
Helen Keller
humanitarian
Helen Keller overcame being deaf and blind to live ~ not just a full life ~ but a legendary one. In doing so, she forever changed attitudes about people with disabilities.
Born in 1880, Helen lost her sight and hearing due to an unknown illness as an infant. She couldn't communicate until age 6, when tutor Anne Sullivan taught her a finger alphabet. By age 7, she was writing words. By age 8, her educational achievements were making headlines.
In an era when many with her afflictions lived in asylums, Helen went on to become a college graduate, renowned author, activist and global ambassador for the underprivileged. Her timeless advice ~ “Never bend your head. Always hold it high. Look the world straight in the face.”
determination | overcame blindness and deafness to become one of the most extraordinary figures of the 20th century
writing | authored poetry, 14 books, more than 475 speeches and essays on everything from faith to atomic energy
activism | campaigned for workers rights + women's suffrage, helped found the American Civil Liberties Union and raised millions for the American Foundation for the Blind
1887 | "The most important day I remember in all my life is the one on which my teacher {Anne Sullivan} came to me … three months before I was seven years old."
1902 | first book, The Story of My Life, was published serially in The Ladies Home Journal
1964 | received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Lyndon B. Johnson
from | to
wild child living in a silent world of darkness | internationally renowned writer, humanitarian, and advocate for people with disabilities
born on
June 27, 1880
born in
Tuscumbia, Alabama
birth name
Helen Adams Keller
nickname
Little Bronco
~ due to the incredible tantrums she threw as a young child ~
citizen of
The United States of America
daughter of
Arthur Keller
~ former confederate soldier | newspaper editor ~
Kate Adams
~ housewife ~
sister of
Phillips + Mildred
grew up at
Ivy Green | her family's Alabama farm
educated at
Cambridge School for Young Ladies
~ 1898 - 1900 ~
Radcliffe College
~ BA | 1900 - 1904 ~
loved studying
Greek
almost married
Peter Fagan
~ newspaperman and socialist ~
~ her parents thwarted the marriage {Helen was 36} ~
advocate for
the deaf, blind and disabled
women's right to vote and birth control {friend of Margaret Sanger}
NAACP
the underdog
talents recognized by
Alexander Graham Bell
Mark Twain
~ "Two of the most interesting characters of the 19th century are Napoleon and Helen Keller." ~
in her spare time
tandem bicycle riding
horseback riding
traveled in a vaudeville show
received an honorary Academy Award for the documentary "Helen Keller in Her Story"
died on
June 1, 1968
~ Easton, Connecticut ~
~ she's buried alongside her teacher Anne Sullivan + interpreter Polly Thompson ~
image credits
Library of Congress | public domain
collapse bio bits"One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar."
American Association to Promote the Teaching of Speech to the Deaf {AAPTSD} | july 1896
"If it is true that the violin is the most perfect of musical instruments, then Greek is the violin of human thought."
letter to Mrs. Laurence Hutton | february 1898
"I love the good that others do; for their activity is an assurance that whether I can help or not, the true and the good will stand sure."
Optimism: An Essay | 1903
"The best and most beautiful things in this world cannot be seen or even heard, but must be felt with the heart."
The Story of My Life | 1903
"Next to a leisurely walk I enjoy a spin on my tandem bike. It is splendid to feel the wind blowing in my face and the springy motion of my iron steed. The rapid rush through the air gives me a delicious sense of strength and buoyance, and the exercise makes my pulse dance and my heart sing."
The Story of My Life | 1903
"Toleration is the greatest gift of the mind; it requires the same effort of the brain that it takes to balance oneself on a bicycle."
The Story of My Life | 1903
"Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence, and I learn, whatever state I may be in, therein to be content."
The Story of My Life | 1903
"Although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it."
Optimism: An Essay, Part 1 | 1903
"I long to accomplish great and noble tasks, but it is my chief duty to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble."
Optimism: An Essay | 1903
"The world is moved along not only by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but also by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker."
Optimism: An Essay | 1903
"Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope."
Optimism: An Essay | 1903
"The degree of a nation's civilisation may be measured by the degree of enlightenment of its women."
My Future as I See It | 1904
"Every optimist moves along with progress and hastens it, while every pessimist would keep the world at a standstill."
The World I Live in | 1908
"I believe humility is a virtue, but I prefer not to use it unless it is absolutely necessary."
The Brooklyn Eagle | january 1916
"People often...have no idea how fair the flower is to the touch, nor do they appreciate its fragrance, which is the soul of the flower."
Letter to Miss Bose in India | december 1923
"If we do not like our work, and do not try to get happiness out of it, we are a menace to our profession as well as to ourselves."
know thyself | september 1930
"Truly, civilization is the result of long ages of patient, purposeful teaching."
address to the Educational Institute of Scotland | 1933
"A happy life consists not in the absence, but in the mastery of hardships."
The Simplest Way to be Happy | february 1933
"I take happiness very seriously. It is a creed, a philosophy and an objective."
Happiness | may 1935
"Faith is the strength by which a shattered world shall emerge into the light."
Helen Keller's Journals (1936-1937) | january 1937
"International minds, like the Gulfstream, circulate vitality."
Helen Keller's Journals 1936-37 | 1937
"What do I consider a teacher should be? One who breathes life into knowledge so that it takes new form in progress and civilization."
National Education Association | 1938
curated with care by Kathleen Murray {2014} + Alicia Williamson
childhood home of Helen Keller
Ivy Green was the house where Helen grew up. Today it is a museum dedicated to her life. Much of the original grounds are preserved, including the water fountain in back where her teacher Anne Sullivan famously held her hand under the spigot as she spelled out the word w-a-t-e-r. In her autobiography, Helen described that fateful day ~ "Some one was drawing water and my teacher placed my hand under the spout. As the cool stream gushed over one hand she spelled into the other the word water, first slowly, then rapidly. I stood still, my whole attention fixed upon the motions of her fingers. Suddenly I felt a misty consciousness as of something forgotten — a thrill of returning thought; and somehow the mystery of language was revealed to me. I knew then that 'w-a-t-e-r' meant the wonderful cool something that was flowing over my hand. That living word awakened my soul, gave it light, hope, joy, set it free!"
Just Jennifer
CC BY
Helen Keller is a Socialist
This headline {seen here in an exhibit in Nashville's Ryman Auditorium} was no case of yellow journalism; Helen was in fact a member of the Socialist Party of America who joined its Massachusetts branch in 1909 and signed on to the International Workers of the World in 1912. Her whole life, Helen was a supporter of workers and those less fortunate. While she focused mostly on her advocacy for the blind in her later years, the broad mission of her foundation ~ Helen Keller International ~ is still guided by her words: "The welfare of each is bound up in the welfare of all."
Joe Vare
CC BY-ND
Helen, the goodwill ambassador
By the end of her career, Helen had visited 35 countries on 5 continents to advocate for the blind + back political causes. She met with world leaders from Winston Churchill to Golda Meir. After WWII, General Douglas MacArthur even decided to send Helen as the US's first goodwill ambassador to Japan. It was a good move. Her 1948 trip was an immense success ~ drawing an audience of 2 million.
American Foundation for the Blind
© all rights reserved
Helen Keller in India
Helen spent much of her later life raising awareness for the world's blind + funds for the American Foundation for the Blind. She visited 35 countries on 5 continents, making her last trip ~ an ambitious 5-month tour across Asia ~ at the age of 75. She's seen here talking to the press during her stop in India...where preschool for blind + deaf children in Mysore still bears her name.
U.S. Embassy in India
CC BY-ND
JFK meets Helen
Helen Keller meets with President John F. Kennedy in the Oval Office of the White House. Over the course of her life, Helen met every president from Grover Cleveland to Lyndon Johnson ~ 13 in all!
Abbie Rowe | John F. Kennedy Library
Public domain