I Want to Go to School

For me the signal moment in the miracle of Helen Keller’s astonishing life journey takes place years before she is born.

Of course there are several. For instance this marker could be when Dr Samuel Gridley Howe decided he could teach a deafblind person, finds Laura Bridgman in the far northern reaches of New Hampshire, and for the first time in history, does. It could be Charles Dickens’ account of meeting Laura Bridgman, which will be read by Helen Keller’s mother, inspiring her to write Perkins School for the Blind, where Dr Howe had done his remarkable work.

But actually it is a different story that haunts my dreams.

Anne Sullivan is fourteen years old. She is nearly blind. Four years earlier she and her five year old brother had been placed in a state Poor House in Tewksbury, Massachusetts. Her brother quickly sucumbs to tuberculosis exacerbated by the horrific conditions in which they were forced to live. It does not appear things could be worse for this child. Then she learns a delegation of important men from the state are going to visit the Poor House, led by someone named Frank Sanborn. All she knows is this is a chance.

The delegation comes. She pushes her way to the front and throws herself at Mr Sanborn.

She cries out, “Mr Sanborn, Mr Sanborn, I want to go to school!”

Again, she is fourteen years old.

Mr Sanborn tells his friend Michael Anagnos, Dr Howe’s successor at Perkins about this impudent and remarkable child.

Mr Anagnos sends for Anne.

And some years later in response to Mrs Keller’s request, he sends Anne to Alabama.

The rest, as they say, is history…

Anne Sullivan was born on this day in 1866.