The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1911-02-04
SAVING BLIND BABIES
+" Mother Love J" Often
Shields a Blind Child Too
Much-Blind Babies Need
Special Training Become
Idiots If Raised With
Idiots.

Mrs Cynthia Westover Alden,
President General International Sun
shine Society.
Exclusive Service The Survey Press
Bureau)
A baby that is born blind presents
a strangely pitiful problem to modern
philanthropy. It has a soul. 1t has
a mind that conditions combine to
stunt. 1t has physical organs that
need to be kept In normal operation.
The eye. through which babyhood re-
ceives. commonly, perhaps nine-tenths
of the impressions that mean the earl
lest Education" is lacking. The baby
in its first year works harder than
at any other time in life, getting a
grip on vital things Tennyson's lines
emphasize this:
: 1.-THE baby. new to earth and sky,
What time his infant hands are
pressed
Against the circle Of the breast
Has never thought that this is f.
But. as he grows ne gathers much,
And learns the use of T. and me
And finds I am not what I see
And other than the things I touch
Now the blind baby has to come to
ious processes. through touch. hearing,
and the sense Of smell. The work is
heavier. And help from the untrain-
ed parent is not to be expected. even
where the parent Is not compelled by
the need Of earning a livelihood to
With children who can see. the par
emit has the guide Of personal memoir
les running back almost to babyhood,
and the guide Of common and conven-
tional treatment Of babies. Both fail
miserably when applied to the case
Of the blind baby.
Until the International Sunshine So
ciety established its first Home for
the Blind Babies such infants took
their chances with special attendants
always unscientific and often unsym-
pathetic. if the parents were more
class homes. were fed and washed and
pitfed by affectionate mothers whose
ideas Of drawing out the mind were
primitive and impossible; or in the
wage earning class they were left long
hours each day, locked in rooms or
dent. while the mother earned a liv-
ing: or. if foundlings. they were picked
up and classed as idiots and made to
become idiots by institutional sur
roundings.
For example. Randa1ps Island
which takes all children Of New York
city who are direct dependents on pub
lie charity. took blind babies with the
rest. It had neither the needed ap-
preparation nor the space. nor the
trained assistance requisite specially
to care for the blind. It had no place
to put them save with the other de-
fectives, and 1t put them there. In
is now, so far as I have been able to
discover, no institution for blind ba-
bies outside Of the International Sum
shine Societys activities. The City
institution, here, takes children over
eight years. The State institution at
Batavia takes them at five years, IL
they are bright and normal outside OF
their blindness and have been taught
to care for themselves In a measure.
The age limit at six schools in the
United States is five years, at one it
is twelve.
Help toward mental unfolding and
normal physical development is what
the blind baby needs, rather than
pity; and pity is even a disadvantage
human being to be pitied. Mother
love- in the home too often shields
the blind child from what is best for
it. The little legs are unemployed,
for fear Of a fall down stairs or some
other injury. The child is fed on
l1Qu1QS because II IS AFRAID or SOllQS
in the mouth even of sugar Jumps, in
stead Of being encouraged to chew and
digest what is Strengthening and
what the stomach and the whole sys-
tenn need. The picking at the eyes,
common to all blind children-a peril
GUS phase Of the sight-lust, probably
producing a sensation like the "see-
ing Of stars from a fall-goes on
without check in the home The
mother does not understand that it
means real idiocy or death If not re-
strained.
In the Dyker Heights Home the little
body is nourished, oiled, massaged,
while the mind is being slowly awa1k-
ened. Out Of eighty-two cases, only
one has been given up as hopeless.
But often it was months before any
sign of mind appeared.A In that Of
one little girl it took two years to
teach her that her hand could grasp
an object and lay it down at will.
Now she walks and talks and shows
much intelligence Another little girl
was Ave years old when five years
ago we took her from Randa1l's Island
idiot Department" where she was
thought to be untrainable, hopelessly
feeble minded. She is now in the
Fifth Reader, New York Point. The
other day she said ito a gentleman
who called at the Home, ooh, am