GROWING UP BLIND IN TENNESSEE DURING THE DEPRESSION

GROWING UP BLIND IN TENNESSEE DURING THE DEPRESSION

Growing Up Blind in Tennessee During the Depression

by Kenneth Jernigan

I grew up on a farm in middle Tennessee during the depression-first the
farm depression and then the one that everybody talks about. Life was not the way it is
today. My father (though intelligent) had less than two weeks of formal schooling, and my
mother (at least equally intelligent) did not finish the eighth grade. There were no books
in our home except the family Bible, and we didn’t get a newspaper or magazine.

We had no radio; no telephone; and until I was six, no automobile. It
was the early thirties, and money was scarce. Hogs (when we had any) brought two cents a
pound; and anything else we had to sell brought an equally low price.

I had an isolated existence. Except for the extremely elderly, I was
the only blind person for miles around. My experiences in no way were like those of the
sighted children I knew. Mostly until I was six, I had nothing to do and nobody to play
with. Sometimes on Sundays my family and I would go to the home of one or the other of my
grandparents for dinner and the day. I remember those times vividly.

The men (remember that this was rural Tennessee in the early thirties)
would sit under a shade tree in the front yard and talk about the crops, the weather, and
the price of hogs. The women would be in the kitchen preparing Sunday dinner and talking
about children, what the neighbors were doing, and their gardens.

The boys and girls (usually a bevy of cousins were there on such
occasions) would be in the barnyard playing hide and seek, tag, or some other game. I
belonged to none of these groups. I circulated back and forth on the edges and hoped the
day would end.

One thing more: Nobody had indoor toilets, so if I knew we were going
somewhere for Sunday dinner, I would begin the day before to reduce my intake of liquids.
It is embarrassing for a child of five to have to interrupt the men under the shade tree
to ask if someone will take him down behind the barn to answer the call of nature.

I am sure that each person who attended those gatherings came away with
different memories, memories that lingered through the years-playing with other children,
talking with the men under the trees, or exchanging confidences in the kitchen.

Certainly I came away with memories. They revolve around a full bladder
and a day of boredom. This is not to say that I felt abused or mistreated. Instead, I
recognized (even at that early age) that the world was as it was; that nobody was trying
to do me in; and that if I wanted to have a full life, I had better learn to plan and
think ahead.

My parents loved me, but they didn’t know how to deal with a blind
child. They knew that they wanted the best for me, and I knew that I wanted out of that
limited environment.

Every time I could, I got somebody to read to me. Read what?
Anything-anything I could get. I would nag and pester anybody I could find to read me
anything that was available-the Bible, an agriculture yearbook, a part of a newspaper, or
the Sears Roebuck catalog. It didn’t matter. Reading was magic. It opened up new
worlds.

I remember the joy-a joy which amounted to reverence and awe-which I
felt during those times I was allowed to visit an aunt who had books in her home. It was
from her daughter (my cousin) that I first heard the fairy stories from The Book of
Knowledge-a treasure which many of today’s children have unfortunately missed.

My cousin loved to read and was long-suffering and kind, but I know
that I tried her patience with my insatiable appetite. It was not possible for me to get
enough, and I always dreaded going home, finding every excuse I could to stay as long as
my parents would let me.

I loved my aunt; I was fascinated by the radio she had; and I delighted
in her superb cooking-but the key attraction was the reading. My aunt is long since dead,
and of course I never told her. For that matter, maybe I never really sorted it out in my
own mind, but there it was-no doubt about it.

As you might imagine, I wanted to go to school as soon as I could, and
I made no secret about it. But you had to be six, and when they said six, they meant six.
School started in September, but I was not six until November 13, 1932. So I was not
allowed to begin until the next quarter-January 9, 1933.

My parents loaded me into a car (a new secondhand Chevy bought
especially for the occasion with hard earned savings) and took me to the residential
school for the blind in Nashville fifty miles away. I entered the school grounds in early
January of 1933 and didn’t come out again until Easter when my parents took me home
for the weekend.

That first year at the school for the blind in Nashville was quite an
experience for me. I had never been away from my parents for any length of time in my
whole life, and suddenly I was plopped down in the midst of twenty-five other small boys,
who (though possessing certain cultural traits in common) came from widely diverse
backgrounds and environments.

We called the woman who was in charge of us our supervisor. (We would
have been outraged and humiliated by the term "housemother.") She was a genteel
person, the elderly widow of a doctor; and she did the best she could to teach us manners
and morals, keep us in order, and raise us right.

But even if she had had the sleuthing skills of a Sherlock Holmes and
the energy of a strong young athlete, she couldn’t have kept track of us all of the
time. Although we obeyed her rules and paid the penalty when we didn’t-that is, when
she caught us (I might say here that a heavy paddle was much in evidence), primarily we
made our own rules and governed ourselves-at least in matters relating to social
interaction.

One of the more noteworthy customs of the school was a Saturday morning
ritual involving the Scriptures. Shortly after breakfast the small boys (I don’t know
what happened to the girls) were plopped down on a bench and given the task of memorizing
a chapter from the Bible. It didn’t do any good to protest, object, or try to resist.
You sat there until you memorized it, after which you were free to go play.

One’s religion had nothing to do with it, nor did one’s
interest or aptitude. When you got the task done, you could go where you pleased and do
what you liked. Meanwhile, you couldn’t. And any time you spent trying to beat the
system was just that much of the morning gone.

I suppose I need not tell you that I quickly concluded to learn my
chapter with minimum delay, which I religiously (no play on words intended) did. As a
result, I have been a devout Bible quoter ever since-and much, I might add, to my benefit
and long-range satisfaction. Ah, well, children are not always in the best position to
know what will stand them in good stead.

At home on the farm my family got up early, often around four
o’clock. My dad would go to the barn to feed the livestock and milk the cows, and my
mother would build a fire in the wood stove and cook breakfast. We would then eat, and by
the time it was light, my dad would be in the field to start his day’s work. I got up
when the others did, for the table was one place where I was equal with the rest. It was
not just food that I got there but an important part of the day’s routine and
ritual-a time when all of us were together in a common activity.

But at school it was all different. I went to bed that first night at
the school for the blind in a strange city and in the biggest building I had ever seen-a
building with running water, indoor toilets, electricity, steam heat, and a group of
strangers.

And as might have been predicted, I woke up about four o’clock the
next morning. It was not only that I was wide awake and in a strange setting. I had to go
to the bathroom (simply had to), and I didn’t know where it was or how to get there.
I didn’t think I should wake anybody else up, but I knew I had to do something-so I
got up, went out into the hall, and began to hunt.

Somehow (I don’t know how I did it, but somehow) I found the
bathroom, but then I didn’t know how to get back to my room. At this point I simply
lay down in the middle of the hall and waited for something to happen. It was an
experience which I still vividly remember.

But that was not all that happened that day. When the other boys got
up, I went with them to the bathroom to wash my hands and face and get ready for the day.
One of them (he was nine and big for his age) said, "Here, give me your hand.
I’ll show you where to wash."

I wasn’t very sophisticated, but it was clear he was trying to put
my hand into the toilet. I was outraged. My mother and father didn’t believe a blind
person could do very much, and they had restricted my movements and actions-but they loved
me, and even spoiled me. Certainly they never mistreated me.

My anger took tangible form. I jerked away and resisted, accompanying
my actions with sharp words. The nine-year-old (who, as I was to learn, made a practice of
bullying the smaller children) was not pleased to have his fun spoiled and to be resisted
in the presence of the other boy. He beat me up. In fact, it was but the first of several
beatings that he gave me during the next few days.

It was clear that I was either going to have to find a way to solve the
problem or lead a life of intolerable misery. There were a number of other six- and
seven-year-olds in the same boat. So I got together with them, and we went to see him as a
group-and this time we didn’t lose the fight. Just to make certain, we kept at it for
a while until there was absolutely no doubt that we hadn’t lost the fight. He never
bothered us again.

It was my first lesson in the worthwhileness of collective action. It
was a valuable learning experience, one that I have never forgotten. It has stood me in
good stead through the years and been a comfort to me in times of trouble-and I am sure
that it always will.

If I should ever be foolish enough to doubt the necessity of the
National Federation of the Blind, all I would need to do would be to remember that week of
misery in January of 1933 when I was six. That nine-year-old that I confronted may long
since have passed to his reward, but he did me a service and taught me a lesson.

The most exciting thing about starting to school was finally learning
to read. But I soon found that Braille was hard to come by at the Tennessee School for the
Blind. As a matter of fact, it was rationed.

In the first grade we were allowed to read a book only during certain
hours of the day, and we were not permitted to take books to our rooms at night or on
weekends. Looking back, I suppose the school didn’t have many books, and they
probably thought (perhaps correctly) that those they did have would be used more as
missiles than instruments of learning if they let us take them out.

When we advanced to the second grade, we were allowed (yes, allowed) to
come down for thirty minutes each night to study hall. This was what the "big
boys" did. In the first grade we had been ignominiously sent to bed at seven
o’clock while our elders (the second and third graders and those beyond) were
permitted to go to that mysterious place called study hall. The first graders (the
"little boys") had no such status or privilege.

When we got to the third grade, we were still not permitted to take
books to our rooms, but we were allowed to increase our study hall time. We could actually
spend a whole hour at it each night Monday through Friday. It was the pinnacle of status
for the primary grades.

When we got to the "intermediate" department (the fourth,
fifth, and sixth grades) we were really "growing up," and our status and
prestige increased accordingly. We were allowed (I use the word
advisedly-"allowed," not "forced") to go for an hour each night Monday
through Friday to study hall, and during that time we could read books and magazines to
our hearts’ content.

True, the choice was not great-but such as there was, we could read it.
Of course, we could not take books to our rooms during the week, but on Friday night each
boy (I presume the girls had the same privilege) could take one Braille volume to his room
for the weekend.

Before I go further, perhaps I had better explain that comment about
the girls. The girls sat on one side of the room, and the boys sat on the other; and woe
to the member of one sex who tried to speak or write notes to a member of the other.
Girls, like Braille books, were difficult to get at-and all the more desirable for the
imagining. But back to the main thread.

As I say, each boy in the "intermediate" department could
check out one Braille volume on Friday night. Now, as every good Braille reader knows,
Braille is bulkier than print; and at least four or five Braille volumes (sometimes more)
are required to make a book. It is also a matter of common knowledge that people in
general and boys in particular (yes, and maybe girls, too) are constantly on the lookout
for a way to "beat the system." What system? Any system.

So on Friday nights we boys formed what would today be called a
consortium. One of us would check out volume one of a book; the next, volume two; the
next, volume three; et cetera. With our treasures hugged to our bosoms we would head to
our rooms and begin reading.

If you got volume three (the middle of the book), that’s where you
started. You would get to the beginning by and by. Now, girls and Braille books were not
the only items that were strictly regulated in the environment I am describing. The hours
of the day and night fell into the same category. Study hall ended at 8:00, and you were
expected to be in your room and in bed by 9:40, the time when the "silence bell"
rang. You were also expected to be trying to go to sleep, not reading.

But as I have said, people like to beat the system; and to us boys,
starved for reading during the week, the hours between Friday night and Monday morning
were not to be wasted. (Incidentally, I should say here that there were usually no radios
around and that we were strictly forbidden-on pain of expulsion, and God knows what
else-to leave the campus except for a brief period on Saturday afternoon-after we got big
enough, that is, and assuming we had no violations on our record which required erasure by
penalty.)

In other words the campus of the Tennessee School for the Blind was
what one might call a closed ecology. We found our entertainment where we could.

Well, back to Friday night and the problem of books. Rules are rules,
but Braille can be read under the covers as well as anywhere else; and when the lights are
out and the sounds of approaching footsteps are easy to detect, it is virtually impossible
to prohibit reading and make the prohibition stick.

The night watchman was regular in his rounds and methodical in his
movements. He came through the halls every sixty minutes on the hour, and we could tell
the time by his measured tread. (I suppose I need not add that we had no clocks or
watches.)

After the watchman had left our vicinity, we would meet in the bathroom
(there was one for all twenty-six of us) and discuss what we had been reading. We also
used the occasion to keep ourselves awake and exchange Braille volumes as we finished
them.

It made for an interesting way to read a book, but we got there-and
instead of feeling deprived or abused, we felt elated. We were beating the system; we had
books to read, something the little boys didn’t have; and we were engaged in joint
clandestine activity.

Sometimes as the night advanced, one of us would go to sleep and fail
to keep the hourly rendezvous, but these were minor aberrations-and the weekend was only
beginning.

After breakfast on Saturday morning some of us (not all) would continue
reading-usually aloud in a group. We kept at it as long as we could, nodding off when we
couldn’t take it any more. Then, we went at it again.

Let me be clear. I am talking about a general pattern, not a rigid
routine. It did not happen every weekend, and even when it did, the pace was not uniform
or the schedule precise. We took time for such pleasantries as running, playing, and
occasional rock fights.

You can understand that after I had been in school for a few weeks, I
contemplated with mixed feelings the summer vacation which would be coming. I loved my
family, but I had been away from home and found stimulation and new experiences. I did not
look forward to three months of renewed confinement in the four-room farm house with
nothing to do.

Then, I learned that I was going to be sent a Braille magazine during
the summer months. Each month’s issue was sixty Braille pages. I would get one in
June, one in July, and one in August. What joy! I was six, but I had learned what boredom
meant-and I had also learned to plan. So I rationed the Braille and read two pages each
day. This gave me something new for tomorrow. Of course, I went back and read and re-read
it again, but the two new pages were always there for tomorrow.

As the school years came and went, I got other magazines, learned about
the Library of Congress Braille and talking book collection, and got a talking book
machine. By the time I was in the seventh grade I was receiving a number of Braille
magazines and ordering books from three separate libraries during the summer. Often I
would read twenty hours a day-not every day, of course, but often. I read Gone With the
Wind, War and Peace, Zane Grey, and hundreds of others.

I read whatever the libraries sent me, every word of it; and I often
took notes. By then it was clear to me that books would be my release from the prison of
the farm and inactivity. It was also clear to me that college was part of that program and
that somehow I was going to get there. But it was not just escape from confinement or hope
for a broader horizon or something to be gained. It was also a deep, ingrained love of
reading.

The background I have described conditioned me. I did not feel about
reading the way I see a lot of people viewing it today. Many of today’s children seem
to have the attitude that they are "forced," not "permitted," to go to
school-that they are "required," not "given the privilege and honor,"
to study.

They are inundated with reading matter. It is not scarce but a
veritable clutter, not something to strive for but to take for granted. I don’t want
children or the general public to be deprived of reading matter, but I sometimes think
that a scald is as bad as a freeze. Is it worse to be deprived of books until you feel
starved for them or to be so overwhelmed with them that you become blase about it? I
don’t know, and I don’t know that it will do me any good to speculate.

All I know is that I not only delight in reading but believe it to be a
much neglected joy and a principal passport to success, perspective, civilization, and
possibly the survival of the species. I am extremely glad I have had the opportunity and
incentive to read as broadly as I have, and I believe my life is so much better for the
experience that it borders on the difference between living and existence.

The world today is much different for everyone from what it was when I
was a child. And for blind people it is a better world with more opportunities and a
better future ahead because we have worked with each other and with generous and caring
sighted people to make it so. I believe there are few problems in life that can’t be
solved when people do what they can for themselves and join together to help others. I am
grateful for the help I have received in my lifetime and try to do my share to make the
world a better place for all of us.

Back to Top | Table of Contents | Next Page