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I'm inspired by our American Independence Day, which we will celebrate tomorrow at the time of this recording, July 4. And I'm thinking especially about Braille and how much it has contributed to the success I've had in my life and feeling independent as a blind person. When I teach braille, I always sell it in terms of this will help you to be more independent. Whether it's reading that elevator button, putting a label on a spice jar, reading a braille display, and acquiring employment, that might not have been a possibility. It is true, and it has been studied, that about 90% of blind people who are working happen to read braille. In my opinion, this is not that every job requires braille, but to me it's a symbol of that blind person employing all the tools they possibly can in their toolbox to move forward in their lives. So if you haven't yet learned braille, it doesn't mean that you're not going to be successful. But I would encourage you to give it a try, if at all possible, and see how much it adds to your life. So when I think about how much it adds to my life, I'm sitting here reading a braille display, contemplating what I'm going to share with you that I've written on it, or that I've downloaded to it on an everyday basis. I read labels. I also read elevator buttons and signage and so many other things. I read music and mathematic and of course, literary braille as I teach. But in thinking about different topics concerning the origin of braille and how our history has evolved, I'm thinking about the book that Jonathan Mosin mentioned in his address to the International Council on English Braille, and he mentioned the War of the Dots. So I looked this book up, and I'm fascinated to find that it was not available on bookshare, but is available through the Library of Congress on Bard. And I found that it is actually a part of a bigger book that Robert B. Irwin wrote in about 1955. And he wrote a book called, as I saw it which I did locate on the Internet Archive and so but finding the braille book available to me that focuses on braille is great. So I was thinking about picking out a little section to read to you, and this first paragraph might be a little annoying to some of you, as it was initially to me. However, it is perhaps the way sighted people were feeling in history at this time, and the perception of people who are blind and the perception of how they should learn and what their code should be like. So I'd like to read you just a few little paragraphs here and whet your appetite, and maybe this month until we meet again over the podcast. Perhaps if you're able, you could download it and read it if you're interested in the history of our code. So here is what Erwin writes. Social workers often complain that the blind are a difficult lot to deal with. My comment is your blood pressure up? Yet when one considers how cheerfully most of them have adjusted themselves within the span of a single lifetime to such changes in their reading codes as from Boston line type to New York Point, New York Point to American Braille, american braille to revised braille, grade one and a half, and finally from grade one and a half to grade two, it must be admitted that sweet reasonableness must characterize a large percentage of finger readers. What an outcry would be heard in this country if the seeing public had been forced to make a similar series of accommodations. While it is not the purpose of this book to go into the history of the work for the blind much before 1900, some account of the origin of types for the blind in the united states would not be out of place. The founders of schools for the blind in this country turned to Europe for special appliances and special methods. In the early 1830s, when the three mother schools for the blind were founded in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia, the common type in official use on the other side of the Atlantic was embossed roman letters, more or less simplified to make them more tangible. Their virtue, as compared with arbitrary codes, seemed to be that they could be read by the sighted and seeing teachers with no special instruction. Furthermore, it was contended that the blind people must, by using similar type, similar to that of their seeing associates, were set less apart from the rest of the world. While Louis Braille had already published an exposition of his dot system in 1829, it had no official standing anywhere, and it is not clear that our earliest american pioneers knew anything about this code. However, in 1960, Doctor Simon Pollock, a member of the board of Missouri School for the blind who had observed the system in use in Europe, brought it back to America with him and caused it to be officially adopted by this school. My editorial comment thank you, Europe. Thank you for being the birthplace for Louis Braille and for the ability of someone to bring it back to us so that it could be a contender and ultimately a winner in our system of reading. So I encourage you to check out this book. The book, War of the Dots is available, like I say, from the National Library service. And it would do us all well to revisit the history of our code. So I was also doing a little research, thinking about how we have grown to need to have courses in braille and the Hadley it used to be Hadley School for the blind. Then it was the Hadley Institute. And now when I'm researching, I'm finding that it is hadleyhelps.org. and Hadley has gone through a lot of transformation. But it all started back when William Hadley, who was a teacher, he was born in 1860, and he lost his sight when he was 55. So thinking about that, doing a little math here, not very complicated, it would have been in, it would have been in 1915. And so thinking of the opportunities that may or may not have existed at that point, he decided he would do what he could. And so he began to teach a woman, I believe she was from Kansas, and she wanted to learn Braille. And so he started teaching her by correspondence. And so within five years, he had founded, in 1920, the Hadley School for the Blind, which became the Hadley Institute in the early 1980s. I was a correspondent student, and I learned to expand my horizons with grade three braille, as I've mentioned before. And I also learned and study a little music appreciation because I was passionate about classical music. And I actually got a little bit of high school credit, I think, for that. They had offered some GED type opportunities and a lot of things for blind correspondent students, and they since reorganized their offerings into workshops and other learning opportunities for folks, I think, focusing mostly on the aging population and how they can best present their materials. So in researching for this podcast here today, I decided I would look up their braille course offerings, and they provide a braille workbook, and they provide a cartridge of the materials. They also provide online access as well. When I was developing my braille course that I've written for the students that I teach, I was inspired by Hadley's offerings several years ago because they included the audio cartridge and so the person could listen to the lesson, listen to the exercises in the workbook, and complete the assignment. There was a lot of listening, a lot of thinking about, maybe you'd have a line of letters and you'd be asked, you know, how many C's are in the line? You know, what letters are different, which one is not like the others, that kind of thing. So although it sounded easy, it involves a fair amount of perhaps higher learning, maybe perhaps rewinding thinking about what was asked. And so a lot of auditory as well as tactile learning. So the course is broken down into big sections. There is braille for everyday use, and within that there's the Letters series, the number series, and the punctuation series. Then there's a big course on techniques for better reading. This series focuses on, you know, techniques that will be helpful in increasing your reading speed even at that level of learning letters, numbers, and punctuation. Then there's the producing Braille series, and that would be with a slate and stylus, or I believe they still teach that, or a Perkins brailler and a labeler come to think that they may not teach the slate and stylus anymore, which is kind of a shame, I understand. You know, you barely learn braille forwards, and then you're asked to learn it backwards so you can write it. Then there is the everyday braille writing series. So then you have letters, numbers, and punctuation, just like the reading course. Then there's a whole big course on the contracted Braille series, writing special symbols and reading of those different big sections. The course is under the workshops, whereas some of us old timers knew it as classes. But it's under the workshops, and instructors are available to answer questions, and you can find out if you're interested. More information at hadley. Hadley helps.org. again, that's Hadley helps.org, and their phone number is 803 234238. And if it would be easier for you to email them, it is infoadleyhelps.org. i'm really glad there's a resource available out here for many people who may not have access to vocational rehabilitation services, either because they're not wanting to work at this point, not able to work, or maybe they're retired and they are done working, and there needs to be a place for people to study and to learn that isn't costly. And all these services are free, but that's available free of charge no matter where you are in the world. Hadley serves people in the US and in over 100 countries, which is just astounding. I'm sure that William Hadley would be so pleased to know that his legacy now, after 104 years, is still carried on even as time changes things. And even as needs change, Hadley is still meeting the needs of people who want to learn. So there you have it. It is at your fingertips. Braille, then and now. And focusing on the now part for me, as Braille is so relevant in my life, and the then part, either thinking about the war of the dots and how our code has come to be, and also about a wonderful organization who provides continuing education, including Braille.