure, there is misery also--poverty and

suffering and misfortune aplenty--just as there is in the general

history of mankind. But this truth is only a half-truth--and,

therefore, not really a truth at all. The real truth, the whole

truth, reveals a chronicle of courage and conquest, of greatness,

and even glory on the part of blind people, which has been

suppressed and misrepresented by sighted historians--not because

these historians have been people of bad faith or malicious

intent but because they have been people, with run-of-the-mill

prejudice and ordinary misunderstandings. Historians, too, are

human; and when facts violate their

preconceptions, they tend to ignore those facts.

Now, we are at a point in time when the story of the blind

(the true and real story) must be told. For too long the blind

have been (not unwept, for there has been much too much of that)

but unhonored and unsung. Let us, at long last, redress the

balance and right the wrong. Let us now praise our famous men and

celebrate the exploits of blind heroes. Rediscovering our true

history, we shall, in our turn, be better able to make history;

for when people (seeing or blind) come to know the truth, the

truth will set them free.

Let us begin with Zisca: patriotic leader of Bohemia in the

early fifteenth century, one of history's military geniuses, who

defended his homeland in a brilliant campaign against invading

armies of overwhelming numerical superiority. Zisca was, in the

hour of his triumph, totally blind. The chronicle of his

magnificent military effort--which preserved the political

independence and religious freedom of his country, and which led

to his being offered the crown of Bohemia--is worth relating in

some detail. Need I add that this episode is not to be found,

except in barest outline, in the standard histories? Fortunately

it has been recorded by two historians of the last century--James

Wilson, an Englishman writing in 1820, and William Artman, an

American writing seventy years later. What do you suppose these

two historians have in common, apart from their occupation? You

are right: Both were blind. The account of the career of Zisca

which follows has been drawn substantially from their eloquent

and forceful narratives. The Council of Constance,

which was convened by the Pope in the year 1414 for the purpose of rooting

out heresy in the

Church--and which commanded that John Huss and Jerome of Prague

be burned at the stake--"sent terror and consternation throughout

Bohemia...."1 In self-defense the Bohemian people took up arms

against the Pope and the emperor. They chose as their commanding

general the professional soldier John de Turcznow-better known as

Zisca, meaning "one-eyed," for he had lost the sight of an eye in

the course of earlier battles. At the head of a force of 40,000

citizen-soldiers--a force not unlike the ragged army that would

follow General Washington in another patriotic struggle three

centuries later--Zisca marched into combat, only to be suddenly

blinded in his remaining eye by an arrow from the enemy. Here

is where our story properly begins. For Zisca, upon his recovery from the

injury, flatly refused to play the role of the

helpless blind man. "...His friends were surprised to hear him

talk of setting out for the army, and did what was in their power

to dissuade him from it, but he continued resolute. `I have yet,'

said he, `to shed my blood for the liberties of Bohemia. She is

enslaved; her sons are deprived of their natural rights, and are

the victims of a system of spiritual tyranny as degrading to the

character of man as it is destructive of every moral principle;

therefore, Bohemia must and shall be free.'"2 And

so the blind general resumed his command, to the great joy of his troops.

When the news came to the Emperor Sigismund "he called a convention of all the states in his empire ...and

entreated them, for the sake of their sovereign, for the honor of

their empire, and for the cause of their religion, to put

themselves in arms.... The news came to Zisca that two large

armies were in readiness to march against him.... The former was

to invade Bohemia on the west, the latter on the east; they were

to meet in the center, and as they expressed it, crush this

[rebel] between them."3 By all the rules of

warfare, by all conventional standards of armament and power, that should

have been the end of Zisca and

his rabble army. "After some delay the emperor entered Bohemia at

the head of his army, the flower of which was fifteen thousand

Hungarians, deemed at that time the best cavalry in Europe.

...The infantry, which consisted of 25,000 men, were equally

fine, and well commanded. This force spread terror throughout all

the east of Bohemia."4 The stage was set for the fateful

climax--the final confrontation and certain obliteration of the

upstart rebel forces. "On the 11th of January, 1422, the two

armies met on a large plain. ... Zisca appeared in the center of

his front line [accompanied] by a horseman on each side, armed

with a poleax. His troops, having sung a hymn,... drew their

swords and waited for the signal. Zisca stood not long in view of

the enemy, and when his officers had informed him that the ranks

were well closed, waved his saber over his head, which was the

signal of battle, and never was there an onset more mighty and

irresistible. As dash a thousand waves against the rock-bound

shore, so Zisca rolled his steel-fronted legions upon the foe.

The imperial infantry hardly made a stand, and in the space of a

few minutes they were disordered beyond the possibility of being

rallied. The cavalry made a desperate effort to maintain the

field, but finding themselves unsupported, wheeled round and fled

... toward ... Moravia."5 It was a total rout

and an unconditional victory, but, "...Zisca's labors were not yet ended. The emperor, exasperated

by his defeat, raised new armies, which he sent against Zisca the

following spring.... But the blind general, determined that his

country should not be enslaved while he had strength to wield a

sword, gathered his brave army "and met the enemy yet again,

despite fearsome disadvantages in numbers and equipment. "An

engagement ensued, in which the [enemy] were utterly routed,

leaving no less than nine thousand of their number dead on the

field."6 The remaining branch of the grand

imperial army, under the command of Sigismund himself, next met a similar

fate, and the

mighty emperor was compelled to sue for peace at the hands of the

blind general. Then there occurred the final magnificent gesture

of this extraordinary human being. As the historian Wilson

recounts the episode: "Our blind hero, having taken up arms only

to secure peace, was glad for an opportunity to lay them down.

When his grateful countrymen requested him to accept the crown of

Bohemia, as a reward for his eminent services, he respectfully

declined."7 And this is what Zisca said: "While you find me of

service to your designs, you may freely command both my counsels

and my sword, but I will never accept any established authority;

on the contrary, my most earnest advice to you is, when the

perverseness of your enemies allows you peace, to trust

yourselves no longer in the hands of kings, but to form

yourselves into a republic, which species of government only can

secure your liberties."8 That is the true story

of Zisca--military genius, patriot, freedom fighter, statesman, and blind

man. Extraordinary as his

heroism was, it exceeds only in degree the story of yet another

blind Bohemian--King John, the blind monarch who fell in the

historic Battle of Crecy, which engaged the energies and cost the

lives of many of Europe's nobility. This king had been blind for

many years. When he heard the clang of arms, he turned to his

lords and said: "I only now desire this last piece of service

from you, that you would bring me forward so near to these

Englishmen that I may deal among them one good stroke with my

sword." In order not to be separated, the king and his attendants

tied the reins of their horses one to another, and went into

battle. There this valiant old hero had his desire, and came

boldly up to the Prince of Wales, and gave more than "one good

stroke" with his sword. He fought courageously, as did all his

lords, and others about him; but they engaged themselves so far

that all were slain, and next day found dead, their horses'

bridles still tied together. In the country of the

blind, it has foolishly been said, the one-eyed man will inevitably be king.

This, of course, is

nonsense. In fact, the very opposite has often been true. History

reveals that in the realm of the sighted it is not at all

remarkable for a blind man to be king. Thus, in 1851, George

Frederick, Duke of Cumberland, first cousin to Queen Victoria,

ascended the throne of Hanover under the royal title of George

the Fifth. That this blind king of Hanover was no imcompetent,

but distinctly superior to the ordinary run of monarchs, is shown

by the words of a contemporary historian, who said: "Though

laboring under the deprivation of sight, this Prince is as

efficient in his public, as he is beloved in his private,

character; a patron of the arts and sciences, and a promoter of

agricultural interests...he has acquired a perfect knowledge of

six different languages."9 A strikingly similar

account has been handed down to us of the blind Prince Kitoyasu, who reigned

as a provincial governor

in Japan over a thousand years ago and "whose influence set a

pattern for the sightless which differed from that in any other

country and saved his land from the scourge of beggary."10

Thoroughly trained in both Japanese and Chinese literature,

Prince Hitoyasu introduced blind people into society and the life

of the court. In ninth-century Japan, when the blind led the

blind, they did not fall into a ditch, but rose out of it

together. Let us turn now from the records of royalty

to the annals of

adventure. Perhaps the most persistent and destructive myth

concerning the blind is the assumption of our relative inactivity

and immobility--the image of the blind person glued to his or her

rocking chair and, at best, sadly dependent on others for guide

or transport on routine daily rounds. "Mobility," we are led to

believe, is a modern term, which has just begun to have meaning

for the blind. To be sure, many blind persons have been cowed by

the myth of helplessness into remaining in their sheltered

corners. But there have always been others--like James Holman,

Esquire, a solitary traveler of a century and a half ago, who

gained the great distinction of being labeled by the Russians as

"the blind spy. "Yes, it really happened! This intrepid

Englishman, traveling alone across the steppes of Greater Russia

all the way to Siberia, was so close an observer of all about him

that he was arrested as a spy by the Czar's police and conducted

to the borders of Austria, where he was ceremoniously expelled. Here

is how it happened. Holman lost his sight at the age of twenty-five, after

a brief career as a lieutenant in the Royal

Navy; but his urge to travel, instead of declining, grew

stronger. He soon embarked upon a series of voyages--first

through France and Italy, then (at one fell swoop) through

Poland, Austria, Saxony, Prussia, Hanover, Russia, and Siberia.

His real intention, as he later wrote, was to "make a circuit of

the whole world," entirely on his own and unaccompanied--an

ambition he might well have fulfilled had it not been for the

Czar's police and the Russian spy charges. He later published a

two-volume account of his travels and observations, and his own

reflections upon his Russian adventure are worth repeating: "My

situation," he wrote, "was now one of extreme novelty and my

feelings corresponded with its peculiarity. I was engaged ... in

a solitary journey of a thousand miles, through a country,

perhaps the wildest on the face of the earth, whose inhabitants

were scarcely yet accounted within the pale of civilization, with

no other attendant than a rude Tartar postillion, to whose

language my ear was wholly unaccustomed; and yet, I was supported

by a feeling of happy confidence...."11 As

Federationists know, there have been other blind travelers in our own time

quite as intrepid as James Holman. Yet,

Holman's story--the case of the "blind spy"--is important for its

demonstration that blind people could wear such seven-league

boots almost two centuries ago--before Braille or the long cane,

before residential schools or vocational rehabilitation, before

even the American Foundation for the Blind and its 239-page book

on personal management for the blind.

But there is a more basic side to mobility, of course, than

the opportunity and capacity for long-distance traveling. There

is the simple ability to get about, to walk and run, to mount a

horse or ride a bicycle--in short, to be physically independent.

The number of blind persons who have mastered these skills of

travel is countless, but no one has ever proved the point or

shown the way with more flair than a stalwart Englishman of the

eighteenth century named John Metcalf. Indeed, this brash fellow

not only defied convention, but the world. Totally blind from

childhood, he was (among other things) a successful builder of

roads and bridges; racehorse rider; bare-knuckle fighter; card

shark; stagecoach driver; and, on occasion, guide to sighted

tourists through the local countryside. Here is an account of

some of his many enterprises: "In 1751 he commenced a new employment; he set up a stage

wagon betwixt York and Knaresborough, being the first on the

road, and drove it himself, twice a week in summer, and once in

winter. This business, with the occasional conveyence of army

baggage, employed his attention till the period of his first

contracting for the making of roads, which engagement suiting him

better, he relinquished every other pursuit.... The first piece

of road he made was about three miles ... , and the materials for

the whole were to be produced from one gravel pit; he therefore

provided deal boards, and erected a temporary house at the pit;

took a dozen horses to the place; fixed racks and mangers, and

hired a house for his men, at Minskip. He often walked to

Knaresborough in the morning, with four or five stone of meal on

his shoulders, and joined his men by six o'clock. He completed

the road much sooner than was expected, to the entire

satisfaction of the surveyor and trustees."12 The

story of "Blind Jack" Metcalf, for all its

individuality, is far from unique. Rather, it underscores what

even we as Federationists sometimes forget, and what most of the

sighted have never learned at all--namely, that the blind can

compete on terms of absolute equality with others--that we are

really, literally, the equals of the sighted. We have been kept

down by the myths and false beliefs about our inferiority, by the

self-fulfilling prophecies of the custodial system which has

conditioned the sighted and the blind alike to believe we are

helpless, but not by any innate lacks or losses inherent in our

blindness. Metcalf's accomplishments in applied

science were probably matched by those of a French army officer more than

a century

before. Blaise Francoise, Comte de Pagan, was blinded in the

course of military service, shortly before he was to be promoted

to the rank of field marshal. He then turned his attention to the

science of fortifications, wrote the definitive work on the

subject, and subsequently published a variety of scientific

works, among which was one entitled "An Historical and

Geographical Account of the River of the Amazons" (which included

a chart drawn up by this military genius after he became blind)!

Like the sighted, the blind have had their share of solid

citizens, namby-pambies, strong-minded individualists, squares,

oddballs, eggheads, and eccentrics. The sixteenth-century German

scholar James Shegkins, for instance, refused to undergo an

operation which was virtually guaranteed to restore his sight:

"In order," as he said, "not to be obliged to see many things

that might appear odious and ridiculous."13 Shegkins, a truly

absent-minded professor, taught philosophy and medicine over many

years with great success, and left behind him influential

monographs on a dozen scientific subjects.

The success story of Dr. Nicholas Bacon, a blind lawyer of

eighteenth-century France, somewhat resembles that of our own

beloved founder, Dr.Jacobus tenBroek. Both were blinded in

childhood by bow-and-arrow accidents, and both went on to high

academic achievement in law and related studies. The strenuous

exertions which Bacon was forced to go through at each stage of

his climb are indicated by the following account: "When he recovered his health, which had suffered from the

accident, he continued the same plan of education which he had

before commenced.... But his friends treated his intention with

ridicule, and even the professors themselves were not far from

the same sentiment; for they admitted him into their schools,

rather under an impression that he might amuse them, than that

they should be able to communicate much information to him."

However, he obtained "the first place among his fellow students.

They then said that such rapid advances might be made in the

preliminary branches of education, but not ... in studies of a

more profound nature; and when ... it became necessary to study

the art of poetry, it was declared by the general voice that all

was over.... But here he likewise disproved their prejudices....

He applied himself to law, and took his degree in that science at

Brussels."14 Years earlier--in the fourth century

after Christ--another blind man made an even steeper ascent to learning.

He was Didymus

of Alexandria, who became one of the celebrated scholars of the

early church. He carved out of wood an alphabet of letters and

laboriously taught himself to form them into words, and shape the

words into sentences. Later, when he could afford to hire

readers, he is said to have worn them out one after another in

his insatiable quest for knowledge. He became the greatest

teacher of his age. He mastered philosophy and theology, and then

went on to geometry and astrology. He was regarded by his

students, some of whom like St. Jerome became church fathers,

with "a touch of awe" because of his vast learning and

intellect. Didymus was not the only blind theologian to gain

eminence within the church. In the middle of the seventeenth

century, at almost the same moment Milton was composing Paradise

Lost, a blind priest named Prospero Fagnani was writing a

commentary on church law, which was to bring him fame as one of

the outstanding theorists of the Roman faith. At the precocious

age of 21, Fagnani had already earned the degree of doctor of civil and

canon law, and in the very next year, he was appointed Secretary

of the Congregation of the Council. His celebrated Commentary,

published in six quarto volumes, won high praise from Pope

Benedict XIV and caused its author to become identified

throughout Europe by a Latin title which in translation signifies

"the blind yet farseeing doctor." These

few biographical sketches plucked from the annals of the blind are no more

than samples. They are not even the most

illustrious instances I could have given. I have said nothing at

all about the best known of history's blind celebrities--Homer,

Milton, and Helen Keller. There is good reason for that omission.

Not only are those resounding names well enough known already,

but they have come to represent--each in its own sentimentalized,

storybook form--not the abilities and possibilities of people who

are blind but the exact opposite. Supposedly these giants are the

exceptions that prove the rule--the rule, that is, that the blind

are incompetent. Each celebrated case is explained away to keep

the stereotype intact: Thus, Homer (we are repeatedly told)

probably never existed at all--being not a man but a committee!

As for Milton, he is dismissed as a sighted poet, who happened to

become blind in later life. And Helen Keller, they say, was the

peculiarly gifted and just plain lucky beneficiary of a lot of

money and a "miracle worker" (her tutor and companion, Anne

Sullivan).

Don't you believe it! These justly famous cases of

accomplishment are not mysterious, unexplainable exceptions--they

are only remarkable. Homer, who almost certainly did exist and

who was clearly blind, accomplished just a little better what

other blind persons after him have accomplished by the thousands:

that is, he was a good writer. Milton composed great works while

he was sighted, and greater ones (including Paradise Lost) after

he became blind. His example, if it proves anything, proves only

that blindness makes no difference in ability. As for Helen

Keller, her life demonstrates dramatically what great resources

of character and will and intellect may live in a human being

beyond the faculties of sight and sound--which is not to take

anything at all away from Anne Sullivan.

In the modern world it is not the poets or the humanists,

but the scientists, who have held the center of the stage. As

would be expected, the stereotyped view has consistently been

that the blind cannot compete in these areas. How does this

square with the truth? Consider the case of Nicholas

Saunderson--totally blind from infancy--who succeeded Sir Isaac Newton in

the chair of

mathematics at Cambridge University, despite the fact that he had

earlier been refused admission to the same university and was

never permitted to earn a degree! It was the great Newton himself

who pressed Saunderson's appointment upon the reluctant Cambridge

dons; and it was no less a personage than Queen Anne of England

who made it possible by conferring the necessary degree upon

Saunderson. Later he received a Doctor of Laws degree from King

George II, a symbol of the renown he had gained as a

mathematician. Among Saunderson's best subjects, by the way, was

the science of optics--at which he was so successful that the

eminent Lord Chesterfield was led to remark on "the miracle of a

man who had not the use of his own sight teaching others how to

use theirs."15 For another example, consider

John Cough, a blind English biologist of the eighteenth century, who became

a master at

classification of plants and animals by substituting the sense of

touch for that of sight. Or consider Leonard Euler, a great

mathematician of the same century, who (after becoming blind) won

two research prizes from the Parisian Academy of Sciences, wrote

a major work translated into every European language, and devised

an astronomical theory which "has been deemed by astronomers, in

exactness of computation, one of the most remarkable achievements

of the human intellect."16 Or, for a final illustration, consider

Francois Huber, blind Swiss zoologist, who gained recognition as

the pre-eminent authority of the eighteenth century on the

behavior of bees. The famous writer Maurice Maeterlinck said of

Huber that he was "the master and classic of contemporary

apiarian science."17

Even after all of this evidence, there will be many (some of

them, regrettably, our own blind Uncle Toms) who will try to deny

and explain it all away--who will attempt to keep intact their

outworn notions about the helplessness of the blind as a class.

So let me nail down a couple of points: In the first place, is

all of this talk about history and the success of blind

individuals really valid? Isn't it true that most blind people

throughout the ages have lived humdrum lives, achieving neither

fame nor glory, and soon forgotten? Yes, it is true--but for the

sighted as well as for the blind. For the overwhelming majority

of mankind (the blind and the sighted alike) life has been

squalor and hard knocks and anonymity from as far back as anybody

knows. There were doubtless blind peasants, blind housewives,

blind shoemakers, blind businessmen, blind thieves, blind

prostitutes, and blind holy men who performed as competently or

as incompetently (and are now as forgotten) as their sighted

contemporaries. "Even so," the doubter may say, "I'm

still not convinced. Don't you think the track record for the blind is worse

than the

track record for the sighted? Don't you think a larger percentage

of the blind have failed?"

Again, the answer is yes--just as with other minorities.

That's what it's all about. Year after year, decade after decade,

century after century, age after age, we the blind were told that

we were helpless--that we were inferior--and we believed it and

acted accordingly. But no more! As with other minorities, we have

tended to see ourselves as others have seen us. We have accepted

the public view of our limitations, and thus have done much to

make those limitations a reality. When our true history

conflicted with popular prejudice, the truth was altered or

conveniently forgotten. We have been ashamed of our blindness and

ignorant of our heritage, but never again! We will never go back

to the ward status of second-class citizens. There is simply no

way. There are blind people aplenty--and sighted allies, too--

(many of them in this room tonight) who will take to the streets

and fight with their bare hands if they must before they will let

it happen.

And this, too, is history--our meeting, our movement, our

new spirit of self-awareness and self-realization. In our own

time and in our own day we have found leaders as courageous as

Zisca, and as willing to go into battle to resist tyranny. But we

are no longer to be counted by ones and twos, or by handfuls or

hundreds. We are now a movement, with tens of thousands in the

ranks. Napoleon is supposed to have said that history is a legend

agreed upon. If this is true, then we the blind are in the

process of negotiating a new agreement, with a legend conforming

more nearly to the truth and the spirit of the dignity of man.

And what do you think future historians will say of us--of you

and me? What legends will they agree upon concerning the blind of

the mid-twentieth century? How will they deal with our movement--

with the National Federation of the Blind? Will they record that

we fell back into the faceless anonymity of the ages, or that we

met the challenges and survived as a free people? It all depends

on what we do and how we act; for future historians will write

the record, but we will make it. Our lives will provide the raw

materials from which their legends will emerge to be agreed upon. And,

while no man can predict the future, I feel absolute confidence as to what

the historians will say. They will tell of

a system of governmental and private agencies established to

serve the blind, which became so custodial and so repressive that

reaction was inevitable. They will tell that the blind ("their

time come 'round at last") began to acquire a new self-image,

along with rising expectations, and that they determined to

organize and speak for themselves. And they will tell of Jacobus

tenBroek, how he, as a young college professor, (blind and

brilliant) stood forth to lead the movement like Zisca of old.

They will tell how the agencies first tried to ignore us, then

resented us, then feared us, and finally came to hate us--with

the emotion and false logic and cruel desperation which dying

systems always feel toward the new about to replace them. They

will tell of the growth of our movement through the forties and

fifties, and of our civil war--which resulted in the small group

that splintered away to become the American Council of the Blind.

They will tell how we emerged from our civil war into the

sixties, stronger and more vital than we had ever been; and how

more and more of the agencies began to make common cause with us

for the betterment of the blind. They will tell of our court

cases, our legislative efforts, and our organizational struggles-

-and they will record the sorrow and mourning of the blind at the

death of their great leader, Jacobus tenBroek.

They will also record the events of today--of the 1970s--

when the reactionaries among the agencies became even more so,

and the blind of the second generation of the NFB stood forth to

meet them. They will talk of the American Foundation for the

Blind and its attempt (through its tool, NAC) to control all work

with the blind, and our lives. They will tell how NAC and the

American Foundation and the other reactionary agencies gradually

lost ground and gave way before us. They will tell of new and

better agencies rising to work in partnership with the blind, and

of harmony and progress as the century draws to an end. They will

relate how the blind passed from second-class citizenship through

a period of hostility to equality and first-class status in

society.

But future historians will only record these events if we

make them come true. They can help us be remembered, but they

cannot help us dream. That we must do for ourselves. They can

give us acclaim, but not guts and courage. They can give us

recognition and appreciation, but not determination or compassion

or good judgment. We must either find those things for ourselves,

or not have them at all.

We have come a long way together in this movement. Some of

us are veterans, going back to the forties; others are new

recruits, fresh to the ranks. Some are young; some are old. Some

are educated, others not. It makes no difference. In everything

that matters we are one; we are the movement; we are the blind.

Just as in 1940, when the National Federation of the Blind was

formed, the fog rolls in through the Golden Gate. The eucalyptus

trees give forth their pungent smell, and the Berkeley hills look

down at the bay. The house still stands in those hills, and the

planes still rise from San Francisco to span the world. But

Jacobus tenBroek comes from the house no more, nor rides the

planes to carry the word.

But the word is carried, and his spirit goes with it. He it

was who founded this movement, and he it is whose dreams are

still entwined in the depths of its being. Likewise, our dreams

(our hopes and our visions) are part of the fabric, going forward

to the next generation as a heritage and a challenge. History is

not against us: the past proclaims it; the present confirms it;

and the future demands it. If we falter or dishonor our heritage,

we will betray not only ourselves but those who went before us

and those who come after. But, of course, we will not fail.

Whatever the cost, we shall pay it. Whatever the sacrifice, we

shall make it. We cannot turn back, or stand still. Instead, we

must go forward. We shall prevail--and history will record it.

The future is ours. Come! Join me on the barricades, and we will

make it come true.

FOOTNOTES

1. Wilham Artman, Beauties and Achievements of the Blind (Auburn:

Published for the Author, 1890), p.265.

2. James Wilson, Biography of the Blind (Birmingham, England:

Printed by J.W. Showell, Fourth Edition, 1838), p.110. 3.

Artman,

3. op. cit., p. 265.

4. Ibid., p.266.

5. Ibid., p.267.

6. Ibid., p.268.

7. Ibid., pp.268-269.

8. Wilon, op.cit., p.115 9. Mrs. Hippolyte Van Landeghem,

Exile and Home: Advantages of Social Education of the Blind (London: Printed

by W. Clowes & Sons, 1865), p.95.

10. Gabriel Farrell, The Story of Blindness (Cambridge: Harvard

University Press, 1956), p.7.

11. Wilson, op.cit., p.262.

12. Ibid., pp.100-101

13. Artman, op.cit., p.220.

14. Wilson, op.cit., p.243.

15. Farrell, op.cit., p.11.

16. Artman, op.cit., p.226.

17. Farrell, op.cit., pp.12-13.

[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Fred Schroeder.]

BRAILLE BILLS: WHAT ARE THEY AND WHAT DO THEY MEAN?

by Fredric K. Schroeder

From the Associate Editor: Fred Schroeder has been a leader

in the organized blind movement for a number of years. He

currently serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the

National Federation of the Blind. He is also an experienced

professional in the field of work with the blind. Trained as a

teacher of blind children and an orientation and mobility

specialist, he directed the low incidence programs in the

Albuquerque, New Mexico, public school system before becoming the

Director of the New Mexico Commission for the Blind. He is a

professional in the blindness field with excellent credentials,

down-to-earth common sense, and a sense of humor that gives him

perspective. But first and foremost, he is a blind consumer, and

his ability to remember that truth keeps his feet planted firmly

in reality. In the following article he describes what Braille

bills are and places them in the context of the struggle of blind

people for equal opportunity. Here is what he has to say:

In 1940, when the blind organized to promote their social

and economic integration, there was a dramatic albeit predictable

response from the field of work with the blind. Professionals

harbored real resentment against clients who presumed to speak

out on their own behalf. The conflict centered on the simple

question of who would speak for the blind. Would it be the blind

themselves, or would it be those in the blindness profession, who

through training and practice had come to regard themselves as

the true experts on the needs of blind people?

For more than fifty years this conflict has continued

focusing on a series of issues which in turn have represented the

latest battleground in the ongoing conflict. We have struggled

over freedom of association; the institutionalization of

oppressive practices through the creation of the National

Accreditation Council; minimum wages for blind workers; and, most

recently, freedom of choice in the provision of rehabilitation

services. In each case and at each step, the right of self-

determination has been at the center of the fray; yet as blind

people we have never faltered in our conviction that we alone are

best able to appraise our own needs and determine our own

futures.

In the late 1970s the National Federation of the Blind began

to call for the teaching of cane travel to young blind children.

What appeared to skilled cane travelers to be the self-evident

advantage of teaching young children to travel

independently escaped most blindness professionals, who met our

demands with open hostility. The orientation and mobility

professionals believed that cane travel should be restricted to

high-school-aged students and perhaps the occasional middle

school student. The concept of training young children to use the

white cane was viewed as irresponsible and denounced as the

political agitation of a radical group of malcontents.

Yet the blind, recognizing the importance of self-confidence

and the skills to put that confidence into practice, began

working with parents and young children to show them the

advantages of independent travel. Finally the self-evident

benefits of early cane training began to penetrate the

orientation and mobility profession. Eventually, the idea of

early cane training ceased to be radical as mobility

professionals began tentatively experimenting with the idea. At

the end of a decade of blind people's pressing for early cane

training, the orientation and mobility profession announced a

startling revelation: the profession--all by itself, without any

help from anyone--had miraculously discovered that young children

could in fact master independent cane travel. Late in 1988 the

Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness, a publication of the

American Foundation for the Blind, carried an article discussing

cane training for young blind children. Incredibly it was

purported that this article was the first time anyone had

discussed the possibility of cane training for preschoolers.

It is disappointing that progress in the field of work with

the blind seems always to follow the pattern of blind people's

pressing for change and the professionals' stubbornly resisting

progress. The most recent example of this pattern can be seen in

the Braille literacy controversy. In the early 1980s the National

Federation of the Blind began drawing attention to the increasing

level of illiteracy among blind students graduating from our

nation's schools. Much of the decrease in literacy can be traced

to the low vision movement of the 1970s, which

inculcated in modern pedagogy the age-old myth that to see a

little was somehow better (almost more virtuous) than to see not

at all. For twenty years young blind children were dissuaded from

learning and reading Braille in favor of relying ineffectively on

limited vision to read print. While it is not necessary to

catalogue this tragedy in detail, it is fair to say that a whole

generation of blind people have suffered diminished opportunity

as a result of inadequate Braille training.

Needing a mechanism for focussing public attention on the

Braille crisis, the National Federation of the Blind created the

concept of Braille legislation, which would establish public

policy on the right of blind persons to become literate and

productive. The first Braille bill was passed in Minnesota just

five years ago in 1987. As with other controversies throughout

the years, the blind have led the fight while professionals

denied that a problem existed.

In the five years since the first Braille bill was passed,

eleven states have followed suit: Arizona, Kansas, Kentucky,

Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, South Carolina,

Texas, and Virginia have joined the ranks of states committed to

greater opportunities for blind children.

Not surprisingly, a number of myths have developed

concerning Braille bills and their effects. The most common of

these is the charge that Braille bills mandate Braille

instruction for all legally blind children. While this charge is

intended to demonstrate the irrationality of the Federation's

viewpoint, one is tempted to ask what is wrong with wanting

legally blind children to learn Braille. Neither parents nor

teachers cringe when they realize that sighted children are

expected to learn print, nor is there a passionate demand to

consider the sighted child's individuality. Yet the concept of

teaching legally blind children to read Braille is offered as

another example of the radical and irrational nature of the

organized blind.

Regardless of whether all blind children should or should

not be taught Braille, none of the nation's twelve Braille

statutes contains such a requirement. No Braille bill in any

state requires the teaching of Braille to all legally blind

children. The strongest legislation sets forth a presumption that

legally blind children will read Braille unless the Individual

Education Plan (IEP) team determines otherwise, while other

legislation mandates only that Braille be considered in the

educational planning for blind children. The real purpose of

Braille bills is to serve as a statement of public policy,

recognizing the need for literacy among the blind, paralleling

the need for literacy among the sighted.

As Braille bills have developed, a number of logical

extensions have become incorporated into more recent pieces of

legislation. One of the most controversial is the requirement for

competency testing for teachers of blind children. With the

National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped

(NLS) on the verge of releasing a Braille competency test, such a

requirement has become practical and easy to administer. While it

is intuitively reasonable that teachers of blind children should

be able to read and write Braille, it must be remembered that the

educational establishment has de-emphasized the code for more

than twenty years. As a result many teachers of blind children

are no longer able to read and write Braille efficiently and have

been trained to believe that Braille is the least desirable

choice. Teachers trained during this period probably received

poor training in Braille reading and writing initially and

subsequently found little if any use for it in their teaching.

Braille legislation requiring competency testing strikes a

responsive chord among many of today's blind children and their

parents. Predictably, significant numbers of teachers of blind

children oppose Braille bills, asserting that their competence to

read and write Braille is unrelated to their ability to teach

blind children. As a result these teachers have testified in

opposition to competency testing as an unimportant and

counterproductive element in Braille legislation.

A relatively new element appearing in Braille legislation

concerns a requirement for textbook manufacturers to produce

material in electronic media in a form readily translatable into

Braille. This provision first surfaced in the Texas Braille bill

in May of 1991. While it was anticipated that this provision

would spark serious opposition from textbook publishers, in fact

the opposite has proven to be the case. Although a number of

technical problems still exist, the concept of computer-

translatable texts promises to make Braille more readily

available than ever before.

As with other controversies throughout the past half-

century, the pattern remains consistent. First the blind promote

an idea which sparks professional opposition. Through

perseverance the idea achieves some implementation and success.

After a while, the validity of the idea is recognized, and

finally members of the profession jump on the bandwagon, eager to

take credit for having thought it up themselves. In 1987 the idea

of Braille bills was strongly opposed by many in the blindness

profession, yet the National Federation of the Blind persisted in

carrying the first one through the Minnesota legislature.

Gradually Braille bills became less controversial, and today

large segments of the blindness field have ceased opposing

Braille bills and, in fact, have formed coalitions to work

cooperatively toward promoting them. Progress does occur, albeit

slowly and painfully.

The pattern of the blind's pressing for change and the

profession's resisting that change continues. As blind people we

refuse to suffer another lost generation. Literacy is a

fundamental right, and we will not have our potential and that of

today's blind children artificially depressed through inadequate

training. Blind children can compete and assume a productive role

in society. Generations of blind people have proven the truth of

this statement, and the next generation must be given the tools

to continue the struggle for true equality. Braille bills are an

expression of public policy and a manifestation of blind people's

determination to live normal lives as fully participating members

of society. Momentum is gathering as more and more states enact

Braille legislation, thereby joining the growing Braille literacy

movement. In many ways this movement has become an expression of

our confidence in the true ability of blind children and our

willingness to ensure them equality of opportunity. We must

translate this commitment into expressions of public policy and,

perhaps more to the point, into the day-to-day training that

blind children receive.

[PHOTO/CAPTION: On April 14, 1992, Kentucky's Governor signed the

state's Braille literacy legislation into law. At the ceremony

which marked this momentous occasion for Kentucky's blind

children, those who were chiefly responsible for accomplishing

this milestone gathered to celebrate the event. Pictured here

from left to right are Will Evans, Superintendent of the Kentucky

School for the Blind; Hilda Caton, Coordinator of Programs for

the Visually Impaired, University of Louisville; Betty Niceley,

President of the National Federation of the Blind of Kentucky;

Brereton Jones, Governor of Kentucky; Robbie Castleman, the State

Representative who introduced House Bill 370; and Charles Allen,

Legislative Chairman of the NFB of Kentucky.]

[PHOTO/CAPTION: NFB of S.C. Braille bill signing.]

BRAILLE BILL UPDATE

In November of 1990 the Board of Directors of the National

Federation of the Blind decided that the organization should

develop language for a model Braille bill that could be used by

state affiliates around the country in working with their

legislatures to create laws that would protect the right of blind

children to full literacy. Since then several state affiliates

have succeeded in achieving passage of the model Braille bill,

and a number of others are working on the project. Of course,

several states had passed Braille Bills prior to the development

of the model bill language, and some of these are now working to

strengthen their laws. Here is a list of the states with Braille

literacy legislation on the books: Arizona, July 1, 1991; Kansas,

1991; Kentucky, signed into law April 14, 1992; Louisiana, 1988;

Maryland, passed April 2, 1992; Minnesota, 1987; Missouri,1990;

South Carolina, signed into law May 20, 1992; South Dakota, 1991;

Texas, September 1, 1991; Virginia, 1990.

Here is the list of states with Braille bills currently

under consideration: California; Colorado; Connecticut; Illinois;

Iowa; Louisiana, considering amendments to the current act;

Massachusetts; Michigan; Minnesota, amendments to make current

law conform to the model Braille bill have passed the Senate;

Nebraska; Ohio; Washington State; and Wisconsin. Here are reports

on the most recent successes:

TEXAS

by

Glenn Crosby

July 31, 1991, was proclaimed Braille Literacy Day in the

State of Texas by Governor Ann Richards. The official

proclamation, written in both print and Braille, was presented to

members of the National Federation of the Blind of Texas during a

celebration in the Lieutenant Governor's Reception Room in the

state capitol.

The news media were there in force to see President Glenn

Crosby thank Senator Mike Moncrief, Representative Elliott

Naishtat, and the scores of Federationists who had worked hard to

see that the Braille Literacy Act was passed during the regular

session of the Texas Legislature, which ended in May of 1991.

More than fifty representatives and senators were present to

celebrate the fact that the Texas Braille literacy legislation

has become the model for the rest of the country.

Many professionals have attempted to take credit for the

hard work done by the blind in Texas, but everyone who worked on

passage of this piece of legislation recognizes that the

Federation was the moving force behind it. If members of the NFB

hadn't written a model law and if many other state affiliates had

not worked so hard to pass Braille laws before we did, the Texas

law would probably not have been adopted.

Dr. Phil Hatlen, superintendent of the Texas School for the

Blind, presented testimony in favor of the legislation, and the

National Federation of the Blind of Texas appreciates his support

on this issue. But the testimony of blind people who had been

denied Braille training because they had some residual vision and

that of the totally blind people who demonstrated that

proficiency in the use of Braille allowed them to be credible

witnesses because they were able to read from notes as

efficiently as other witnesses are what made the real difference.

The legislature knows that the blind of Texas are the reason that

this law was enacted, and so does the governor. They all thanked

the blind for bringing the problem to their attention, and the

proclamation was presented to the National Federation of the

Blind of Texas. It will grace the Federation's office wall rather

than that of any professional in the state.

Since the law was adopted last May, the NFB of Texas has

been working with the Texas Education Agency to implement the

law's provisions dealing with the definition of functional

blindness, certification of Braille proficiency for teachers of

the blind in Texas, and availability of textbooks in electronic

media so that they can be translated into Braille. Jeff Pearcy

and Tommy Craig of Austin have served on committees which dealt

with the first two items, and Eura Mae Harmon of Amarillo serves

on the Texas Commission on Braille Textbook Production, which

will work on making Braille textbooks more available.

Aside from the work with the Texas Education Agency, the

affiliate is also working with the sponsors of the Braille

literacy law, Senator Mike Moncrief and Representative Elliott

Naishtat, to make several public service announcements to be used

on television stations throughout the state. These will inform

the public that this law has been passed and will provide the

toll-free number of the NFB of Texas so that parents and teachers

who have questions about the legislation can contact us. We also

hope to promote the use of Braille with these messages by showing

blind people using Braille in various circumstances while the

announcement is being made.

SOUTH CAROLINA

by Donald C. Capps

The NFB's model Braille bill passed the South Carolina

General Assembly on February 27, 1992, and was signed into law in

a public ceremony by the Governor on May 20. The South Carolina

affiliate arranged to have the model Braille bill introduced into

the joint House Senate Committee on People with Disabilities in

January of 1991, but complications developed during the year when

the parent of a blind child decided that the law would mean that

her child would be compelled to learn Braille against her wishes.

She then disseminated a good bit of misleading information

throughout the legislature and stirred up what opposition she

could in an effort to derail the bill. In early January of this

year the National Federation of the Blind of South Carolina

shifted into high gear to insure that the bill would be passed.

Each of the thirty-four Federation chapters spoke with local

legislators, and the affiliate developed a Braille literacy

brochure, which was given to each lawmaker who attended the

organization's annual legislative dinner on January 15. The

brochure was also sent to every representative and senator who

had not attended. Ample use was also made of Braille Monitor

articles about the importance of Braille literacy, and letters

and other contacts by Federation experts on Braille literacy from

across the country poured into legislators' offices. The result

of all this effort was that in less than six weeks from the date

of the legislative dinner the bill had passed both the House and

the Senate and was on its way to the Governor for signing. The

South Carolina affiliate worked hard to pass this law, but we

could not have done it without the expertise and support of the

entire membership of the National Federation of the Blind.

KENTUCKY

by

Betty Niceley

On March 30, 1992, the Kentucky Senate passed the state's

version of the Federation's model Braille bill. By that date

every committee and both houses of the legislature had passed the

bill unanimously. Governor Brereton Jones signed it into law in a

public ceremony on April 14. The explanation for all this

unanimity was simple: the National Federation of the Blind of

Kentucky had been working for many months behind the scenes to

bring all the parties into agreement.

As frequently happens, the special education teachers who

work with blind and visually impaired youngsters had been

extremely nervous about the legislation. Recognizing that their

own Braille skills were weak or, in some cases, non-existent,

they began by opposing the bill. But Dr. Hilda Caton, Coordinator

of Programs for the Visually Impaired at the University of

Louisville and a Braille researcher at the American Printing

House for the Blind, was enthusiastic about the proposed

legislation from the beginning. She said repeatedly and publicly

that "the Federation has been right about Braille literacy all

along." Her vocal support was extremely helpful, for she has

trained most of the teachers of blind students working in the

state today and is therefore highly respected by them. Will

Evans, Superintendent of the Kentucky School for the Blind, invited representatives

from the Federation to a meeting

to discuss with teachers the provisions of the bill. David

Murrell, one of the authors of the bill's language; Dr. Caton;

and I, as President of the NFB of Kentucky, attended the meeting

to address teacher concerns. We had expected to face the teachers

from the School for the Blind only, but the twenty-one vision

teachers from Jefferson County were there as well. The entire

meeting lasted about four hours. One young teacher complained

that she would have to return to school to master Braille

sufficiently to become certified. Who was going to pay for that?

The Superintendent suggested that she could surely study on her

own to get the necessary practice. At that she began a long

recital of her duties and said that she did not have the time to

do work independently, to which Dr. Caton replied in her gentle

drawl, "Honey, if you don't have time to learn Braille, you're in

the wrong job."

Another teacher stood up at one point and said that he was

legally blind, but he would have to be dragged kicking and

screaming into learning Braille. My response was a statement to

the entire group that this teacher's negative attitude was the

best reason I could think of for beginning early Braille

instruction with legally blind children. Eventually

a small group retired to work on compromise language that would reassure

the teachers without diluting the

bill. Several times Dr. Caton was appealed to by the teachers to

suggest new language. She kept repeating, "I thought the original

language was fine." At last, however, everyone agreed on a text,

and letters of endorsement were submitted by the School for the

Blind and by the Jefferson County teachers. The model bill sailed

through the legislative process under the skillful and watchful

supervision of the NFB of Kentucky's invaluable Legislative

Chairman, Charles Allen and his equally dedicated wife Betty.

MARYLAND

by Sharon Maneki

The National Federation of the Blind of Maryland first

introduced a state Braille bill in 1986. The concept was

violently opposed by the staff of the Maryland School for the

Blind and by the state's Department of Education, and because of

the opposition the bill was defeated. During the intervening

years a great deal of patient effort has gone into educating

Department of Education personnel about the issue of literacy for

blind children and about the National Federation of the Blind.

Recently the Department established an advisory committee to

develop guidelines for determining which students should be

taught Braille and which should be taught print. The NFB agreed

to work with this committee, and at the same time the Department

agreed to send a representative to be a part of a task force

formed by the Federation to write a literacy bill for blind

students. Representatives from the School for the Blind, from the

special education programs of the three largest school systems in

the state, and from the American Council of the Blind, as well as

from the Department of Education, joined with the NFB in writing

the bill, completed late last fall.

In January the Federation devoted its annual legislative day

in the state capital to talking about Braille literacy with

Representatives and Senators. Two members of the ACB spent a

couple of hours working on the bill that day alongside the forty

Federationists, and the School for the Blind representative to

the task force visited a Senator or two, but most of the work was

done by the Federation. The Department of Education had helped to

write the bill, and though no one stepped forward from the

Department to discuss the issue with legislators, it was commonly

understood that the bill would not be opposed by Department

officials.

Then, two days before Senate committee hearings were to

begin in mid-February, the Department introduced several

amendments, the most important of which would have altered the

bill's presumption that Braille would be taught unless print was

clearly indicated; the Department version provided merely that

Braille would be considered. The amendment struck at the heart of

the Federation's legislation, and the amended version was the one

that the Senate passed.

In the meantime a House committee was preparing to hear the

original version, which had been introduced simultaneously in

that chamber. The Department of Education indicated to House

committee members that it would like its amendments to be added

to the House version, but this time the legislators asked for an

opinion from the Attorney General about whether the presumption-

of-Braille provision of the NFB bill conflicted with the

federally guaranteed right to an Individual Education Plan. The

Attorney General ruled that it did not, and as a result the House

passed the bill without the weakening amendments that the Senate

had attached. Next each chamber considered the other's version of

the bill. The House of Representatives passed the Senate bill

after it removed the amendments, but the Senate passed the House

bill without insisting upon adding them. The blind had won! The

legislative roller coaster ended on April 2, and the Governor is

scheduled to sign the bill into law in early May. It will take

effect on October 1, 1992.

The law is not everything that the organized blind wanted.

National Library Service competency certification has not been

mandated in the legislation, but Federationists are prepared to

go back to strengthen the certification standards if necessary.

In addition, the law does not address the question of requiring

publishers to provide text materials in electronic media for

rapid Braille production. But the heart of the model Braille bill

is intact: legally blind and functionally blind students now must

be offered Braille in Maryland.

There you have the report on the most recent victories in

the NFB's battle for Braille literacy. Twenty states have Braille

legislation on the books or are considering it, and several other

NFB affiliates are getting ready to have literacy bills

introduced. Increasingly these bills are versions of the model

Braille bill first written by the Federation. State by state

blind people are taking responsibility for seeing that the next

generation of blind students will not face the functional

illiteracy that has plagued so many blind adults and children

today. More and more, and with increasing authority, we are

changing what it means to be blind.

[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Norma Crosby.]

REACTION TO AMERICAN FOUNDATION FOR THE BLIND

ARTICLE ON TEXAS BRAILLE BILL

From the Editor: As the new balances of influence and action

take shape in the blindness field, it would be surprising indeed

if some turbulence did not occur. A case in point involves the

Texas Braille Bill. Norma Crosby (who, as Monitor readers know,

is one of the leaders of the National Federation of the Blind of

Texas) expresses in the following letter to President Maurer her

annoyance with what she perceives to be inaccurate claims and

inappropriate reaching for credit by the American Foundation for

the Blind. Here without editorial comment is what she has to say:

Houston, Texas

March 18, 1992

Dear President Maurer:

Enclosed you will find a copy of the Fall, 1991, AFB News (a

publication of the American Foundation for the Blind). It is a

dreadful piece of journalism which is filled with inaccuracies.

It implies that the Texas Braille Bill Literacy Act was more or

less the idea of the American Foundation for the Blind, and if

you didn't know better, you might think that the whole concept of

Braille literacy in Texas was theirs. Needless to

say, we of the NFB of Texas are not amused by this slanted journalism. In

discussing Braille bills the

Foundation says, "In another literacy initiative, AFB played a

major role in advocating for a Braille bill which was signed into

law in the state of Texas in June." Nothing

could be further from the truth. In fact, when AFB discovered that this piece

of legislation had been introduced,

Mary Ann Siller, Southwest Regional Educational Consultant for

AFB, made contact with the sponsor of the bill and indicated that

they had some major problems with it, and she indicated that they

were opposed to the proposed law because it "didn't take into

account the rights of teachers." AFB only became

involved with the law when we, in an effort to assure passage, agreed to

meet with all parties who had

concerns about the bill. They never played a major role in

advocating for this legislation. In fact, when it was time for

testimony on the issue, they were not present. However, they did

show signs of claiming credit early on by calling the proposal "our bill." But

Jeff Pearcy set them straight by pointing out that the NFB of Texas had brought

the bill to the legislature,

and he and Tommy Craig let them know that we would make the final

decision about which proposed changes were acceptable.

The article also indicates that AFB did the organizing of

meetings relative to this bill. In fact, it says: "In another distinction from other Braille bills, Siller

notes that the final law brought a diverse constituency together

around a complex issue. AFB organized meetings and

teleconferences among representatives from AFB, the National

Federation of the Blind, the American Association of Publishers,

Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired, Texas Education

Agency, University of Texas at Austin Special Education

Department, the American Printing House for the Blind, and other

producers of materials in Braille and alternative formats." They

did no such thing. They did attend some of those meetings, and to

that extent they were involved in the process. But, once again, I

point out that they only became involved in the process as

participant with negative feelings about the proposed

legislation. The only "professional" who

was willing to stand up and be counted on this issue was Dr. Phil Hatlen

of the Texas School for

the Blind and Visually Impaired. He supported the legislation

from the beginning, and he worked in good faith to insure that it

would become law. He testified on behalf of the bill, and at

every opportunity, he gives (and has consistently given) the NFB

credit for having brought the bill to the legislature. There may

be times in the future when we will have disagreements with Dr.

Hatlen. However, in this instance he worked well with the members

of our organization to pass a good piece of legislation.

The AFB should be ashamed for taking such liberties with the

truth. This is a major piece of legislation, and the blind of

this state and this country are the ones who caused it to be

law. The tide is turning, and we are winning the law for

literacy. I am very proud to have been a part of the battle. But

I am equally concerned by the fact that we still have a long way

to go in being able to work constructively with some of the

professionals in the field.

Sincerely,

Norma Crosby

There was a time (and not very many years ago at that) when

the blind of this country were in what can only be called a state

of war with the American Foundation for the Blind and a number of

other agencies. Happily (with notable exceptions) that time no

longer exists. Increasingly cooperative relations are being

established between the organized blind and a growing number of

the public and private agencies, but there are still bumps in the

road and problems to be solved. Hopefully we can go the rest of

the way to substantial unity in the blindness field. Otherwise,

the prospects for the blind, and especially for the agencies,

look less than promising.

We have printed Norma Crosby's letter, pointing up a

troublesome situation. To achieve balance and in order that

Monitor readers may judge for themselves, we also print the

material from the Fall, 1991, AFB News to which she refers. Here

it is:

AFB Develops Long Range Literacy Plan

by Fay Jarosh Ellis

NEW YORK--When AFB first announced the launch of a public

education campaign to create awareness about literacy for persons

who are blind or visually impaired, individuals--from U.S.

Senators to teachers and literacy volunteers--called and wrote to

pledge their support. In view of that support, and what it

reflects about the needs for such a focus, AFB has established a

task force to develop a long-range literacy plan. Chaired by Mary

Ellen Mulholland, director of publications and information

services, and Kathleen M. Huebner, Ph.D., director of national

consultants, task force members include Susan J. Spungin, Ed.D.,

associate executive director for program services; Scott

Marshall, governmental relations director; Diane Wormsley, Ph.D.,

Western Regional Center director; Mary Ann Siller, Southwest

regional education consultant; Dawn Turco, Midwest regional

education consultant; Leslye Piqueras, national low vision

consultant; Doris Dieter, director of planned giving; Alberta

Orr, national consultant on aging; and Glenn M. Plunkett,

governmental relations specialist.

The National Braille Literacy Mentor Project, spearheaded by

AFB's Western Regional Center, is one of several agencywide

initiatives included in the literacy plan. Conceived as a vehicle

for developing and disseminating materials to support instruction

in Braille, the project aims to establish a national database of

expert Braille users and Braille teachers, publish a book which

includes successful Braille teaching and learning strategies, and

create a model for Braille instruction that will be used in

summer training programs at residential schools for the blind.

In addition, project staff hope to establish a mentor program by

matching expert Braille users and teachers with others in their

area who need to learn or refine their Braille skills. Dr. Diane

Wormsley, who is administering the project, reports that the

initial call for expert Braille users and teachers has met with

enthusiastic response from professionals all over the country.

And queries about the project steadily increase. In

the next stage of the project, each database participant will be surveyed

and interviewed to solicit their successful

instructional methods. Says Dr. Wormsley: "There is a vast oral

tradition among our teachers, some of whom have since retired,

about how to teach Braille. We hope to glean these tips from our

surveys, techniques which may have once been passed along from

one teacher to the next in an informal way without ever being

recorded in written form. Through the database, our publication,

and summer training programs, we hope to make it easier for

teachers, parents, and blind and visually impaired persons to

learn and teach Braille to others."

Braille Bills

In another literacy initiative, AFB played a major role in

advocating for a Braille bill which was signed into law in the

state of Texas in June. "The Texas law is decidedly different

from other Braille bills now pending in other state

legislatures," said Mary Ann Siller, "because it does not

categorically mandate Braille instruction for all legally blind

students, and it addresses the problem that many blind students

face in getting Braille textbooks in a timely manner." (See

"Excerpted Provisions from the Texas Braille Bill.")

Specifically, the law requires that teachers of blind

children be assessed and evaluated on their Braille skills, and

that a special committee be established to study and design

software to facilitate the production of print materials in the

literary Braille code.

In another distinction from other Braille bills, Siller

notes that the final law brought a diverse constituency together

around a complex issue. AFB organized meetings and

teleconferences among representatives from AFB, the National

Federation of the Blind, the American Association of Publishers,

Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired, Texas Education

Agency, University of Texas at Austin Special Education

Department, the American Printing House for the Blind, and other

producers of materials in Braille and alternative formats. "For professionals, the new law provides standards for

assessing the appropriate learning media for students; and for

students, the law will make it easier to get Braille textbooks on

a timely basis," said Siller. "More importantly, this law puts

the literacy needs of our blind and visually impaired kids on the

front burner of domestic issues and policy. That has not happened

in Texas since the 1970s."

Indeed, making literacy a national priority is the goal of

the AFB literacy plan which will include future projects in the

area of information exchange, research, program models,

publications, videos, technological access, public education,

public relations, and government relations.

Excerpted Provisions from the Texas Braille Bill

* Each functionally blind

student's individualized education program shall specify the appropriate

learning medium based on an

assessment report, and ensure that instruction in Braille will be

provided by a teacher certified to teach students with visual

handicaps.

* The Texas Education Agency shall determine the criteria

for a

student to be classified as functionally blind. * As

a condition of certification to teach students with visual handicaps, the

State Board of Education by rule shall require

satisfactory performance on an examination prescribed by the

board that is designed to assess competency in Braille reading

and writing skills according to standards adopted by the board. * The

Texas Education Agency shall require a publisher of a textbook adopted by

the State Board of Education to furnish the

agency with computer diskettes for literary subjects in the

American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) from

which Braille versions of the textbook can be produced. The

publisher will furnish the agency with computer diskettes in

ASCII for nonliterary subjects, e.g., natural sciences, computer

science, mathematics, and music, when Braille specialty code

translation software is available. * The State

Board of Education shall appoint a 12-person commission consisting of computer

software developers, producers

of Braille textbooks, specialists in Braille education,

publishers of elementary and high school textbooks,

representatives of the Texas Education Agency, and at least one

consumer or an advocate for consumers of Braille materials to

expedite the implementation of Braille translation software for

nonliterary subjects. The commission will be established for a

two-year period and abolished as of September 1, 1993.

[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Peter Grunwald.]

VARIATIONS ON A THEME: ILLINOIS FEDERATIONISTS

FIGHT FOR THE RIGHT TO BRAILLE LITERACY

From the Associate Editor: The effort to pass a Braille

literacy bill takes a different form in each state. Sometimes, as

happened in Kansas, all the knowledgeable parties agree on what

should be done, and the bill sails through the legislative

process guided by an informed and constructive hand. Sometimes

competing bills must be merged and compromises made before any

helpful legislation can be enacted. And very often the Federation

finds itself alone, fighting entrenched self-interest and inertia

as well as ignorance and myth in an effort to protect the right

of blind children to an appropriate education.

Every battle is unique, and most have barely begun. It is

instructive for us all to know what is happening in other states

so that we can benefit from past experience. What follows is an

interim report from Illinois. Peter Grunwald, one of the leaders

of the NFB of Illinois, has been leading the charge there. Here

is the letter he wrote explaining the situation to Dr. Jernigan:

Chicago, Illinois

February 27, 1992

Dear Dr. Jernigan:

Last November we received news that appeared to mean that

our efforts to pass a Braille bill would gain unexpected support.

I was asked by a group of teachers of the blind and other

professionals to meet with them regarding proposed Braille

legislation based on the Texas Braille bill. They indicated that

they support such legislation and asked to meet to discuss plans

and to address some specific issues. We were, of course, pleased

with this development; it certainly would be nice not to have to

pass a bill over the objection of those whose job it would be to

implement it.

The first two meetings seemed positive enough; the

discussion was sometimes uninformed and trivial but, for the most

part, kept on track and moved forward with apparent agreement. By

the third meeting, however, it was clear that there were

problems. Dick Umsted, Superintendent of the Illinois School for

the Visually Impaired (ISVI) in Jacksonville, was absolutely

determined that all the language regarding publishers' supplying

computer diskette versions of textbooks to be used for production

of Braille copies should be removed and replaced with a simple

statement that the State of Illinois would participate in a

program operated by the American Printing House for the Blind. I

told the group that nothing in the language of our proposed bill

would prevent the State Board of Education from participating in

the APH program when it is developed, should that seem

advantageous. On the other hand, I said that mandating

participation in a program which did not yet exist and of which

we knew virtually nothing seemed at least to be putting the cart

before the horse and certainly irresponsible. Mr. Umsted was

adamant, however, and he swayed the other professionals.

Mr. Umsted's single-minded determination on this issue

frankly gave me the impression that there is more involved than

honest conviction. While there is certainly a potential role for

a national clearinghouse, whoever might fill such a role would

obviously stand to gain much in influence, and a mandate under

law that the clearinghouse's services be used is uncomfortably

close to a monopoly. Obviously APH has much to gain in this

endeavor, and I believe Mr. Umsted may be carrying water for

them. I would not be surprised to learn that others are doing the

same.

I am enclosing two pieces of correspondence for your

information. The first (to Jean Osterby) gives a sense of the

meetings which have taken place; the second (to Dr. Tinsley), is

an attempt to acquire a more detailed account of the current

status of the APH plan.

Sincerely,

Peter Grunwald

That was Mr. Grunwald's letter to Dr. Jernigan, and his

enclosures laid out the NFB of Illinois's position clearly. The

first was written to Jean Osterby, Chair of the Illinois Vision

Leadership Council, the organization with which Mr. Grunwald had

been meeting and to which members refer as the Braille Bill

Committee. Here is the letter:

Chicago, Illinois

February 24, 1992

Jean Osterby

Northwest Illinois Association

Geneva, Illinois

Dear Jean:

I am writing you at this time to share with you my current

perceptions of the functioning of the Braille Bill Committee (as

it has been called). I have been troubled for some time, but upon

hearing a tape of the discussion of Braille bill issues at the

Illinois School for the Visually Impaired Advisory Committee

meeting of February 21, my impressions have been crystallized,

and I believe the time is right to bring them to your attention.

Last November I was most pleased to learn from Cathy Randall that

you and other teachers and professionals were interested in and

supportive of the Texas Braille bill and wanted to work toward

adoption of similar legislation in Illinois. I

enthusiastically agreed to meet with you and the others, and a

meeting date of December 2 was chosen.

At the opening of the December 2 meeting I went to some

length to outline the leadership role of the National Federation

of the Blind in the adoption of Braille bills in various states

during the past several years, including the Texas Braille bill.

I indicated that we in the NFB were excited to learn that

Illinois's professionals were actively interested in such

legislation, since the pattern in other states had more often

been the adoption of legislation over the strong opposition of

the education community.

I indicated that we were glad to welcome all of you aboard

our train, since more passengers might speed the desired arrival,

and more ideas might design a better train. However, since this

had been our issue and since we had been until recently virtually

the bill's only champion, we were not about to relinquish the

controls of the train. I told the group of our resolution adopted

at our September, 1991, NFB of Illinois convention and said that

I was bound to operate within the policies contained in that

Resolution.

I indicated that we were actively discussing introduction of

a bill with an interested member of the State Senate and intended

to have a bill introduced at the earliest opportunity. (Dick

Umsted asked if I would identify the possible sponsor, and I said

at that time that I could not.) I told the group that we were

glad to discuss any questions and concerns anyone might have

about the Texas Braille bill and indicated that we would

certainly discuss changes to address agreed concerns. I

emphasized, however, that we were not interested in straying very

far from the Texas model and were completely unwilling to stray

from its intent.

My recollection of the balance of that meeting is that we

all discussed a general direction for further discussion. We

agreed to have a follow-up meeting January 3, at which we would

go through the Texas bill section by section, discuss questions

and concerns, and presumably arrive at mutual understandings. At

the January 3 meeting we actually began to go through the bill. We got through

Sections 1 and 2. Much of the time was spent

changing every occurrence of "blind students" to "students who

are blind." (I indicated that I did not understand the

significance or relevance of this change, but I made no

objection.) One occurrence of "medium" was changed to

"medium/media," an alteration with which I concurred. We also

discussed a number of other concerns, particularly those

regarding multiply handicapped blind students. I explained why I

thought those concerns were already addressed in the Texas model,

and it was my impression that there was consensus that this was

so. At any rate, no changes were proposed regarding these

concerns, and at the end of the meeting we agreed that Sections 1

and 2 had been thoroughly addressed. Another meeting was

scheduled for January 23 to discuss remaining sections and any

other concerns.

At the January 23 meeting I indicated that arrangements had

been finalized with a sponsor. At another point, there was

discussion of having the Illinois State Board of Education

introduce the Braille bill, to which I responded that this had

not been and would not be our intent. Considerable time was spent

discussing the sections regarding computerized production of

Braille textbooks. Dick Umsted led in pushing for specific

endorsement of the American Printing House for the Blind's

proposed program. I expressed concern that, while there was

certainly something to be said for the notion of a national

clearinghouse approach, the APH plan was by no means finalized,

and there is much we do not yet know. I said that there is no

reason why (assuming the adoption of the Texas model) the State

Board of Education could not participate in the APH program. On

the other hand, I said that it seemed to me that to endorse by

legislation a program which did not yet exist and whose benefits

were not yet measurable seemed to be at least putting the cart

before the horse. I believe I made it clear at the time that I

did not support this approach. In case I did not make it clear,

let me do so now: the NFB of Illinois does not support

endorsement of the American Printing House's proposed program by

writing participation in it into the law.

I indicated at the beginning of the January 23 meeting that

I had to leave in order to catch the 6:05 p.m. train. Apparently,

after I left, another meeting was set for the following week in

conjunction with the Association for Rehabilitation and Education

of Blind and Visually Impaired (AER) meeting in Bloomington.

According to the summary material which you sent, at that meeting

some of the issues discussed regarding Sections 1 and 2 at the

January 3 meeting were revisited and changes adopted. I have

concerns regarding these changes. But leaving aside the merits,

it cannot be said that I agreed to them, because I was unaware of

them and indeed was not present.

To return (at last) to the meeting of the Illinois School

for the Visually Impaired Advisory Committee, I heard

considerable discussion of a mystery bill, which had been

introduced without anyone's knowledge. This is, of course, our

bill. We indicated in December that we intended to introduce a

bill, and we discussed progress in January. I always indicated

that we would support amendments which might address agreed

concerns, and this of course remains true. I also heard you, Tony

Heinz, and Dick Umsted refer to the role of the Braille Bill

Committee as being to prepare a draft for introduction by the

State Board of Education. Let me reiterate that, as I indicated

at each of our meetings, that was not and is not the NFB of

Illinois's intention. Finally, I heard discussion implying that

there had been total consensus regarding the output of the

Braille Bill Committee thus far. The previous paragraphs would

certainly imply that I do not concur with such a

characterization.

All this having been said, I remain confident that people of

good will can arrive at an understanding and that it is by no

means too late for this to occur. I think that if we are indeed

to move in this direction, there must be real understanding of

each participant's views and some restraint in characterizing the

positions of others. Perhaps in the interest of harmony at our

meetings, I have not been sufficiently forceful in stating the

NFB's positions (although a lack of forcefulness is not something

of which I have often been accused) and thus have contributed to

a misunderstanding. Be this as it may, misunderstandings

certainly do exist and must be resolved.

I have discussed these matters with Steve Benson, President

of the NFB of Illinois, during the past several days; and we have

agreed that another forum may be the best approach for resolving

such differences. He has agreed to contact you with a proposal

for such a forum for discussion. I am sure that such discussions

can put things back on track and that we can once again move

toward finding areas of concurrence leading to an agreed Braille

bill.

Sincerely,

PeterGrunwald

cc: Steve Benson

There you have the letter to Jean Osterby, and on the same

day Mr. Grunwald wrote to Dr. Tuck Tinsley, President of the

American Printing House for the Blind. Here is that letter:

Chicago, Illinois

February 24, 1992

Dr. Tuck Tinsley

American Printing House for the Blind

Louisville, Kentucky

Dear Dr. Tinsley:

The National Federation of the Blind of Illinois (NFBI) has

been actively pursuing the enactment of legislation in Illinois

which would improve the quality and availability of Braille

instruction to blind students throughout the state. We have used

the Texas Braille bill (with which you are doubtless familiar) as

a model, secured a sponsor, and arranged its introduction into

the State Senate.

During the course of discussion regarding the bill, some

representatives of the education community raised the subject of

the American Printing House's proposed role as a clearinghouse

for computerized data from which Braille copies of textbooks may

be produced. There is certainly merit in the notion of a central

clearinghouse. Potentially a great deal of duplication of effort

might be avoided. Yet there is much that remains unknown

regarding the ultimate potential and the current status of your

efforts in this regard. Therefore, it would be most helpful if

you would review for us your goals and objectives for this

proposal in general and its current status. Additionally, would

you please respond to these specific concerns:

1. With which publishers have you currently reached

agreements regarding your clearinghouse proposal? What steps are

you taking to increase the number of publishers who will

participate?

2. What is the nature of your agreements with publishers?

What carrots and sticks are there to encourage their

participation and their compliance with the agreements?

3. Illinois does not have state-adopted textbooks. In fact,

each school district is free to choose the most obscure titles

for reasons of true merit, politics, whim, etc. How can

Illinoisans be assured that all of the textbooks in use will be

available through your proposed clearinghouse?

4. What technical standards will be in use for your

proposal? What mechanism exists to develop these standards?

5. What charges or fees do you anticipate for the services

of your proposed clearinghouse? What statements, agreements, or

contracts will exist between APH and the recipients of its

clearinghouse services?

We are confident that legislation such as we have introduced

would have an important and beneficial effect on blind students

in Illinois. Your information may well help avoid some

unnecessary controversy and thus assist the process in moving

forward. Therefore, I thank you in advance for whatever

assistance you may be able to provide, and I look forward to your

response.

Sincerely,

Peter Grunwald

cc: Steve Benson, Marc Maurer, Kenneth Jernigan

That was Pete Grunwald's letter to the head of the American

Printing House for the Blind, and on March 23, he received a

response from David Bice, APH's Publisher Liaison. Here it is:

Dear Mr. Grunwald:

Dr. Tuck Tinsley, President of the American Printing House

for the Blind, has given your letter of February 24, 1992, to me

for responses to your questions concerning the American Printing

House for the Blind's role as a clearinghouse for permissions and

electronic data from publishers. I have enclosed a copy of the

proposed agreement between the American Printing House for the

Blind, Recording for the Blind, and publishers. This, in addition

to answers to your specific questions, should help clarify what

is occurring with this issue.

I believe you need a brief history of our efforts in

providing a national depository for permissions and electronic

data. This past July the National Association of State Textbook

Administrators, to which Illinois sends a representative,

endorsed our proposal for a central depository. This endorsement

included a recommendation to the major textbook companies to help

implement such an agreement.

In August two presidents of major textbook companies and two

state textbook administrators came to Louisville to serve as an

advisory board for implementing the recommendation from the July

meeting. The following October Dr. Tinsley and I appeared before

the Board of Directors of the School Division of the Association

of American Publishers in New York to explain our proposal, the

enclosed document, to these eight presidents of textbook

companies. Recording for the Blind officials then appeared before

the group in November to confirm our cooperative approach.

The AAP Board in December, 1991, voted to endorse the

proposal. Don Eklund, Executive Vice-President of the School

Division of AAP, and Buzz Ellis, Chairman of the Board, then

announced the endorsement to the over 300 textbook publishers

present at the School Division of AAP Annual Meeting in Boston in

January, 1992.

Dr. Tinsley and Ritchie Geisel, President of Recording for

the Blind, then sent a joint letter to the presidents of every

major textbook producer in the United States. This letter was

mailed the second week of February. This leads to the point of

answering your questions.

1. One major company signed the agreement on March 7, 1992.

We know of four others that are close to signing the agreement.

We are in contact with publishers on a continual basis by

telephone, mail, and in person. On Monday, March 16, I met with

three presidents and Don Eklund in Chicago to continue our

discussions.

2. The nature of the agreement is in the enclosure. I have

found that the majority of publishers, especially the presidents,

are eager to see this type of agreement work. The stick I have

used is the right of visually impaired students to be treated

equally with sighted students. The carrots are giving the

publishers the right to list in other catalogs the availability

of Braille textbooks and relieving them of the vast amount of

paperwork in releasing permissions.

3. We are well aware that twenty-seven states do not have

state adoptions and have particular problems in supplying

textbooks. Despite the right to choose the most obscure

textbooks, most school districts use books produced by major

publishers. These publishers supply more than 90 percent of the

textbooks nationwide. Smaller publishers will remain a problem

for at least two more years. We cannot guarantee every textbook,

but by establishing a national clearinghouse, we can help you

come closer to reaching that goal.

4. The simple acquisition of ASCII computer files is not the

total answer to placing Braille textbooks in the classrooms. It

is one step. The files are not necessarily complete, nor are they

in order. We are presently working with publishers, the Texas

Braille Commission, and computer groups to organize standards for

receiving ASCII files. We have sent two representatives to the C-

Sun Conferences on Computer Standards to discuss your very

concerns.

5. At this time we envision two levels of dispensing ASCII

files to states. First will be the files as we obtain them. These

files will be transmitted to state agencies without cost. We will

be the depository for publishers to relieve them and you of

requests from across the country for the materials. Permissions

will be done electronically and be instantaneous. Second, will be

edited ASCII. If we edit and organize the files, we will pass

those actual costs to the states and agencies. We have not yet

addressed the issue of a contract or agreement with states though

I can assure you any statement will be made in the interest of

the students.

I hope the above is helpful to you in serving the needs of

visually impaired students in Illinois. Please telephone or write

me if you need further clarification or answers to other

questions.

Sincerely,

David A. Bice

Publisher Liaison

cc: Dr. Tuck Tinsley

There is much to be said for having one or two organizations

take initiative for creating and administering the kind of

clearinghouse for text material ready for conversion to Braille,

large-print, or computer disc texts for blind students. It is a

mammoth task, fraught with many complex technical and legal

difficulties. If the American Printing House and Recording for

the Blind are prepared to work collegially to create the clearing

house and supervise its activities in a way that will make

materials quickly and relatively inexpensively available to blind

students and their teachers, more power to them.

However, such a program should not be written into state

law, particularly before the clearinghouse is in a position to

provide accessible text materials to those who need them.

Moreover, the time might come when the APH clearinghouse was

closed or became unduly expensive or cumbersome to use. It would

be far better for state education personnel to be left free to

negotiate the best means by which to procure text books in

alternative media.

The American Printing House for the Blind and Recording for

the Blind are to be commended for their energetic efforts to work

with publishers to solve the technical problems associated with

providing accessible disc copies of text books for use by blind

students. This said, however, it continues to be important for

the organized blind movement to remain vigilant in order to

insure that everyone continues to act in the best interest of

blind students. That is what the members of the National

Federation of the Blind of Illinois are doing.

[PHOTO: Mary Ellen Halverson seated at table. CAPTION: Mary Ellen

Halverson.]

[PHOTO: Betty Sabin standing at podium. CAPTION: Betty Sabin.]

REFLECTIONS FROM IDAHO:

THE ROLE OF BRAILLE LITERACY

From the Associate Editor: Members of the National

Federation of the Blind of Idaho are preparing to have a Braille

bill introduced in the state's legislature. As part of that

preparation, the affiliate devoted the Fall, 1991, edition of its

publication, Gem State Milestones to the subject of Braille

literacy. The following comments have been excerpted from several

articles appearing in that issue of the newsletter. They

demonstrate how important Braille literacy has always been,

continues to be, and will be in the years ahead, despite the

technological innovations that some maintain have made Braille

obsolete. Mary Ellen Halverson is the Editor of the Gem State

Milestones. Betty Sabin is the second vice-president of the

National Federation of the Blind of Idaho, and Suzie Hanks is the

well-informed mother of a blind child. Here is what they have to

say:

Braille--A Well Kept Secret

by Mary Ellen Halverson

By the time I was in junior high, I was legally blind, and

my parents were reading most of my assignments to me. I took

notes in my classes during junior and senior high and then

struggled to read them in the evenings. I dreaded quizzes and

tests for two reasons: first, I might not be able to read the

sometimes light print, and second, I was very embarrassed because

I had to read and write with the material two or three inches

from my face. During those years not one school official, not one

teacher, not even a sight saving teacher ever suggested that I

learn Braille. In fact, the resource teacher told me that I was

fortunate that I could still read large print and did not have to

learn Braille like a totally blind boy she knew. I am sure that,

by the time we were in high school, that young man was reading

far more efficiently and confidently than I was. I'm so glad that

today schools are awakening to the needs of blind children.

Should My Children Learn Braille?

by Betty Sabin

The school says that my children can read print and should

do so as long as possible. The teacher says about the same thing.

She adds that they can always use cassettes when reading becomes

too difficult. They both say that it would be too hard for my

girls to learn Braille and print at the same time. Some say that

every child has the right to be introduced to Braille. Some say

that using talking devices is helpful but does not contribute to

functional literacy. I'm confused!

Here are my thoughts as a blind parent of two daughters, who

are blind. A student who is just learning the skills of spelling

and grammar is at a disadvantage when using spoken formats.

Therefore, writing well becomes difficult at best. A student who

reads print slowly and with a lot of strain is not able to

comprehend as much as one who reads Braille comfortably at a

normal speed. As children reach the higher grades and their

increased reading requirements, assignments become more difficult

for visually impaired print readers even when they have reading

aids available. My daughters, who did not learn Braille, have

found this to be true. They were able to keep up with their

classmates in the early grades, but in high school it was taking

all day to complete reading assignments. They could read for

short periods only without getting headaches. If they had known

Braille, they would have been able to read assignments in about

the same amount of time as their classmates. If Braille is

presented with a positive attitude, it is not any more difficult

to master than other skills children learn. I believe that

children with useable residual sight should be taught to read

both print and Braille. They can then choose which skill is most

efficient for the task at hand.

Deciding whether to write print or Braille presents a

similar problem. A legally blind person who writes print only may

not be able to write fast enough to take notes in class or may

not be able to read them back later. Adequate Braille skills

eliminate this problem.

Katie Goes to First Grade

by Suzie Hanks

We moved to Idaho three years ago when Katie was three. We

were concerned about her receiving an adequate program.

In Minnesota Katie had a twice-weekly visit from her teacher

for the visually impaired, a twice-weekly visit from her mobility

and orientation instructor, and once-a-week visits from an

occupational therapist and an infant stimulation specialist.

These services were provided through our local school district.

In Idaho we quickly realized that the three- to five-year-

old program in the public schools was just starting and we had to

be innovative and creative. We enrolled Katie in the Child

Development Center and asked the School for the Deaf and Blind to

provide consultation services. The Boise school district agreed

to provide orientation and mobility instruction as well as

consultation with the staff.

Creativity and flexibility have been the key to Katie's

program ever since. She is now in first grade at Liberty

Elementary School, and we have been pleased with her program.

Katie attends regular classes except for her Braille

lessons, which are held in a resource room. The school district

provides the services of an instructor for the visually impaired

for an average of ninety minutes a day, who also gives weekly

mobility lessons. Three teacher's aides are starting Braille

lessons so they can help adapt material and teach Katie.

Though Katie does not read Braille at this time, her school

books are Brailled, and the classroom aide adapts and Brailles

handouts and art projects. Katie's classmates have an opportunity

to be introduced to Braille.

We think of Katie's teachers, the administration, and

ourselves as a team. We work fairly well together because we

share a vision of Katie's future--one of independence. We may

disagree on how much emphasis one part of her school program

should receive or when certain skills should be introduced, but

the team shares the common goal of helping Katie become an

independent, happy adult. This allows us to treat each other's

ideas and feelings with respect and allows for compromise. We

believe that Katie's blindness should not limit her future. Her

school program, like those of all other students, should help her

reach her full potential.

I believe the following ideas help when dealing with school

districts:

1) Be sure you and the school personnel see the same future

for your child.

2) Prioritize those skills you want your child to achieve.

3) Prioritize services you wish the school to provide.

4) Focus on those at the top of the list; this is a long-

term relationship. Don't battle over the trivial.

[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Barbara Pierce.]

DIRTY

TRICKS AND PRESSURE TACTICS IN OHIO

by Barbara Pierce

It was Dr. Samuel Johnson who remarked, "Depend upon it,

Sir. When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it

concentrates his mind wonderfully." Institutionally speaking, NAC

(the National Accreditation Council for Agencies Serving the

Blind and Visually Handicapped) has, during the year that has

elapsed since nearly half its members voted to dissolve it in

order to avoid bankruptcy, been enjoying all the advantages of

that concentrated mind, to which Dr. Johnson referred. First,

drastic budget cutbacks that alone could stop the organization's

financial hemorrhage had to be devised and immediately

implemented. The moment that task seemed to be in hand, it was

time to prepare for NAC's petition to the U.S. Department of

Education for evaluation by the National Advisory Committee on

Accreditation and Institutional Eligibility. (See the April,

1992, issue of the Braille Monitor.) At this writing, in early

May, the Secretary of Education has not yet ruled on that

petition--but at best NAC has won itself only two years of

continued Department of Education recognition under extremely

close fiscal and programmatic supervision.

No sooner had NAC officials survived that close call--if,

indeed, it has been survived--when they learned that the Ohio

Rehabilitation Services Commission (RSC) had voted unanimously to

remove NAC's name from its list of approved accrediting bodies.

(See the March, 1992, issue of the Braille Monitor.) This was a

danger with implications even more immediately disastrous than

the threat that the Department of Education would drop NAC since

no agencies maintain their NAC accreditation solely because of

the Department of Education list; whereas, with NAC off the Ohio

list several agencies would have had to seek other accreditation

if they wished to continue doing business with the state

rehabilitation agency. The Ohio threat was very real. If NAC

could do anything to save the situation, it must be tried. NAC's

first effort failed miserably. (See the April, 1992, issue of the

Braille Monitor.) The joint legislative committee with

jurisdiction over administrative rule-making in Ohio state

government refused to instruct the Rehabilitation Services

Commission that it could not remove NAC from the agency's list of

accrediting bodies.

With that avenue closed, NAC's only chance for reversal of

the RSC decision was appealing to the Commission itself at its

April meeting, during which the seven-member body was scheduled

to rubber-stamp its February decision. NAC and its cadre of well-

wishers set to work. Chief among these was the Director of the

Vision Center of Central Ohio, Richard Oestreich, who lobbied

hard within the ranks of the Ohio Association of Rehabilitation

Facilities (OARF) and the board members of the Ohio chapter of

the Association for Education and Rehabilitation for the Blind

and Visually Impaired (OAER). It should be noted, incidentally,

that the board of the Ohio AER chapter is largely composed of

staff members and associates of the few NAC-accredited agencies

in the state. Oestreich urged the people he lobbied to write

letters to the Commissioners asking them to reverse their

February 18 action and restore NAC to the Ohio list of approved

accrediting bodies. Sources close to the situation

report that Mr. Oestreich's request that the rehabilitation facilities group

pass a

resolution instructing its president to write a letter to the

Commissioners, communicating its opposition to the Commission's

removal of NAC from the list, took place at OARF's March meeting

with no opportunity for RSC staff members to state their case for

having recommended the removal of NAC. I later talked with an

OARF member who had voted for the Oestreich resolution. By the

time of his conversation with me, he had had a chance to listen

to the case made by RSC staff members, and his comment was to the

effect that the Association had clearly acted without hearing all

the facts. When he heard from staff the depth and extent of their

research into and concern about NAC's questionable ability to

provide objective accreditations, along with its shaky financial

viability, he was dismayed and shocked. He inquired with what

struck me as somewhat naive incredulity, "Why didn't we hear any

of this information from the staff?" The staff wasn't invited to

present its side of the question because that would not have

suited Mr. Oestreich's purpose, and under the influence of his

collegial arm-twisting and political pressure, the pro-NAC vote

passed overwhelmingly--and the letters to the Commissioners

materialized.

Phone calls also came in. The National Federation of the

Blind of Ohio had decided not to discuss the issue with the seven

Commissioners until the day of the Commission meeting. We did

provide our written testimony, including a copy in Braille for

the one member of the Commission who is blind, but beyond that we

chose to refrain from lobbying the Commissioners. We knew that

the RSC staff understood the problems with NAC about as well as

blind consumers did, and besides, the Commission had already

unanimously made the decision to remove NAC from its list. The

April 21 vote was supposed to be a formality only. But Dr.

William Weiner (Chairman of the Department of Blind

Rehabilitation, Western Michigan University, and President of the

Association for Education and Rehabilitation of the Blind and

Visually Impaired, one of NAC's Sponsoring Members) contacted the

only academic on the Commission and, as she later explained to

her Commission colleagues, assured her that NAC's financial

problems were behind it and that it was going to be able to do

good work in the future. That was all she needed. Never mind that

Dr. Weiner's objectivity was compromised by his organization's

long-standing endorsement of NAC and that her own agency staff

had independently come to the opposite conclusion; she was ready-

-even eager--to hop onto the NAC bandwagon. The

most interesting and distressing phone calls of all, however, were made to

the blind member of the Commission. He

served at one point on the Board of Trustees of Richard

Oestreich's agency and, though professing to be open-minded on

the NAC issue, had obviously been the only Commissioner with

reservations about the panel's February 18 decision. During the

commission meeting on April 21 he told his colleagues the

following unsubstantiated story. He said that about ten days

earlier he had received a phone call from a man who would

identify himself only as "Tom from the NFB." There are three

members of the Ohio affiliate whose first names are Tom. Two are

hard-working members of their local chapters with very little

knowledge of or interest in matters beyond the local scene. The

third is Tom Anderson, Second Vice President of the National

Federation of the Blind of Ohio and an outspoken advocate for a

number of causes, one of which is the NFB. Tom is well known in

legislative circles, and everyone who knows him recognizes that

he would not hesitate to pick up the phone and contact

agovernmental official if he thought a conversation would benefit

those whom he was trying to assist. According to the

Commissioner, Tom from the NFB told him that he had better vote

to keep NAC off the Ohio list of accrediting bodies or he would

be sorry. He said that his caller assured him that the NFB was

very powerful, and Mr. Jernigan could have him removed from the

Commission when the time came for reappointment. The conversation

lasted for about ten minutes, he said, and was filled

withvariations on this theme.

The entire conversation so incensed the commissioner, he

said, that he wanted his colleagues to know that in the future he

would never vote in favor of any issue if the NFB supported it.

In this instance, however, Tom (Tom Anderson, that is--and there

could be no other) declared earnestly that he had not made any

such call. He prepared an affidavit following the Commission

meeting in order to go on record as denying that he had engaged

in such an unscrupulous and heavy-handed action. Here it is:

Affidavit of Thomas Anderson

I, Thomas Anderson, being first duly sworn, depose and state

as follows:

(1) My name is Thomas Anderson. My address is 64 E. Judson

Ave., Youngstown, Ohio 44507. I am the Second Vice President of

the National Federation of the Blind of Ohio. (2)

On April 21, 1992, I was present at the monthly meeting of the Ohio Rehabilitation

Services Commission, held at Crosswood

Center. I heard Commissioner Eric Parks describe a telephone call

which he had received ten days before. The caller, who identified

himself only as "Tom from the NFB," threatened Mr. Parks with

reprisals unless he voted to give final approval to the

administrative rule which, among other things, would have removed

the National Accreditation Council from the list of approved

accrediting bodies for agencies contracting with the RSC.

(3) I have known since late February of the unanimous

February 18 vote of the Commission to remove NAC from its list,

and until April 21 I had no reason to doubt that a majority of

the members of the Commission would vote to affirm its action of

two months before.

(4) I learned with interest, but no surprise, of the

decision of the Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review on March

10. Despite the testimony of the NAC supporters, I considered

that the Commission's original decision would stand.

(5) At the April 4 meeting of the Board of Directors of the

National Federation of the Blind of Ohio, Barbara Pierce,

President of the organization, briefly reported that some efforts

were being made to muster support for reversing the Commission's

action of February 18. She urged interested members to attend the

April 21 RSC meeting to demonstrate consumer support for the

revised administrative rule. I did not know of Richard

Oestreich's solicitation of OARF and OAER letters of support for

NAC until I was told about them on April 21.

(6) I have not at any time discussed the administrative rule

on agency accreditation with any of the Commissioners in person

or on the telephone. I have never spoken with Mr. Parks on the

telephone.

(7) Attached to this affidavit is a copy of my personal

telephone bill covering the period during which Mr. Parks reports

that someone identified as Tom called him. It clearly shows that

no call was made to (614) 268-4003, which is the number Mr. Parks

gave as his listing to members of the Consumer Advisory Council

at its March meeting. Barbara Pierce, a member of that council,

has supplied me with this number for purposes of this statement.

--Thomas Anderson

Acknowledgement

I, Mary Catherine Sanders, a Notary Public in and for the

State of Ohio, certify that Thomas Anderson, personally known or

satisfactorily proved to me to be the same, personally appeared

before me and took oath in due form of law that the statements

made in the foregoing affidavit are true and correct this 30th,

day of April, 1992.

____________________

There you have the text of Tom Anderson's

affidavit, and the telephone bill attached indicated

that he had made no long

distance calls at all during the billing period. During the days

following this alleged call by "Tom from the NFB," the

Commissioner reported that he received four or five more calls

from men and women refusing to identify themselves except to say

that they were members of the Federation. He said that they, too,

threatened him with loss of his Commission seat if he did not

vote to oppose NAC.

Members of the National Federation of the Blind knew nothing

of all this telephone activity prior to hearing it described at

the April 21 Commission meeting. The Commissioner certainly made

no effort to contact anyone in the Federation in order to

ascertain whether Federationists were responsible for the calls.

But knowing that NAC would undoubtedly send a spokesperson from

out-of-state, we asked James Gashel, Director of Governmental

Affairs for the National Federation of the Blind, to join us at

the April 21 meeting to present testimony. We also encouraged

blind consumers from across the state to attend the open

Commission meeting to make certain that the Commissioners

understood how important this issue was to blind Ohioans.

From the beginning of the meeting it was clear that the

Commissioners were nervous, though we could not understand why

they should be upset. There were somewhat more than thirty

Federationists in the meeting room, but we had filed in quietly

and were conducting ourselves with decorum.

The Commission chairwoman began by lecturing the audience

about proper behavior and warning us that anyone who misbehaved

would be escorted from the room immediately. If I had not known

where I was, I would have concluded that I was in a junior high

school assembly or at a NAC annual meeting as one of a room full

of NFB observers listening to jittery NAC officials.

When the chairwoman asked who wished to speak during the

Commission's consideration of the NAC agenda item, seven people

raised their hands: Ruth Westman, now Executive Director of the

National Accreditation Council; Paul Schroeder, Director of

Governmental Affairs for the American Council of the Blind; Ken

Morelock, Executive Director of the ACB of Ohio; Hank Baud,

Executive Director of the Cincinnati Association for the Blind

(CAB); James Gashel, Director of Governmental Affairs for the

National Federation of the Blind; Phillip Copeland, Member of the

Board of Trustees of the Center for the Visually Impaired,

Elyria, Ohio; and Barbara Pierce, President of the National

Federation of the Blind of Ohio. The chairwoman proposed to call

the speakers in the order listed and give each no more than five

minutes. Ms. Westman asked if she could divide her time in half

so that at the close she could refute any arguments made by the

Federation. This modification was agreed to by the Commission,

and the comments began. Ms. Westman did not choose

to make any statement but instead asked if there were questions from the

Commission. It was obvious

that there were not, but with a little help from the Commission,

Ms. Westman managed to occupy the two and a half minutes. After

working into his introduction the claim that the ACB was the

largest consumer organization of blind people, Paul Schroeder

next read a statement in praise of the general concept of

accreditation for agencies in the blindness field. Ken Morelock,

Volunteer Executive Director of the ACB of Ohio, was then led to

the table, where he apologized for his Braille skills. He had

clearly been assigned the job of bashing the NFB. He began by

saying that he understood that the April issue of the Braille

Monitor had described him as the "Pining Executive Director of

the ACB of Ohio." Since the word used to describe him had been

"volunteer," his comment made very little sense, and that

characterization could appropriately be made of his entire

statement.

Hank Baud, the new Executive Director of the Cincinnati

Association for the Blind, told the Commission that he had

brought along his agency's most recent NAC self-study, which he

described as being three inches thick. The burden of his comment

was that an agency that takes the NAC self-study process

seriously can get a valuable result by working hard. Since the

most recent CAB reaccreditation was done before Mr. Baud's

predecessor left the agency, he himself had by coincidence headed

the on-site review team that assessed the Cincinnati Association.

He assured the Commissioners that the entire process had been

undertaken with great seriousness and dedication to improving

service delivery. Baud said nothing at all about the value of NAC

accreditation. In fact, he was at some pains to stress that he

was speaking of the self-study process only.

Through all of this testimony the Commissioners sat

listening attentively and respectfully. As the presentation

shifted into Federation hands, however, several of the panel

began indulging in behavior that discomfited a number of people

in the room who could see them, including several seated at the

head table. As James Gashel reviewed some of the more troubling

aspects of NAC's fiscal and programmatic plight and Phil Copeland

reported on the increase in his agency's business with the state

agency in the years since it disassociated itself from NAC, the

Commissioners remained relatively polite, indulging in only a

little whispering.

When I rose to speak, however, the atmosphere altered. I

wanted Commission members to understand that blind consumers felt

deeply about this issue. They had no way of knowing how many of

the people in the room were there because of their concern about

NAC and the damage it is doing to blind people. I therefore asked

those who were present in support of the Commission's February 18

decision to stand for a moment. As I began to make this request,

the Commissioner who was about to report his fury at receiving

phone calls supposedly from members of the Federation began

violently shaking his head and making hand gestures to the

chairwoman indicating that she should stop this demonstration of

support. In response to his plea, she told me that our action was

not necessary. I insisted gently that people had come from across

the state and that the Commission should know who they were and

how they felt. As soon as the group was standing, she immediately

told them to be seated again. Her tone was filled with anxiety

and annoyance. At one point during my remarks she indulged

herself in a spate of eye-rolling until she noticed that several

members of our group were watching her performance with attention

and surprise. After that she contented herself with trying to

catch the eye of the Administrator of the Rehabilitation Services

Commission in order to exchange comradely grimaces, but he

refused to participate in the game. When the Commission

members began discussing the issue among themselves and listening to their

own staff members, several

continued to display what can only be called rudeness. Whispered

conversations were conducted with such obviousness that the one

member of the Commission who continued to have misgivings about

NAC's fiscal viability actually paused in making his statement of

concern in what seemed to be momentary astonishment at his

colleagues' lack of attention. Throughout all this restiveness

and inattention to discussion of the issue under consideration,

the chairwoman made no effort to curb her colleagues or even to

refrain from muttered conversations herself. The audience--the

same group whom she had lectured about proper behavior and

threatened with removal from the room--comported themselves with

courtesy and listened in silence, despite the growing impression

that they were, as Linus used to say in the "Peanuts" comic

strip, "living in a stacked deck."

The dissenting Commissioner continued to insist that there

was no indication that NAC can survive financially and that, if

it is not viable, it can't possibly provide meaningful

accreditation. No one contradicted his arguments, but it was

clear that a majority of the Commissioners had no interest in

looking objectively at the evidence or listening to RSC staff

members, who continued to recommend that NAC be removed from the

list.

But what was the turning point and what is the justification

for the charge of dirty tricks? I do not doubt that the blind

commissioner received the phone calls he said he received--but I

am certain that they did not come from anybody connected with the

Federation. Why? In the first place Federationists have enough

sense to know that such tactics would backfire. As the

commissioners reflect on the matter, they will realize this too.

The will know that, as the saying goes, they have been had, and

they will doubtless not appreciate it. In the second

place the telephone call hoax is exactly the kind of shabby conduct one would

expect from NAC supporters. Some

may call it political savvy, but the more astute will call it

dirty tricks and lack of integrity. Some may call it "professionalism" (witness

the behavior of Mr. Oestreich and Dr. Wiener, national president of AER), but

there are more suitable

names for such pressure tactics. Despite NAC's apparent last-

minute escape in Ohio, it did not really escape at all. The noose

grows tighter every day. The telephone call charade is simply

another nail in the NAC coffin, another reason why more of NAC's

few remaining agencies will continue to depart from it in

increasing numbers. Everyone (including NAC itself) knows that

NAC is dying. The only question is how long it will take and how

much damage will be done to the blind and the blindness system

before the obscenity comes to an end.

But back to the April 21 meeting: The NAC victory in Ohio

was provisional at best. It only brought the organization back in

a weakened condition to where it was before February.

Furthermore, NAC had to spend a considerable amount of its

dwindling treasury of human and monetary resources to arrive at

that point. The war of attrition (a war that NAC knows it cannot

win) will continue. As proof of this thesis, the Ohio

commissioners agreed that they would look at the situation again

in no more than two years and sooner if new financial information

comes to light. The meeting recessed for lunch, and

Federationists filed out to regroup for the next confrontation

with NAC.

No one had offered evidence that NAC accreditation has any

intrinsic value. No one provided proof that NAC's financial

position is strong. We heard lots of rhetoric about the noble

concept of accreditation and passionate assurance that NAC has

turned the financial corner. But blind Ohioans are not convinced.

We understand the ways in which NAC has compounded the damage

done to blind people by bad agencies, and we are tired of shabby

treatment and dirty tricks passed off as professionalism and

integrity. We will continue to point out the absurdities of NAC's

claims to stability and programmatic excellence, and we will do

what we can to discourage Ohio agencies from throwing away their

funds on NAC accreditation. Those who are about to die are not

the only ones to master the discipline of a concentrated mind;

those who are fighting for the right to live free and equal know

how to focus their wits as well.

MISSISSIPPI GOVERNOR REDEFINES BLINDNESS

by Kenneth Jernigan

During the last weekend in March of this year I attended the

convention of the National Federation of the Blind of

Mississippi, and it was a good one. The day before the convention

started Sam Gleese, president of the NFB of Mississippi; E. U.

Parker, first vice president of the affiliate; and I paid a visit

to Royal Maid, a large sheltered workshop in Hazlehurst,

Mississippi. We were courteously treated and impressed by the

scope of the operation, but when we asked for financial data

about the workshop (data which by federal law should have been

available to us), we were politely refused. I don't know (and I

am not suggesting) that Royal Maid has anything to hide, but I am

saying that they should not be above the law. If, as is the case,

the law requires that they make financial disclosures upon

request, then they should do it--and the members of the NFB of

Mississippi intend to see that they come up to the line. In the

meantime they are subject to federal monetary penalties for their

refusal to obey the law.

Speaking of the law, something else worthy of comment

occurred while I was in Mississippi. State services for the blind

is part of a larger department of rehabilitation, which has a

nine-member policy board. Certain members of the board are named

by statute, but the law provides that one of the nine must be

visually impaired to represent the interests of the blind and

visually impaired. It had been widely anticipated that the

governor would appoint Carter Gable, a blind man from Jackson,

but during the weekend of our convention the office of the

governor announced that a sighted woman (a former long-time

employee of the state department of rehabilitation) was being

given the position.

To say the least, the blind of the state felt betrayed. In

fact, they were outraged. Regardless of the virtues, sterling

character, or pleasant personality which this woman (one Mildred

Farmer, somebody that very few people had ever heard of) might or

might not possess, she cannot represent the interests of the

blind. Of course, one could argue that since she wears glasses,

she is visually impaired--but unless one is fond of bizarre jokes

or short on mental capacity, such an argument is not likely to be

taken seriously. Certainly the blind didn't take it seriously,

and it is doubtful that the members of the legislature or the

general public will either.

Nor did the press take it seriously. In a column in the

April 9, 1992, Clarion Ledger, Deborah Mathis took the governor

to task. Here is what she had to say:

Does Glasses Wearer Constitute "Visually Impaired" Board Nominee?

Since there is an expense of political currency attached to

every gubernatorial appointment, there is usually some degree of

competition and suspense among those who hope to win the chief

executive's nod. It can get vicious sometimes, but that level of

contentiousness is usually reserved for the plum positions--the

most powerful, high-profile policy-making posts.

However, occasionally controversy seeps onto blander turf,

as in the case of Governor Kirk Fordice's nomination to the state

Board of Rehabilitation Services.

The governor has nominated Mildred Farmer, a Jackson

businesswoman whose personal and professional histories are

steeped in social and civic services: 25 years with what was then

the Vocational Rehabilitation Division of the state Education

Department; 10 years with the Veteran's Administration;

involvement in programs for the disabled and in a project to help

former mental patients make the transition into mainstream

living.

But it's not Farmer's reputation that's led some people to

question the appropriateness of her appointment. Rather, it's

that, as a member of the board, Farmer would be expected to

represent blind Mississippians, and she, herself, is not one of

them.

It may sound nitpicky and hypersensitive, but know this:

However trivial the point may seem, it's the law.

The 1991 state statute establishing the board says one seat

is reserved for a person who is visually impaired or the parent

of such a person. Farmer has been nominated to replace a woman

who fit that description.

So, this is where it gets sloppy. To both the

Mississippi chapter of the National Federation of the Blind and the

Mississippi Council of the Blind, "visually

impaired" is taken to mean "blind." Surely, says Council

President Bonnie Thompson, that was the legislative intent, the

spirit of the law.

But the governor's office has leaped on a technicality to

defend the appointment: Farmer is visually impaired; she's

nearsighted and wears glasses. Sam Gleese, the NFB

president in Jackson, laughs at that. Not because he finds it funny, but

because he finds it absurd. "Mrs. Farmer is not a representative spokesperson for the blind

constituency," said Gleese. "She has not had the experiences that

the blind community has had. And although she has worked for

rehabilitation (services) in the past, we worry that she would

look at it from a bureaucratic standpoint rather than from a

consumer's point of view."

Although likewise concerned, Thompson is willing to give the

nomination a chance. "From all we can gather, (Farmer) is certainly a fine

person," Thompson said. "She does seem to be very community-

minded." Indeed she does. Besides, it's not

as though she has no familiarity with blindness. According to Farmer, her

late husband

had serious visual problems and her aged mother does now. She

has, as she says, "been closely associated with the severely

visually impaired." But, again, that's not

the basis of the dispute. What's left unresolved--what, perhaps will remain

that way--is whether the

lawmakers really meant "visually impaired" (which Farmer

technically is) or whether they meant "blind" and were just

trying to be politically correct.

I'd put my money on the latter scenario. Surely

the drafters meant for the position to go to a blind person--an unsighted

person. Surely the governor's office knows

that. Surely most people can understand why the two organizations

that represent the blind are offended that, once again, it

appears they're being "looked after" by someone. And

surely Mrs. Farmer, for all her good heart, knows wearing glasses is as poor

a passport to qualifying as would be a

Coppertone tan if the job called for a "person of color."

But in all probability Mildred Farmer will be seated on the

Vocational Rehabilitation Board and, given her reputation, I

would expect she would serve well.

Yet, potent doubts remain: Can she really know what a blind

person experiences? Isn't the best advocate for any group a

person who can not only sympathize but empathize?

And, is the case made when the governor and the nominee

can't understand why the blind community is so upset about this?

____________________

This is what the column in the Clarion Ledger says, and it

doesn't take a lot of smarts to see that we are dealing with a

flim-flam, the same kind which the blind have often faced in the

past. However, there is a new element in the equation in

Mississippi. We have a dynamic, savvy group of leaders in the NFB

and a growing affiliate. Blacks and whites are working together

as colleagues and brothers and sisters, so nobody can divide us

by introducing the race question. E. U. Parker, state first vice

president, knows his way around state political circles and has

connections second to none. Sam Gleese, the state president, is

energetic, willing to work, and determined. Add to this the

street smarts possessed by the leadership, and this latest

shenanigan by the governor is likely to strengthen the blind

instead of doing major harm.

At the Saturday session of the state convention the head of

the rehabilitation department (John Cook) made a presentation.

When he was asked whether the fact that Mildred Farmer had been

appointed had anything to do with her former employment at the

rehabilitation department and whether he had used influence to

get the job done, he blew his cool. He made a few snippy remarks

and left the room before anybody could respond. When someone went

out into the hall and asked him to come back, he said he didn't

have time because he had to go make another speech. It didn't

help his image, and it didn't add to his credibility even if

every word he said was true. The coincidence was too fortuitous--

besides which surely two or three more minutes wouldn't have

mattered. Moreover, the recordings of the convention will show

that the comments made to Mr. Cook were courteous and that he was

treated with respect.

The NFB of Mississippi is, indeed, on the move. Sam Gleese

was re-elected president, and the future looks bright for the

blind of the state.

[PHOTO: Pickup truck decorated as a leprechaun for the St.

Patrick's Day parade in Denver. CAPTION: The completed leprechaun

float created by members of the National Federation of the Blind

of Denver and the students at the Colorado Center for the Blind

is pictured here immediately before the 1992 St. Patrick's Day

Parade in Denver, Colorado.]

THE FEDERATION ON PARADE

by Kimberley McCutcheon

From the Associate Editor: Kimberley McCutcheon is a member

of the staff at the Colorado Center for the Blind and an

enthusiastic Federationist. Here is her description of the CCB

adult rehabilitation program's preparation for and participation

in the 1992 St. Patrick's Day parade in Denver:

It started as a tiny germ of an idea in the depths of a

Colorado winter. Of course the CCB had taken part in last year's

St. Patrick's Day parade, amidst drizzling rain and unflagging

enthusiasm. Could we make a float this year? Last year we marched

proudly, canes and dog harnesses gaily decorated with the green

and white of St. Pat's; but what about making a float this year?

Last year we all felt a thrill of pride as we marched past the

crowds of delighted parade observers who clapped and cheered for

our spirit and determination; but what about making a float this

year?

As the snow piled higher on the sidewalks and streets, the

idea blossomed and came closer to fruition. Trina Boyd, the

Colorado Center for the Blind's travel teacher, began marshalling

her troops by contacting the NFB's Denver chapter president Julie

Deeden, who issued the first challenge at January's Denver

chapter meeting. From that point on, there was no doubt that the

National Federation of the Blind would be in the parade, and we

would build a float!

The design for the float was a leprechaun lying on his

stomach. His body was a pickup truck, and his arms were wrapped

around the truck's hood. His hat was perched atop the cab, which

had a face drawn on the windshield. Over the next four weeks we

purchased fifty-eight feet of chicken wire and fashioned it into

leprechaun arms, legs, and hat. Denver chapter members and

Colorado Center staff and students stuffed over 15,000 paper

napkins into the holes in the chicken wire legs, arms, and hat of

our leprechaun friend.

To me, the most meaningful part of the parade, the float,

and the entire adventure was the many, many hours spent laboring

together in camaraderie and lively exchange of ideas during the

time-consuming task of stuffing our leprechaun, made pleasant by

familiarity and renewed friendships with fellow Federationists.

The day of the parade dawned bright and clear, a perfect

spring day--truly a day in which a pickup truck could be

transformed into a leprechaun of unique character. At 7:30 a.m.

the transformation began as a hardy crew of volunteers,

flourishing cans of spray paint and flexing strong muscles,

hoisted our green friend, frame and all, onto the truck. After

driving slowly to downtown Denver, the team reassembled to put

the final flourishes on our float. As the time reached 10:00

a.m., the rest of our company began to gather. We waited our turn

to enter the parade and laughed amiably as the children passing

our float asked their parents what our exhibit was. At

noon, as our green-clad assembly got underway and as cheers and applause

rose spontaneously from the people-lined

streets, it seemed to me that all our labors had birthed this

marvelous day, on which we of the NFB could march proudly, side

by side, united in purpose. We tipped and waved our green derbies

in appreciation for the shouted messages of encouragement: "Glad

you're here!" and "Way to go!" Yet my thoughts kept returning

to

those evenings and weekends when, blind and sighted alike, we

Federationists gathered together to work with steady purpose and

sure goal, inch by inch fashioning more than a float, creating a

symbol to remind us that anything we put our minds to can be

accomplished if we work together!

******************************

If you or a friend would like to remember the National Federation of the

Blind in your will, you can do so by employing the following language: "I give, devise, and bequeath unto National Federation of the Blind,

1800 Johnson Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21230, a District of Columbia

nonprofit corporation, the sum of $_____ (or "_____ percent of my net estate"

or "The following stocks and bonds: _____") to be used for its worthy

purposes

on behalf of blind persons."

******************************

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Donald Curran, Associate Librarian for

Constituent Services at the Library of Congress, presents a

twenty-five-year pin to Thomas Bickford.]

FEDERATIONIST HONORED BY LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

From the Associate Editor: In the early seventies, when I

joined the National Federation of the Blind, the banquet

recordings to which I listened with rapt attention all featured

Federation songs sung with much enthusiasm by the throngs of

conventioneers. The singing was always led by Tom Bickford, who

had a wonderful voice and an encyclopedic knowledge of the words.

I later learned that Tom, who was a semi-professional musician,

was very active in the late sixties in conducting the contest to

choose a Federation song. In fact, President Maurer recalls that

at the 1969 convention in Columbia, South Carolina, Tom Bickford

and his tape recorder were to be found everywhere, Tom inviting

people to listen to the contest entrants in preparation for

voting.

In those years Tom Bickford had been an employee of the

Library of Congress for only a few years. Now he has completed

twenty-five years of service. His actual title is Quality

Assurance Specialist, Recorded Products. The following article

appeared this spring in the L.C. Journal, the publication of the

Library of Congress. It was written by one of the staff writers

of the National Library Service. Here is the article as it

appeared:

Tom Bickford Marks Twenty-Fifth Anniversary

Tom Bickford commemorates twenty-five years of federal

service in February, all but a few months of it spent with the

National Library Service for the Blind and Physically

Handicapped. Working in the Quality Assurance Section of NLS,

Bickford's major responsibility is the final review of talking-

book master tapes just before circulation copies are produced.

At the time of this interview, Bickford had tapes of two

books cued up on the open-reel machines he uses simultaneously,

tacking from one to the other, listening sometimes at high

speeds--the equivalent of 350 words per minute in print. One of

the books was Mark Helprin's novel, A Soldier of the Great War,

read by Ed Blake, a narrator Bickford knows and admires. "He

lived in ten different countries," Bickford comments, "and he

knows his Romance languages well. Plus, he has a gift: he can

fake languages." Accuracy in the pronunciation

of words and phrases in foreign languages and obsolete, exotic, technical,

obscure, or

regional English is essential, and Bickford will send books back

for correction if necessary. He does abundant research in the

course of his reading--checking, verifying, solving puzzles in

what he calls "paleolinguistics" through the textual evidence of

rhymes, errors, and etymologies. He is not averse to drawing upon

the expertise of scholars at local universities.

Bickford respects the artistic integrity of individual

narrators and appreciates stylistic individuality. Nevertheless,

the performance of the narrator of the second book Bickford is

reviewing is felt to be slightly substandard: she speaks

erratically, clustering words in a manner disruptive to the flow

of thought. Although he will not reject the completed book,

Bickford will provide written criticism in the hope of improving

future performance by this narrator.

Bickford's background in languages has been of inestimable

value to him in this work. His main second language is Russian,

which he has studied at the graduate level; he has also formally

studied German, French, and Serbian. From the study of music he

has gained a phonetic sense of Italian and Church Latin; from

living on the West Coast he has developed a passable ear for

Spanish; from having been born in China and spending the first

seven years of his life there, he has a critical appreciation of

the Chinese language--although his skills, he admits, are a bit

rusty.

Bickford's parents were Presbyterian missionaries to China

during the extraordinary time between the World Wars. His

childhood was spent in and around Beijing, and he recalls Chinese

as spoken by his Chinese amah--or nanny. Bickford's father spent

part of the Second World War interned as a civilian prisoner.

Bickford received a B.A. from Occidental College in Los

Angeles in 1956 and a master's (1961) from the University of

Iowa, followed by an interlude of Russian studies at Georgetown.

He enjoyed folk music during these days and performed semi-

professionally, playing occasionally in the District's celebrated

folk club, the Cellar Door. At the beginning of his federal

employment, in February, 1967, Bickford worked for a short time

with the Internal Revenue Service, then joined NLS.

Along with his family and his church, Bickford names the

National Federation of the Blind (NFB) as an important influence

in his life. He has been a member of the Federation for thirty-

six years and has held a variety of offices in different parts of

the country. He is currently treasurer of the Sligo Creek chapter

in Maryland. Bickford takes pride in his role in effecting the

passage in the early 1970s of Public Law 92-515, the so-called

white cane law, of the District of Columbia. This important

legislation provides for equal access by blind and physically

disabled persons to public places, buildings, and conveyances and

prohibits discrimination against blind and physically disabled

persons in housing and employment.

Bickford relishes travel and has made trips to Mexico and

Guatemala, Europe, and the quondam Soviet Union, in addition to

having crossed the United States three times. Considerable travel

is entailed in his attendance at state and national NFB meetings. Bickford

has written articles for the NFB publication the Braille Monitor--including

a piece in which he shares a set of

recipes for a German coffee cake--Kichen--"the second nicest

thing my mother-in-law gave me." Until a shade tree lately

overshadowed his garden, Bickford raised vegetables. He is

currently pondering alternative horticultural strategies. All

of his formal studies and self-directed education have been useful to him

in his work. "You are always learning in this

job," Bickford says. "You have to be open to learning every day." Bickford,

as the saying has it, wears his erudition lightly; but his erudition is real,

and his love of knowledge is infectious.

[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Sondra Williams.]

[PHOTO: Jennifer Feingold (wearing sleep shades and using cane)

prepares shishkebabs on a charcoal grill. CAPTION: Students at

the Colorado Center for the Blind learn many cooking skills.

Pictured here Jennifer Feingold, a Center student, tends

shishkebabs on a charcoal grill.]

RECIPES

This month's recipes come from Colorado. The first four

were submitted by Sondra Williams, President of the Royal Gorge

chapter of the National Federation of the Blind of Colorado. The

last three come from the Colorado Center for the Blind, where

students learn, among other things, to become skilled and

confident cooks. The several student favorites reprinted here and

contributed by Kimberley McCutcheon, the CCB cooking teacher,

demonstrate why cooking class at the Colorado Center is so

popular.

ZUCCHINI CAKE

by Sondra Williams

Ingredients:

2 cups sugar

1 cup oil

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

2-1/2 cups flour

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon

3 cups zucchini, peeled, seeded, and grated

1 cup (6 ounces) chocolate chips

1 cup chopped nuts, optional

Method: Combine sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla; beat until

creamy. Stir in flour, salt, soda, baking powder, and cinnamon.

Add the zucchini and mix well. Pour into 9 x 13-inch well-greased

and floured pan. Sprinkle top with 1 cup chocolate chips. Bake at

350 degrees for 40 to 50 minutes.

SALMON SURPRISE

by Sondra Williams

Ingredients:

1 pound can salmon, drained, reserve liquid

1 can condensed cream of mushroom soup

1/2 cup soft bread crumbs

1/2 cup catsup

2 eggs, slightly beaten

Method: Drain salmon, adding enough water to liquid to equal

1/2 cup. Mix salmon, its liquid, and 3/4 cup of the undiluted

soup with the remaining ingredients and spoon into greased

custard cups or casserole dish. Bake approximately 35 minutes in

350 degree oven. Unmold onto platter (or leave in dish). Cover

with a sauce made from the remaining soup diluted with milk and

heated.

CARAMEL CORN

by Sondra Williams

Ingredients:

2 cups brown sugar, packed

1/2 cup light corn syrup

2 sticks margarine (1/2 pound)

1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

7 quarts popcorn, popped and unsalted

Method: In a sauce pan, mix all ingredients, except baking

soda and popcorn, and bring to boil, stirring constantly until

syrup reaches the hard-ball stage (about 5 minutes). This occurs

when a small amount of the hot syrup dropped from a spoon into a

cup of cold, clear water forms a hard ball. Remove pan from heat

and stir in the soda. Immediately pour over popcorn in shallow

pans. Bake in 200 degree oven for 1 hour, stirring every 15

minutes. Pour out onto table or counter, and separate when cool.

BAKED CHICKEN IN WINE SAUCE

by Sondra Williams

Ingredients:

1 chicken, cut into pieces

1/2 cup celery, chopped

1/2 cup onion, chopped

salt, pepper, and paprika to taste

1/2 cup white wine

1 can cream of mushroom soup

Method: Place chicken in greased baking dish. Add the celery

and onion. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and paprika. Mix wine with

mushroom soup, and pour over chicken. Bake uncovered for

approximately 1 hour at 350 degrees.

For variety, place 1 cup uncooked rice in bottom of pan. Add

2-1/4 cups water and 1 teaspoon salt. Carefully place chicken

pieces on top. Add celery, onion, seasoning, and soup mixture.

Cover with foil for about 45 minutes, then uncover for several

minutes more in order to brown.

SZECHWAN CHICKEN

by Kimberly McCutcheon

Whenever students at the Colorado Center want to do

something more challenging in the kitchen, this is one recipe I

suggest. Besides, it is fabulous!

Ingredients:

1 pound skinned, boned breast of chicken

1 egg white

1-1/2 tablespoons corn starch

1/8 cup hot green peppers, shredded

1/4 cup green onion, chopped

1 tablespoon garlic, minced

1 tablespoon dry sherry

1 teaspoon white vinegar

1 teaspoon sugar

1 tablespoon soy sauce

2 cups peanut oil

sprigs of fresh cilantro

Method: Partially freeze the chicken to facilitate slicing.

Cut the chicken into lengthwise strips, as thin as possible. Beat

the egg white lightly, then beat in the corn starch. Add the

shredded chicken and stir to coat well. Let the coated chicken

stand in the refrigerator five hours. In a bowl combine the hot

green pepper, green onions, garlic, and chopped ginger. In

another bowl combine the sherry, vinegar, sugar, and soy sauce.

Stir to blend thoroughly. Have a wok filled with the oil and heat

to medium. Just before serving, fluff up the chicken shreds with

fingers, then add to a sieve or small wire basket. Lower into the

oil and cook only until the chicken shreds turn white (they also

become firm when touched lightly and quickly), about one minute

or less. Do not brown. Lift the basket from the oil. Remove all

but 2 tablespoons of oil from the wok and heat to high. Add the

chicken and green onion mixture. Stir to blend, then add the

sherry and vinegar mixture. Cook briefly, stirring rapidly and

constantly, until the mixture is bubbling and thoroughly hot.

Garnish with cilantro. Serves 2 to 6.

CHICKEN AND PASTA SALAD

by Regine Sediva

Regine is a student at the Colorado Center for the Blind and

is graduating in May. This summer recipe is one of her family's

favorites and now one of the Center's favorite main-dish salad

recipes.

Ingredients:

4 cups Rotelle pasta, uncooked

1 tablespoon oil

1 1/2 teaspoons curry powder

2/3 cup mayonnaise

1 1/4 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon dried tarragon leaves, crushed

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

6 cups chicken, cooked and cubed

1 1/2 cups cooked broccoli

3/4 cup chopped sweet red pepper (or substitute green pepper for half the red)

Method: Cook and drain pasta according to the package

directions. Place in large bowl. Heat oil in small skillet. (I

use olive oil.) Add curry powder. Cook, stirring until spice is

fragrant, about 20 seconds. Transfer to small bowl. Add

mayonnaise, salt, tarragon, and black pepper. Mix well. Add

chicken, broccoli, and sweet red pepper to pasta. Stir in

seasoned mayonnaise. Chill. Serves 4 to 6.

COPPER DOLLAR SALAD

by Wayne Miller

Wayne Miller is a long-time leader in the National

Federation of the Blind of Colorado and was a student at the

Colorado Center last year.

Ingredients:

2 pounds carrots

1 onion

1 bell pepper

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup vinegar

1 teaspoon mustard

1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

1/2 cup oil

1 can condensed cream of tomato soup

1 teaspoon pepper

1 teaspoon salt

Method: Scrape and slice carrots thinly. Add to boiling

water and cook 15 minutes. Drain water. Finely chop onion and

pepper and add to carrots. Combine next 8 ingredients and bring

to a boil. Pour over carrots, pepper, and onion. Mix well and

refrigerate at least 12 hours. Makes about 12 servings.

CCB BOOT CAMP BEEF STEW

When the students at the Colorado Center for the Blind cook

a hearty meal for visitors to the Center, we need a large

quantity by the time you count staff, students, and visitors. The

following is a Center favorite.

Ingredients:

6 tablespoons shortening

5 pounds sirloin steak, cubed

1/3 cup flour for dredging meat

3 medium onions, sliced

3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced

1/2 teaspoon pepper

4 bay leaves

1/2 teaspoon cloves

1/4 cup lemon juice

1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce

1 quart hot water

a #10 can tomatoes (weighs about 6 1/2 pounds)

3 each chicken and beef bouillon cubes

1/2 cup flour

10 carrots, scraped and sliced

full bunch celery, diced

5 pounds potatoes, peeled and quartered

1/2 teaspoon salt, or more to taste

Optional:

1 pound fresh mushrooms, sliced or whole

2 green peppers, sliced

1 1/2 cups red wine

1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley

Method: Melt shortening in large pot on medium high heat.

Add meat coated with 3 tablespoons flour, a little at a time in

order to brown evenly. Do not allow the pieces of meat to touch

while browning. Push browned pieces to the side or remove from

pan while turning and browning new pieces. Add onions, garlic,

seasonings, hot water, chicken and beef bouillon cubes, and

tomatoes. Cover tightly and cook over low heat for two hours, or

until meat is tender. Mix the 1/2 cup of flour with a cup of

water until smooth and add slowly to meat mixture, stirring

constantly until liquid thickens. Add vegetables, salt, and the

optional ingredients you have chosen. Cook for 30 minutes or

until vegetables are tender. Serves 25.

MONITOR MINIATURES

**Correction:

In the April, 1992, issue of the Braille Monitor we

published a picture of four students who took part in a skit

titled "The Young and the Skill-less" during this year's

Washington Seminar. Only three names were listed. Pam Dubel, a

1991 scholarship winner and one of the leaders of the National

Association of Blind Students, was accidentally omitted. Those in

the photograph should have been identified (left to right) as

Heather Kirkwood (Kansas), David Cohen (Ohio), Pam Dubel (New

York), and Holly Pilcher (Massachussetts).

**Convention Door Prize Reminder:

Door prizes provide fun and liveliness to convention

proceedings each year. Individuals, local chapters, and state

affiliates who are planning to contribute prizes to the 1992

convention are reminded to label them in print and Braille and

bring them to Diane McGeorge, door prize chairman, at the

convention in Charlotte or send them to Hazel Staley, President

of the NFB of North Carolina. Her address is: 5310 Farm Pond

Lane, Charlotte, North Carolina 28212.

**Stereotyper Available:

We have been asked to carry the following announcement: "One

used stereotype machine for embossing zinc plates or metal signs

is available from Lutheran Braille Workers, Inc. Nonprofit

organizations preferred. Available FREE except for shipping

charges and transportation arrangements. For more information

please contact: LeRoy Delafosse, Lutheran Braille Workers, Inc.,

Post Office Box 5000, Yucaipa, California 92399, or phone: (714)

795-8977."

**Participation in Test:

From the Editor: We have been asked to carry the following

announcement from Mark Kilwein of Indianapolis, who says in his

accompanying letter:

"I am trying to recruit subjects for a research project

which will serve as my doctoral dissertation in clinical

psychology at Ohio State University. I've been having a very hard

time finding volunteers, mostly because legally blind college

students are not concentrated in any one place. I'm hoping to

take advantage of the convention to get a number of volunteers."

Here is the announcement that Mr. Kilwein asks that we run:

Individuals who are legally blind and who are currently

attending a college or university are requested to volunteer for

a scientific study concerned with better understanding the ways

in which visually impaired people categorize basic objects. I

will be administering the questionnaire at the NFB convention in

Charlotte and would like to set up an appointment to meet with

those who are interested. It's easy, takes less than forty

minutes, and pays $5.00. Please write: Mark L. Kilwein, M.A.,

9341 San Jacinto Drive, Indianapolis, Indiana 46250; or call

collect (317) 595-9224.

**Braille 'n' Speak at Charlotte Convention:

Deane Blazie, President of Blazie Engineering, has asked us

to carry the following announcement concerning the NFB convention

in Charlotte this summer. Here it is:

Blazie Engineering will be at the convention in force. We

will be updating Braille 'n' Speaks with new features, so bring

your machines. We will offer many of our products for sale at the

convention, including the Braille 'n' Speak, the Braille 'n'

Speak 640, and the upgrade from the Braille 'n' Speak to the

Braille 'n' Speak 640. We will have a good supply of accessories.

Take a Braille 'n' Speak for a test drive in Charlotte--

Blazie Engineering will be bringing fifty Braille 'n' Speaks to

the convention in Charlotte to loan anyone who would like to try

one out. You must be registered at the convention and provide

some identification. The loan will be on a first-come-first-serve

basis, so look for us in the exhibit hall and give Braille 'n'

Speak a try.

**Wedding Bells:

From the Editor: Over the years many Federationists have

known my secretary, Miss Myrick. My secretary is no longer Miss

Myrick, for on April 11, 1992, she was married to Robert

Boeshore. The Boeshores were married at St. Luke's Lutheran

Church, and Mrs. Boeshore is now busily back at work as usual.

We also had another wedding at the National Center for the

Blind. Some of you know Miss Finneyfrock, who works in the

accounting department, and a number of you have yet to meet her.

In any case she was married at the Democratic Club in Baltimore

on April 4, 1992, to Leonard Paul Swiger, Jr., to whom she had

been engaged for the past four years.

So romance is blooming at the National Center for the Blind.

Congratulations to the newlyweds.

**Norton Utilities 6 Quick Reference Now Available in Braille:

We have been asked to print the following:

Utilities are enhancement tools. They make it easier for

computer users to perform certain clerical tasks, such as

manipulating files, rearranging things in memory, or reorganizing

disks. One of the most popular enhancement tools on the market

today is Norton Utilities.

National Braille Press has just completed--simultaneously

with the release of the print version--the Norton Utilities 6

Quick Reference by Que Corporation. This compact guide is an

instant reference for the most often used commands, options, and

latest enhancements of this best-selling utilities program. Make

computer and file management fast and easy with Que's Norton

Utilities 6 Quick Reference!

Norton Utilities 6 Quick Reference is divided into two

parts. The first covers the Norton Utilities, and the second

covers NDOS. Each part provides an alphabetical listing of

commands. Because it is a quick reference, this book is not

intended to take the place of the extensive documentation

included with the Norton Utilities. Instead, it provides specific

information likely to be needed instantly like the syntax to

execute commands and the switches available for them.

This versatile reference guide helps you become familiar

with the features and shortcuts that can make PC maintenance more

efficient and effective. This resource covers such features as

NDOS, file management, and data-recovery commands. Now you can

put essential information at your fingertips with Norton

Utilities 6 Quick Reference for just $9.95--the same price as the

print edition!

Prepaid orders can be placed with National Braille Press, 88

St. Stephen Street, Boston, Massachusetts 02115; or call (617)

266-6160.

**RFB Update:

We have been asked to print the following reminder and list

of newly available titles:

You probably have fond memories of school days that may have

included books on tape from Recording for the Blind. RFB does

produce taped books from grade four level up, but you should know

that its 79,000 audio books and more than 300 on computer disk

aren't just for students--they're for anyone who is blind or

visually impaired and who likes to read.

RFB joined forces last July with Computerized Books for the

Blind of Missoula, Montana, and now offers more than 300 books on

low-density disk for use with a personal computer and adaptive

software (synthetic speech, Braille, or enlarged print). Books

are available on 3.5-inch diskettes for IBM and compatible

computers and Macintosh and Apple formats as well as on 5.25-inch

floppy disks for IBM and compatibles. You can order a free

electronic information kit by contacting RFB and specifying the

type of disk you'd like. Electronic text titles (E-text, for

short) are for sale and become yours to keep. Included are a

variety of computer manuals as well as dictionaries, a thesaurus,

several law books, and even two versions of the Bible.

If you used RFB in the past but it's been a few years since

you borrowed a book from us, it's quick and easy--and free--to

reactivate your membership. Simply call the toll-free Customer

Service number, (800)221-4792, or write to RFB's registrar, at 20

Roszel Road, Princeton, NJ 08540. Give us your name, address,

your original RFB I.D. number (if you have it), your birth date,

and the years you used RFB. In most cases your account will be

reactivated and ready for your next book order in twenty-four

hours.

A few years ago RFB instituted a one-time $25 registration

fee entitling members to lifetime use of the organization's

library and other services. Registering for the first time is

simple. Fill out an application (available by calling or writing

RFB) and return it with the $25 registration fee. The application

form documents your disability and provides us with your address,

phone number, and other important information.

By the way, the toll-free number has new, expanded hours

for book orders or other customer service inquiries. You can call

between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern Time Monday through Friday.

Books can also be ordered by fax, at (609)987-8116, or by mail,

to 20 Roszel Road, Princeton, NJ 08540.

Here's a glimpse of what's new on the RFB shelves. E-text

books are designated by EA or EP shelf numbers.

E-text

EA295, The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway, Charles

Scribner's Son Publisher, 1988, 1 disk, $10.

EA354, Stedman's Pocket Medical Dictionary, by William

Hensyl, Williams & Wilking Publisher, 1987, 19 disks, $50

EP017 Microsoft MS-DOS: Operating System, Version 5.0, Microsoft

Corporation Publisher, 1991, 5 disks, $27

EA010, Mastering Wordperfect 5.1, Alan Simpson, Sybex Inc.

Publisher, 1990, 5 disks, $27.

EP032, The Norton Utilities, Version 6, Symantec Corporation

Publisher, 1991, 6 disks, $29.

Audiocassette

CD711, Beethoven On Beethoven: Playing His Piano Music His Way,

William S. Newman, W. W. Norton Publisher, 1991.

CE204, Mark Twain's Own Autobiography, Mark Twain, University of

Wisconsin Press, 1991.

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Frances Radcliff rocks two infants in the nursery

of the Calvary Church, where she volunteers every Sunday

morning.]

**Honored:

Sharon Gold, President of the National Federation of the

Blind of California, came across the following article about

Frances Radcliff, who is a faithful and dedicated Federationist.

She worked for many years as a rehabilitation teacher in

California. Her students report that she was an excellent

teacher, always believing in them and expecting more of them than

they dared to expect of themselves. She is not as active as she

once was, but she still contributes wherever she finds a need she

can fill. Here is the story that appeared in the May, 1991, issue

of the church newsletter "At Calvary":

This month's Golden Apple Award goes to Frances Radcliff,

one of the nursery's faithful workers. Every Sunday morning at

8:00 a.m. you will find Frances in a rocking chair, keeping one

of the babies happy. Frances has been serving in

the nursery for about three years. She wanted to do something for the Lord.

When she tried

working in the nursery, she says that she knew right away "it was

the place for me." Frances likes working in

the nursery because it enables the young mothers to go to the worship service

and to teach in other

classes. She also says, "I would be happy to leave my child

there. I can go home and feel happy knowing that each baby got

good care."

Frances was born in Oklahoma and grew up in Arkansas. At the

age of nine years, she went to a boarding school for the blind.

She received the Lord when she was thirteen. Frances went on to

Fresno State College and did her graduate work at the University

of California at Berkeley.

When she finished her training, she worked as a vocational

guidance counselor for the blind with the State Department of

Rehabilitation in Long Beach. She also worked in prevention of

blindness. Long Beach was where she met and married

her husband. When her husband died in 1966, Frances came to Santa Ana. Frances

has

no children of her own, but she says, "I have lots of kids who

need lots of care."

Frances began attending Calvary Church in 1976 at the

invitation of her next-door neighbors. She immediately felt at

home in our non-denominational, missionary-minded church.

Although Frances is now retired, she remains very active.

She still manages a scholarship fund for blind college students.

She goes to Bible studies. She is part of the Daytime Missionary

Fellowship with many senior adults. As Frances puts

it, "I work with the babies, and I work with

the seniors. Those in the middle will just have to make it on

their own."

**For Sale:

We have been asked to print the following:

Larry Evans has for sale an Optacon Model R-1D in good

condition. Must sell. You can contact him at the phone number

listed at the end of this miniature. Fred Jones would like to buy

an RC Smith Braille Writer. If you have one of these Braille

writers, please contact him at (314) 449-9999.

**Braille Menus Available:

Victor Hemphill, an active member of the National Federation

of the Blind of Illinois and founder of Volunteer Braille

Services of Merisa, Illinois, has asked us to print the

following:

The Cracker Barrel restaurant chain has completed

distribution of Braille and large-type editions of both their

breakfast and dinner menus to all franchise restaurants. Each

location has been supplied with several copies of each menu in

both formats.

The Braille menus are embossed on 11 1/2 by 11-inch paper

and are spiral bound. A table of contents immediately behind the

title page makes it possible to locate quickly any item in any

category.

The large-type menus are printed in 24-point Helvetica type

on white 8 1/2 by 11-inch bond paper. They are also spiral bound

with index covers and contain a table of contents.

I hope that, as Federationists travel on business or

pleasure or just decide to eat out now and then, they will make

it a point to visit the nearest Cracker Barrel Restaurant and let

the manager know they appreciate having their menus in a format

they can use easily. The Cracker Barrel restaurant chain has

locations in the following states: Alabama, Florida, Georgia,

Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan,

Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina,

Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.

**National Church Conference of the Blind:

We have been asked to print the following: The

1992 meeting of the National Church Conference of the Blind will take

place Sunday, July 26, to Thursday, July 30, at

the City Center Holiday Inn in Little Rock, Arkansas. The

conference theme is "God's Word for the '90s." In

addition to the daily Bible studies and the Thursday evening banquet with

special guest Lucy Ching, this year's

conference will include seminars on "Methods of Studying the

Bible" and "Dangers of the New Age Movement."

For registration information and more details, please

contact The Reverend Frank Finkenbinder, Membership Secretary,

National Church Conference of the Blind, P.O. Box 163, Denver,

Colorado 80201; or call (303) 455-3430.

**Braille Transcription Service Available:

We have been asked to print the following: "I

will Braille scannable print material or files provided on 3-1/2-inch

disks for use with an IBM compatible computer. I

can produce material in either Grade I or Grade II Braille at .20

per page. When ordering, please include payment. Send all

correspondence to Pat Wise, 424 South Main Street, Fostoria, Ohio

44830. Please include your phone number with orders. Brailled

material will be shipped free matter for the blind unless other

arrangements are made with me. You will be notified of the

shipping cost if the free matter privilege is not used."

[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Eileen Tscharner.]

**Honored:

Eileen Tscharner, First Vice President of the National

Federation of the Blind of South Dakota, was recognized by the

Rapid City Chamber of Commerce for her volunteerism. She and four

others were given the "Wind Beneath Our Wings" award during a

banquet hosted by the Health and Human Services Committee of the

Chamber on March 27, 1992. Her picture and biographical sketch

was published in the "Outstanding Performance Awards" booklet.

The inscription on her plaque reads as follows:

The Wind Beneath Our Wings

Presented to

Eileen Tscharner

National Federation of the Blind

For outstanding efforts

You have accepted the challenge to soar above the world and

to overcome barriers to success that would have caused others to

falter and fail. You have been decisive where others have

hesitated. You are recognized as a leader for your efforts. You

have inspired us all like the majestic eagle.

For all you have done to make this a better place, thank

you.

Rapid City Chamber of Commerce

Health and Human Services Committee

Outstanding Performance Award 1992

The biographical entry in the booklet reads:

Eileen Tscharner, National Federation of the Blind of South

Dakota. Since her vision loss in 1987, Eileen has undergone

intensive training in the alternative skills of blindness, held a

job in the furniture business, and become a full-time volunteer

with the National Federation of the Blind of South Dakota. She

participates in her local church activities and community

organizations and travels throughout the state as the Vice

President of the National Federation of the Blind of South

Dakota. Her blindness has certainly not restricted her.

Eileen was raised with her two brothers on a farm near

Hemmingford, Nebraska. She married her husband Jack in 1947 and

moved to Rapid City following the close of the semester at

Chadron State College, where they were students. They held

various jobs until 1960 when they purchased Jack's Camera Shop--a

business they operated until Jack's death in 1978. Eileen is the

mother of two sons, Chris and Dan.

Eileen has volunteered 1,161 hours on behalf of blind

persons in South Dakota during 1991. She assists with white cane

travel lessons, gives encouragement to those who are losing

vision, and provides the role model of a truly independent person

who has become blind in later life.

____________________

We in the Federation add our congratulations to those of the

Chamber of Commerce. We are proud to have Eileen Tscharner as our

sister and colleague in the organized blind movement.

**Food for Thought:

From the Associate Editor: The following poem appeared

recently in a recent issue of Insight, the publication of the

National Federation of the Blind of South Dakota. Think about it.

Winners and Losers

A winner says, "Let's find out!"

A loser says, "Nobody knows."

When a winner makes a mistake, he says, "I was wrong."

When a loser makes a mistake, he says, "It wasn't my fault."

A winner goes through a problem.

A loser goes around it but never gets past it.

A winner makes commitments.

A loser makes promises.

A winner says, "I'm good, but not as good as I ought to be."

A loser says, "I'm no worse than a lot of other people."

A winner tries to learn from those who are superior to him.

A loser tries to tear down those who are superior to him.

A winner says, "There must be a better way to do it!"

A loser says, "That's the way its always been done around here."

Which are you?