Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-10-19
HELEN KELLER AT THE FAIR.
The Great Work Of Alexander Graham
Bell

To the Editor of The Evening Star:
What is there that could be more salts
flying to mortal man, even in this en-
iightened and progressive age Of ours to-
day, than to be BILE to take up telephone
in st. Louis and talk to persons in his own
home in this city of Washington, and say
to himself this is a result of some of my
efforts and 1 am not near to the graveyard
yet? But 1t may be safely said that the
proudest day of DIR. Alexander Ora ham
Bells life was yesterday, and it is because
of Helen Keller, only she, the most remark
able product of mental development of any
age, even such as is ours of today.
Tuesday was Helen Keller day at the
worlds fair, in the midst of the convention
of the superintendent and principals of the
American schools for the deaf and dumb
over a hundred in number and with some
thirteen thousand scholars today, for this
class is growing more and more numerous
with our population, and because of the in
ability to check diseases that make deaf
ness and ward of accidents that cause
the same, and because of children now be-
ing sent to these schools whether their de-
feet of hearing is small or great. The fact
is there will soon be no hard o hearing per-
sons save those that have become so after
school age and from old age
Miss Keller is q genius, and all such are
studies To nearly every one of us the
story of this deaf and blind girl is familiar,
yet there is no story of her like unto that
her own. In it she does not say she hears
or sees, or that she swims and rows and
rides a wheel, romps and runs and talks
like all other children. She tells only the
truth and nothing but the TRUTH and while
she Is no more like unto Laura Brldgman
that our old folks tell or told of than the
modern scholar deaf mute is like unto John
Kits there is in this girl much that we
can learn of interest, and the more we
study her the more we learn OF the deaf
and of the blind and in this poor girl, 50
lovely in every way, so much to be pit1ed
and yet admired without pity at all. We
learn simply that she Is blind and that
she is deaf, and a composite or neither
class, but if composite at all 1t Is with
Miss Sullivan, her companion, teacher
nurse. No hospital nurse ever attended a
patient as has Miss Sullivan Helen Keller
DIR. Alexander Graham Bell never had a
child to train as he has In this child, YET
he Is a father, and was a tutor OF the deaf
long before she was born. Nor has he ac-
complished so much, not even with his wife
after she left the Michigan State School for
Deaf .MuteS.
Without making any effort to depreciate
this most worthy young woman 1t should
be said frankly that to those who knew the
deaf and the blind Helen kellar is but one
of each. and shows in every way, save
from the training given her, that she is
handicapped both ways. Instead Of walking
like an Indian across a room. as will one
that is blind. she has the walk of the deaf
mute, and reels her way around Dy tHe
walls. Her great mental prowess is likely
due from cultivation as well as heredity,
being related to both Edward Everett and
Robert Edward Lee, two of the greatest
men of our broad land. Blood will tell"
This would be quite we'll said even If it
came only from the lips of Helen's old
black NANNY down in Alabama far away.
Her Collegiate Work.
What Dr. Alexander Graham Bell has
achieved in seeing Helen Kellar graduate
from Ratcliffe he has seen scores of
deaf mutes graduate from Kendall Green,
and now beholds her the honor guest of the
greatest exposition ever held, he has well
earned. GLADLY would we teach and as
gladly learn" Is this most modest man S
motto, and here we have the fulfilment of
the prophecy of Isaiah in beautiful words,
"And l will lead the blind by a way which
they knew not and in paths they have not
known. l will make darkness light before
them and error things straight. These
things will / do unto them and not for
sake them" At Kendall Green the mutes
OF America erected marble bust to Presi-
dent Garfield, and to Father Gallaudet there
is a memorial in bronze and stone. Could
any class feel more deep, so full. or feel so
grateful on this day as the deaf mutes
must to DIR. Alexander Graham Bell?
l think the interest of DR.. Bell in
Helen Keller has done more to create an
interest, and an interest with a second
thought. In this class, as varied as 1t is,
than all else that we can recall II has
opened an entire new and uncultivated
field. and today there are in various schools
for the deaf or the blind blind deaf mutes
that otherwise. perhaps, would be relegated
with those that are simply helpless. ire
their lives.
One of these. girl of seventeen, deaf at
thirteen and nearly blind by reoccurrence
Of the same disease at sixteen, once SAID