The Durant news. (Durant, Miss.) 1882-1985, 1938-11-10
David Guyton IN Hollands


An inspiring picture of David Guyton, Mississippfs
famous blind son, appears in the current isue of Hol-
lands, the magazine of the south.
Mr.. Guyton is known to almost every Mississippian
as the head of the Department of History and Social
Science at Blue Mountain College at Blue Mountain,
Mississippi, one Of the most famous colleges for women
in the south. He is also president Of the bank at Blue
Mountain and known as a writer and poet OF note.
Born in February, 1880, on his fathers plantation
near Blue Mountain, Professor Guyton enjoyed a normal
boyhood up until he reached eleven years of age. At
that time a seIf-inf1icted pocketknife wound IN the left
eye shattered his sight forever.
Not letting this become a handicap in the business
of living David Guyton by special permission of the au-
thorities obtained q degree of Bachelor Of Arts, the first
man to graduate from Blue Mountain College for women.
Later Guyton entered and was the first blind stu
dent to graduate from the University OF. Mississippi with
a B. S. degree in a single session and led the junior law
class with an average Of ninety-nne. He was also the
first blind student ever to obtain the M. A. degree from
Columbia University. New York. He also did graduate
work at the University Of Chicago.
Thus equipped with a thorough education and one
of the brightest minds of our day Professor Guyton
has taught hundreds Of students during the years since
1914 when he became a full-fledged professor at Blue
Mountain. His life has been one Of service and an in
spiration to the youns women under his training.
Blindness has proved no handicap to this noble
Mississippian who says: "Eyesight is cheap and can
De bought Tor a Few cents an nour. BralnS are rare
and dear"
David Guyton believes and convinces his hearers
that the blind need only a chance to prove their ability
to accomplish tasks which seem impossible for them to
accomplish by those of us who can see. He says:
"The biggest task any blind person bumps up against
is TO convince seeing people that the blind can easily and
satisfactorily perform innumerable things which, seen
through the eyes of the sighted, seem utterly impossible
for blind people to do. Pensions, state and national,
will soon take care of the actual needs of the less capable
blind; but pensions, in a way, will make it even more
difficult for the talented blind to obtain work, simply
because the misguided seeing men and women will feel
that they have made it safe and easy for the sightess
by providing them with pensions for their physical ne
cessities, Talking Books and Braille books for their
intellectual diversion, and the radio to keep them in touch
with the rest of the world.
"Work-a chance to earn their own way by solid
crave and that is what the seeing would give them, if
seeing could only comprehend the possibilities for prac-
teal service by literally thousands of blind.
''The blind men and women of exceptional talents
can fairly well shift for themselves; but even those,
after winning high scholastic honors and being awarded
Phi Beta Kappa keys, often are forced to accept infe-
rior positions with merely a pittance of pay for their
work.
"Give the blind a chance, and they will prove their
wit and worth"