page_title: Louis Braille
section_title: Honors and tributes
hierarchical_section_title: Louis Braille / Legacy / Honors and tributes
caption_attribution_description: English: Stamp Deutsch: Briefmarke: Welt-Braille-Jahr
context_page_description: Louis Braille was a French educator and inventor of a system of reading and writing for use by the blind or visually impaired. His system remains virtually unchanged to this day, and is known worldwide simply as braille.
  Blinded in both eyes as a result of an early childhood accident, Louis Braille mastered his disability while still a boy. He excelled in his education and received a scholarship to France's Royal Institute for Blind Youth. While still a student there, he began developing a system of tactile code that could allow blind people to read and write quickly and efficiently. Inspired by the military cryptography of Charles Barbier, Braille constructed a new method built specifically for the needs of the blind. He presented his work to his peers for the first time in 1824.
  In adulthood, Louis Braille served as a professor at the Institute and had an avocation as a musician, but he largely spent the remainder of his life refining and extending his system. It went unused by most educators for many years after his death, but posterity has recognized braille as a revolutionary invention, and it has been adapted for use in languages worldwide.
context_section_description: The immense personal legacy of Louis Braille was described in a 1952 essay by T.S. Eliot: 
  "Perhaps the most enduring honor to the memory of Louis Braille is the half-conscious honor we pay him by applying his name to the script he invented – and, in this country [England], adapting the pronunciation of his name to our own language. We honor Braille when we speak of braille. His memory has in this way a security greater than that of the memories of many men more famous in their day."
  Braille's childhood home in Coupvray is a listed historic building and houses the Louis Braille Museum. A large monument to him was erected in the town square which was itself renamed Braille Square. On the centenary of his death, his remains were moved to the Panthéon in Paris. In a symbolic gesture, Braille's hands were left in Coupvray, reverently buried near his home.
  Statues and other memorials to Louis Braille can be found around the world. He has been commemorated in postage stamps worldwide, and the asteroid 9969 Braille was named for him in 1992. The Encyclopædia Britannica lists him among the "100 Most Influential Inventors Of All Time".
  The 200th anniversary of Braille's birth in 2009 was celebrated throughout the world by exhibitions and symposiums about his life and achievements. Among the commemorations, Belgium and Italy struck 2-euro coins, India struck a 2-rupee coin, and the USA struck a one dollar coin, all in Braille's honor.
  World Braille Day is celebrated every year on Braille's birthday, January 4.
caption: Postage stamp, East Germany, 1975
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