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Anne Sullivan but what the heck gonna go cut & paste---
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""ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Despite being left in a orphanage with no formal educational facilities, Anne Sullivan prospered!. When the state board of charities chairman, Frank Sanborn visited the Tewksbury orphanage; Anne literally threw herself in front of him crying, "Mr!. Sanborn, I want to go to school!."
After regaining her eyesight from a series of operations and graduating as class valedictorian in 1886 from the Perkins Institute for the Blind, she began teaching Helen Keller!. When Miss Sullivan first arrived, Helen was seven years old and highly undisciplined!. Miss Sullivan had to begin her teaching with lessons in obedience, followed by teachings of the manual and Braille alphabets!. Sullivan attended classes with Keller and tutored her through the Perkins Institute, The Cambridge School for Young Ladies and Radcliffe College!. All who came in contact with them were amazed at the ability of Miss Sullivan to reach Miss Keller and Miss Keller's heightened ability to grasp concepts unheard of by deaf and blind students before her!. Alexander Graham Bell, Andrew Carnegie, Henry H!. Rogers and John Spaulding were only a few of those who met them and supported them!.
Throughout Helen's formal education and after, Miss Sullivan was often viewed with suspicion and speculation: many believed that Anne was trying to control Keller or use Keller!. They did not trust the commitment that Anne Sullivan had to her student!.
After Miss Keller's formal education, Anne Sullivan continued to assist Miss Keller by accompanying her on her travels and to various lecture tours!. After Helen's graduation from Radcliffe, Anne married young Harvard instructor, John Albert Macy in 1905!. The three lived together until 1912 when the Macy's separated!.
Sullivan and Keller were constantly in demand to give lectures and to raise money for the American Foundation for the Blind!. However, they often were too charitable and as a result had to supplement their income!. The pair attempted to produce a movie, Deliverance, but it was unsuccessful; they experienced better success on the vaudeville circuit!.
Eventually, Miss Sullivan's own eyesight failed her but toward the end of her life received recognition from Temple University, the Educational Institute of Scotland, and the Roosevelt Memorial foundation for her tireless teaching and commitment to Helen Keller!. ""
http://www!.rnib!.org!.uk/xpedio/groups/pub!.!.!.
""------------------------------------!.!.!. 1913 “Out of the Dark” was published!. This was a series of essays on socialism and its impact on Helen’s public image was immense!. Everyone now knew Helen’s political views!.
Helen tours the World
Helen and Anne filled the following years with lecture tours, speaking of her experiences and beliefs to enthralled crowds!. Her talks were interpreted sentence by sentence by Anne Sullivan, and were followed by question and answer sessions!.
Although Helen and Anne made a good living from their lectures, by 1918 the demand for Helen’s lectures had diminished and they were touring with a more light-hearted vaudeville show, which demonstrated Helen’s first understanding of the word “water”!. These shows were hugely successful from the very first performance, a review of which read as follows:
“Helen Keller has conquered again, and the Monday afternoon audience at the Palace, one of the most critical and cynical in the World, was hers!.”
At this time they were also offered the chance to make a film in Hollywood and they jumped at the opportunity!. “Deliverance”, the story of Helen’s life, was made!. Helen was, however, unhappy with the glamorous nature of the film and it unfortunately did not prove to be the financial success that they had hoped for!.
The vaudeville appearances continued with Helen answering a wide range of questions on her life and her politics and Anne translating Helen’s answers for the enthralled audience!. They were earning up to two thousand dollars a week, which was a considerable sum of money at the time!.
In 1918 Helen, Anne and John moved to Forest Hills in New York!. Helen used their new home as a base for her extensive fundraising tours for the American Foundation for the Blind!. She not only collected money, but also campaigned tirelessly to alleviate the living and working conditions of blind people, who at that time were usually badly educated and living in asylums!. Her endeavours were a major factor in changing these conditions!.
Helen’s mother Kate died in 1921 from an unknown illness, and this left Anne as the sole constant in Helen’s life!. However that same year Anne fell ill again and this was followed in 1922 by a severe bout of bronchitis which left her unable to speak above a whisper and thus unable to work with Helen on stage anymore!. At this point Polly Thomson, who had started working for Helen and Anne in 1914 as a secretary, took on the role of explaining Helen to the theatre going public!.
They also spent a lot of time touring the world raising money for blind people!. In 1931 they met King George and Queen Mary at Buckingham Palace, who were said to be deeply impressed by Helen’s ability to understand what people said through touch!.
All the while Anne’s health was getting worse, and with the news of the death of John Macy in 1932, although their marriage had broken up some years before, her spirit was finally broken!. She died on 20 October 1936!.
When Anne died, Helen and Polly moved to Arcan Ridge, in Westport, Connecticut, which would be Helen’s home for the rest of her life!.
After World War II, Helen and Polly spent years travelling the world fundraising for the American Foundation for the Overseas Blind!. They visited Japan, Australia, South America, Europe and Africa!.
Whilst away during this time Helen and Polly learnt of the fire that destroyed their home at Arcan Ridge!. Although the house would be rebuilt, as well as the many mementoes that Helen and Polly lost, also destroyed was the latest book that Helen had been working on about Anne Sullivan, called “Teacher”!.
It was also during this time that Polly Thomson’s health began to deteriorate and whilst in Japan she had a mild stroke!. Doctors advised Polly to stop the continuous touring she and Helen did, and although initially they slowed down a bit, the touring continued once Polly had recovered!.
In 1953 a documentary film “The Unconquered” was made about Helen’s life, this was to win an Academy Award as the best feature length documentary !.It was at the same time that Helen began work again on her book “Teacher”, some seven years after the original had been destroyed!. The book was finally published in 1955!.
Polly Thomson had a stroke in 1957, she was never to fully recover and died on March 21, 1960!. Her ashes were deposited at the National Cathedral in Washington DC next to those of Anne Sullivan!. It was the nurse who had been brought in to care for Polly in her last years, Winnie Corbally, who was to take care of Helen in her remaining years!.
The Miracle Worker
It was in 1957 that “The Miracle Worker” was first performed!. A drama portraying Anne Sullivan’s first success in communicating with Helen as a child, it first appeared as a live television play in the United States!.
In 1959 it was re-written as a Broadway play and opened to rave reviews!. It became a smash hit and ran for almost two years!. In 1962 it was made into a film and the actresses playing Anne and Helen both received Oscars for their performances!.
Helen retires from public life
In October 1961 Helen suffered the first of a series of strokes, and her public life was to draw to a close!. She was to spend her remaining years being cared for at her home in Arcan Ridge!.
Her last years were not however without excitement, and in 1964 Helen was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award, by President Lyndon Johnson!. A year later she was elected to the Women’s Hall of Fame at the New York World’s Fair!.
On June 1, 1968, at Arcan Ridge, Helen Keller died peacefully in her sleep!. Helen was cremated in Bridgeport, Connecticut and a funeral service was held at the National Cathedral in Washington DC where the urn containing her ashes would later be deposited next to those of Anne Sullivan and Polly Thomson!.
Helen’s legacy
Today Helen’s final resting place is a popular tourist attraction and the bronze plaque erected to commemorate her life has the following inscription written in braille:
“Helen Keller and her beloved companion Anne Sullivan Macy are interred in the columbarium behind this chapel!.”
So many people have visited the chapel, and touched the braille dots, that the plaque has already had to be replaced twice!.
If Helen Keller were born today her life would undoubtedly have been completely different!. Her life long dream was to be able to talk, something that she was never really able to master!. Today the teaching methods exist that would have helped Helen to realise this dream!. What would Helen have made of the technology available today to blind and deafblind individuals!? Technology that enables blind and deafblind people, like Helen, to communicate directly, and independently, with anybody in the world!.
Helen Keller may not have been directly responsible for the development of these technologies and teaching methods!. But with the help of Anne Sullivan, through her writings, lectures and the way she lived her life, she has shown millions of people that disability need not be the end of the world!.
In Helen’s own words:
“The public must learn that the blind man is neither genius nor a freak nor an idiot!. He has a mind that can be educated, a hand which can be trained, ambitions which it is right foWww@QuestionHome@Com

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