Undaunted By Blindness, 2nd Edition: Concise Biographies of 400 People Who Refused to Let Visual Impairment Define Them

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Foreword

When I was a young boy, I was diagnosed with pre-senile cone dysfunction, a disorder that would lead to eventual blindness. My parents were devastated and could not imagine how I could live independently if I became blind. Like so many other people, they did not know anyone who was blind. They knew only two extremes: the less-than-flattering stereotypes about blind people or at the other end of the spectrum, a rare individual like Helen Keller. Those who are blind or visually impaired have often told me their biggest barrier is not vision loss itself, but society’s view of them as blind people.

Having worked in the blindness field my entire adult life, I’ve met thousands of people with vision loss. They are students attending mainstream schools who are more than capable of keeping up with or surpassing their sighted peers. They’re working nine-to-five jobs and doing them well.

They are raising families, volunteering in their communities and running marathons. Simply put, they’re going about their lives, but in a world made for the sighted. And they are proving every day that blind people can do virtually anything sighted people can, despite the obstacles.

This book will inform, inspire and sometimes surprise. The diverse individuals profiled in the pages that follow, demonstrate that people with visual impairments can achieve extraordinary things. I’ve had the privilege of meeting several of the people featured in this volume and they are indeed noteworthy. My hope is that in reading these four hundred concise biographies, parents of visually impaired children will have hope for their child’s future, employers will be motivated to hire workers with vision loss, teachers of the blind will have high expectations for their students’ success and blind people themselves will aspire to any dream.

Carl R. Augusto

President and CEO

American Foundation for the Blind

THE ONLY LIMITS IN YOUR LIFE ARE THOSE YOU ACCEPT YOURSELF.

— MILES HILTON-BARBER

BORN 1948, HARARE, ZIMBABWE

Introduction

The purpose of this book is to provide concise biographical information about four hundred notable blind persons. The people in this volume are but a small sample of the many thousands of notable blind persons in history. Most of the information about their lives comes from secondary sources. Where feasible some of the subject’s own words were used.

This book came about from a love of history and from inspiration I gained in 1968 reading Ishbel Ross’s book, Journey into Light (1951). Her book, subtitled The Story of the Education of the Blind, included biographical information about many interesting people who were blind. A few years later I began collecting biographical information on a few dozen blind people and conceived of a book containing the stories of about two hundred such persons. As research continued, the list of notable blind persons grew to over eight hundred. I selected the four hundred with the most available information about their lives and those whom I thought would be of the greatest interest to the reader.

A high percentage of those included were totally or nearly totally blind for the majority of their adult lives. However, there are also those who became blind late in life and those who had some useful vision their entire lives. All were considered legally blind, and those who became blind later in life had achievements or celebrity after becoming visually impaired. For the most part, I did not write about the notable’s romantic life, marriages, or families. I also did not include most awards and citations. Some exceptions were Grammy Awards, Knighthoods, Oscars, and Presidential Awards.

Although musicians and writers are the most common occupations of those listed, a wide variety of occupations are represented, including administrators, innovators, teachers, singers, politicians, songwriters, composers, athletes, poets, ministers, scientists, judges, physicians, radio broadcasters, mathematicians, philanthropists, historians, businesspeople, and actors.

Most of the people listed were well known or famous during their lifetimes. Some, such as Arthur Blake, Louis Braille, and Mary Ingalls, were not well known but became famous after they died.

Finally, much effort was made to check and recheck the information included; however, in case of mistakes, I apologize.

Clifford E. Olstrom

Executive Director

Tampa Lighthouse for the Blind

Biographies

MICHAEL AARONSOHN

Born July 5, 1896, in Baltimore, Maryland

Died February 25, 1976, in Cincinnati, Ohio

Soldier, rabbi, patriot, and writer, Michael Aaronsohn displayed courage and intelligence in his life and work.

Aaronsohn attended Johns Hopkins University before volunteering for military service in 1916. He served as a sergeant major in the 147th Infantry of the United States Army in World War I. A German shell blinded him in 1918 while he was rescuing a man in his unit. After spending time in hospitals in France and England, he returned to the United States. He continued his education, graduating from the University of Cincinnati and Hebrew College in 1923.

From 1923 to 1931, Aaronsohn was a field representative of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, and for many years had special staff duty at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, Ohio. Aaronsohn served as national chaplain of the Disabled American Veterans and the Veterans of Foreign Wars. In 1937 he was a representative for the American Battle Monuments Commission, dedicating World War I monuments in France.

Aaronsohn was active in national Republican politics for many years and was a participant in the Republican National Convention in 1940. He was highly critical of the Roosevelt Administration’s New Deal programs, saying they used communistic doctrine. In 1938 he said, The New Deal has caused the nation, conceived in liberty, to become enchanted by the monster [communism] . . . The technique of the communists calls for class hatred. This has been the practice of the New Deal administration.

Aaronsohn wrote three autobiographical narratives in which he recounts history in the form of a drama. The first, Broken Lights (1946), covers Aaronsohn’s life up to age twenty-seven and includes his family background, schooling, service in the army, becoming blind, and his rehabilitation. In it he wrote, More than all else in the world of darkness he dreaded the unguarded pity of fellow men. Like poisoned arrows, pity gangrened his soul, his sense of human worth. The second, Red Pottage (1956), covers American history and Aaronsohn’s part in it from 1923 to 1943. The third, That the Living May Know (1973), recounts Aaronsohn’s life and events in American history from 1903 to 1957.

From 1954 to 1974, Aaronsohn was a visiting Jewish chaplain at Veteran Hospitals in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Fort Thomas, Kentucky. Once, when asked why he volunteered for the Army when he was exempt from military service as a theological student, he said, I could not go through life constantly reminding myself that at a time like this, when the country called for volunteers, I let others go while I stayed home. My conscience would never stop tormenting me.

VIRGINIA ADAIR

Born February 28, 1913, in New York, New York

Died September 16, 2004, in Los Angeles, California

Adair composed her first poem at age two and had many poems published in magazines. She taught English at California State Polytechnic University for many years. Adair became blind in her early eighties from glaucoma, and at age eighty-three published her first book of poetry, Beliefs and Blasphemies (1998). She subsequently published three more books, Ants on the Melon (1999), Living on Fire: A Collection of Poems (2000), and New Daughters of the Oracle: The Return of Female Prophetic Power in Our Time (2001).

ALMEDA C. ADAMS

Born February 26, 1865, in Meadville, Pennsylvania

Died September 8, 1949, in Cleveland, Ohio

Almeda Adams dedicated her life to teaching music, especially to underprivileged children. The daughter of a Baptist minister, she lost her sight when she was about six months old. Adams began attending the Ohio State School for the Blind at the age of seven and graduated in 1885. She studied music for two years at the New England Conservatory, and taught piano and voice from 1887 to 1901 at the Lincoln Normal University in Nebraska.

In 1901 Adams moved to Cleveland, Ohio, and taught music to children in three settlement houses (community centers). In 1912 she started Cleveland’s Music School Settlement for underprivileged children. She taught music in this program until 1948. In August 1926, Adams began a year-long trip through Europe and later wrote a book about her experiences, Seeing Europe Through Sightless Eyes (1929).

Adams said she had three guideposts she lived by: Don’t lean on pity (stand alone); help others, for that no one needs eyesight, just insight; and have faith. A music critic in Cleveland who was initially skeptical about her ability to teach because of her blindness later said, Music in Cleveland needed more teachers of Almeda Adams’s ability and conscientiousness.

GARY ADELMAN

Born July 1, 1935, in Brooklyn, New York

Adelman showed symptoms of diabetes when he was thirteen years old. The diabetes caused his deteriorating vision at age twenty-eight, and by age thirty he was totally blind. He earned a bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan in 1957, a master’s degree from Columbia University in 1958, and a Ph.D. from Columbia University in 1962. Adelman taught English from 1959 to 1963 at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York. He was a professor of English at the University of Illinois from 1963 to 2006.

Adelman is the author of Political Poems (1968) and an autobiographical novel in poetry and prose, Honey Out of Stone (1970). He has also written several books on English literature, including Heart of Darkness: Search for the Unconscious (1987), Anna Karenina: The Bitterness of Ecstasy (1990), Snow of Fire: Symbolic Meaning in The Rainbow and Women in Love (1991), Jude the Obscure: A Paradise of Despair (1992), Retelling Dostoyevsky: Literary Responses and Other Observations (2001), Reclaiming D. H. Lawrence: Contemporary Writers Speak Out (2002), and Naming Beckett’s Unnamable (2004).

SALLY HOBART ALEXANDER

Born October 17, 1943, in Owensboro, Kentucky

A professional writer of children’s books, Sally Hobart Alexander writes about blindness and how other people are affected by it. After graduating from Bucknell University, Sally Hobart taught elementary school in Long Beach, California.

In 1967 at the age of twenty-four Hobart became blind due to detached retinas. She moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and took a training program for the adult blind at the Greater Pittsburgh Guild for the Blind. She taught for a year at the Guild and then earned a master’s degree in social work from the University of Pittsburgh. Alexander worked as a child therapist at St. Francis Hospital in Pittsburgh from 1973 to 1976.

In 1974 she married Robert Alexander, a college professor, and they had a son and a daughter. Raising two young children, Alexander discovered a talent for inventing stories. She joined a writing group and began writing down her stories. She became a professional writer of children’s books. She wrote Sarah’s Surprise (1990) about a girl who helps her mother when the mother hurts her ankle hiking on a beach; Mom Can’t See Me (1990) about a nine-year-old girl’s description of her mother’s life as a blind person; Maggie’s Whopper (1992) about a seven-year-old girl who gives up a prize fish to save her great uncle from a bear; Mom’s Best Friend (1992) about the author’s loss of her first guide dog; and Do You Remember the Color Blue? (2000), questions kids ask about blindness. Alexander also wrote two autobiographical books, Taking Hold, My Journey Into Blindness (1994) and On My Own: The Journey Continues (1997). About her blindness Alexander has said, Because of this challenge, I’ve grown in ways I never would have. It has changed me as a human being, deepened me. I’ve been asked, ‘If you could regain your sight, would you do it in exchange for everything you’ve learned and all the ways you’ve grown?’ I have to say no. I think I am a better person because of my experience with blindness.

FULTON ALLEN

Born July 10, 1907, in Wadesboro, North Carolina

Died February 13, 1941, in Durham, North Carolina

One of the most recorded bluesmen of the late 1930s, Fulton Allen, called Blind Boy Fuller, influenced many bluesmen including Carolina Slim, Alec Seward, and Ralph Willis. Allen lived the fast life, drinking, carousing, and constantly traveling. Despite being totally blind, Allen carried a gun that he once used to threaten his manager, J. B. Long.

Allen was born into a sharecropper’s family of ten children. Soon after his birth, the family moved to Rockingham, North Carolina. Allen began losing his sight in his teens, and by age twenty-one he was totally blind, probably from gonococcal conjunctivitis. He learned to play guitar by listening to phonograph records. He began playing and singing for pay on street corners and at parties in Rockingham. About 1929 he moved to Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Fuller married Cora Mae Martin in 1927, and they had one adopted child. Fuller was once arrested for shooting Cora in the leg with his gun, but was released when she refused to press charges. This incident resulted in Fuller writing the song Big House Bound that begins, I never will forget the day they transferred me to the county jail/ I never will forget the day they transferred me to the county jail/ I had shot the woman I love; ain’t got no one to come go my bail.

Allen moved to Durham, North Carolina, about 1933, where he played near the tobacco factories and on street corners. There he met J. B. Long, a record store owner, who helped him get a recording deal in 1935. Between 1935 and 1940 he recorded over 130 songs as Blind Boy Fuller. On many of his early recordings Fuller was accompanied by Blind Gary Davis, and on later recordings by blind harmonica player Sonny Terry. Some of his most well-known recordings are Careless Love, Jivin’ Woman Blues, Rag Mama Rag, I’m a Rattlesnakin’ Daddy (1935), Mama Let Me Lay It on You (1936), Truckin’ My Blues Away (1936), Little Woman You’re So Sweet (1940), and Step It Up and Go (1940).

According to one of Sonny Terry’s nephews, Fuller and Terry once argued over a song. Fuller told Terry, I ain’t gonna get up on you. I know you got that big knife, but if you move I’ll know where you at. Terry had a gun as well, and the nephew said they both shot at each other. Another bluesman, Willie Trice, sometimes traveled with Fuller and knew him well. Trice said Fuller was fun to be around but carried a pistol and had a fiery temper. Trice said, If Fuller got mad at you, you’d better stand still and not say a word.

Fuller also made some religious recordings under the name Brother George and the Sanctified Singers. His last recording session was in June 1940. Fuller developed kidney disease in his late twenties and died at age thirty-three from blood poisoning.

Blues expert Robert Santelli said, Fuller sang and played in a variety of blues styles that featured intricate finger-picking passages; still others contain rough-cut bottleneck guitar playing. In short, few bluesmen from this period were more stylistically versatile than Blind Boy Fuller.

ROBERT G. ALLMAN

Born July 23, 1918, in Atlantic City, New Jersey

Died May 28, 1994, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

A successful attorney, star athlete, would-be Congressman, and civic leader, Allman was a founder of the United States Blind Golfers Association. Allman was blinded in an accident at age four when he fell from the top of a railroad car he was playing on and injured his head. He attended Overbrook School for the Blind where he said, I learned things I could do instead of things I couldn’t do. Allman graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1939 and earned a law degree in 1942. In college Allman was an intercollegiate wrestling star and captain of the University of Pennsylvania wrestling team his senior year.

After being admitted to the Bar he practiced general law, specializing in adoption cases for more than forty years. For a short time in 1947 he had a weekly sports radio show on a Philadelphia radio station. Commenting on all his jobs, Allman joked, I work at law during the day, insurance at night, radio on Saturdays, and blondes anytime.

Allman became a golfer and in 1948 founded the Middle Atlantic Blind Golfers Association. He helped found the United States Blind Golfers Association in 1953 and was its first president.

Allman was involved with many community organizations and spoke at schools about overcoming adversity. He was interested in politics and was a ward committeeman for many years. In 1976 Allman ran in a Democratic primary for the First Congressional District in Pennsylvania. He lost to the other Democratic candidate by a large margin, even though his opponent had died fifteen days before the election. Allman received a lot of ribbing about losing to a dead man and he joked about it as well. He ran again for the Congressional seat in 1978 and 1980 but was unsuccessful.

ALICIA ALONSO

Born December 21, 1921, in Havana, Cuba

One of the greatest ballerinas of all time, Alonso is considered a national treasure in Cuba.

Born Alicia Ernestina de la Caridad del Cobre Martinez Hoyo (Alicia Martinez), she was the youngest of four children in a well-to-do family. She became interested in dance as a young child and at age nine began taking ballet classes. By age fourteen she was Havana’s foremost ballerina. At sixteen she went to New York, New York, and soon after married Fernando Alonso, a fellow ballet school student who was also from Havana, Cuba. Their daughter Laura was born in 1938, and at age one and a half was sent to live with her grandparents in Cuba.

Alonso began touring with the American Ballet Caravan. In 1940 she tried out and was chosen by the Ballet Theatre. She was beginning to become well known as a ballerina, when in 1941 at age nineteen she lost sight in both eyes from detached retinas. After several operations on her eyes, she had to lie still in bed for several months. Her muscles atrophied and she needed assistance when she began walking again. Slowly she regained her strength and began dancing again with partial vision. Alonso relearned to move onstage with the aid of strategically positioned spotlights. She danced in the United States from 1943 to 1948.

In 1948 Alonso and her husband returned to Cuba and formed the Ballet Alicia Alonso, touring in South America, the United States, and Cuba. In 1950 she established her own ballet school and performed again in the United States.

In 1953 Alonso again suffered detached retinas and also developed cataracts. In 1957 she danced as a guest artist with the Bolshoi Ballet in Moscow, Russia. In 1959 when Fidel Castro took over the government of Cuba, he met with Alonso and gave her money to create a school and ballet company, the Ballet Nacional de Cuba.

Alonso was almost totally blind in the 1960s but continued to dance and toured Europe and the Soviet Union. In 1972 she had surgery for detached retinas and cataracts, leaving her totally blind in one eye and with some useful vision in the other eye. In 1975 she danced again in the United States.

Nearly totally blind and in her late fifties, Alonso was asked why she was still dancing. She replied, I know people say, why doesn’t she retire and be happy? I go on dancing because it makes me feel good mentally and physically when I dance. It is a necessary thing. So far my body demands it—and so does my mind.

In a letter to Alonso, Arnold L Haskell, the British dance historian wrote, With you, all critics’ phrases are meaningless. How can you interpret Giselle when you are Giselle? . . . Cuba is fortunate to possess you; you belong to the world, and are already an immortal in the history of our great art.

LON E. ALSUP

Born April 25, 1898, in Carthage, Texas

Died August 7, 1969, in San Antonio, Texas

As a businessman, state legislator, and administrator of a state agency for the blind, Lon Alsup gained a reputation for innovation, dedication, and sincerity.

Born blind, Alsup was educated at the Texas School for the Blind. At age twenty-three he supported himself by tuning pianos and started a music store business, which prospered. In 1930 he ran for and was elected to a seat in the Texas House of Representatives. He was reelected five times, serving from 1931 to 1942. As a legislator he was known as a watchdog of the State Treasury and helped pass legislation that created the Texas Commission for the Blind.

In 1942 Alsup resigned his seat in the legislature and became Executive Director of the Texas Commission for the Blind. He held that position from 1942 until his retirement in 1966.

During his tenure he did formative work in providing optical aids for the blind and services to parents of preschool blind children.

MIKE ANSELL

Born March 26, 1905, in County Kildare, Ireland

Died February 17, 1994, in Brighton, England

When Michael Picton Ansell was nine years old, his father, a Lt. Colonel in the British Army, was killed in World War I. Ansell later said his father had taught him many things, but two in particular: How to be a fine polo player and a terrific worker.

Ansell was commissioned in the British Cavalry in 1924 and by 1935 had moved up the ranks to Commander. He was also an international polo player and equestrian show jumper. In 1940, at the beginning of World War II, Ansell was with his regiment in France waiting to be picked up by the British Navy. As the Germans advanced, Ansell and his men took refuge in a hayloft. Another group of British soldiers came upon the barn, and when told by a French farmer there were Germans in the loft, the soldiers blasted it with gunfire. The thirty-five-year old Ansell was hit in the head losing most of his eyesight. He also had severe damage to four fingers on his left hand, and the fingers were later amputated. Injured and trying to escape, Ansell was captured by the Germans and spent three years in a prisoner-of-war camp before he was exchanged in 1943.

After rehabilitation, Ansell headed the British Show Jumping Association from 1945 to 1964. He was knighted for his work in 1968. He wrote an autobiography titled Soldier On (1973), a book about show riding, Riding High (1974), and another book about his show jumping horse, Leopard: The Story of My Horse (1980).

H.R.H. Prince Phillip wrote the foreword to Ansell’s autobiography, saying in part, Sir Michael Ansell’s passion for anything to do with horses has carried him through more than a fair share of crises and disasters. His talent for organization has lifted horse shows and equestrian sports to a remarkable level in this mechanical age.

ESREF ARMAGAN

Born March 9, 1953, in Istanbul, Turkey

Born totally blind, Armagan received no formal education or training. As a child he used a nail to draw familiar shapes of objects on discarded cardboard boxes. He learned the names of colors and what things were associated with each color. He began painting at age six.

With no lessons and no help, Armagan devised a method to produce oil paintings. Currently when he paints he uses a Braille stylus to etch an outline of his drawing and applies oil paint with his fingers one color at a time to avoid smearing, allowing each color to dry for two to three days.

Armagan has displayed his work at exhibitions in Turkey, the Czech Republic, China, and the Netherlands.

THOMAS RHODES ARMITAGE

Born in 1824, in Sussex County, England

Died October 23, 1890, in Thurles, Ireland

A doctor turned philanthropist and worker for the blind, Armitage was the sixth of seven brothers in a well-to-do Sussex family. When he was seven years old the family moved to France, and when he was nine they moved to Frankfurt, Germany. As a result Armitage became fluent in French and German. He graduated from King’s College in London with a medical degree and had a successful medical practice in London from 1846 to 1860.

Armitage had poor vision from childhood, and at age thirty-six became nearly totally blind. While he had a little remaining vision, it was not enough even to read large print. He decided to give up his medical practice, dedicating the rest of his life to work for the blind.

Traveling to the Continent, Armitage studied methods of teaching the blind. In 1868 he founded the British and Foreign Blind Association, which later became the Royal National Institute for the Blind. In his work with the blind, Armitage recognized the need for a consensus on embossed type. At the time there were several competing versions of touch writing, so he coordinated an effort to assess the various types of embossed writing. The assessment, done by blind persons who had knowledge of a particular system, took nearly two years. It was decided the Braille system should be