{"id":2708,"date":"2014-09-15T08:48:51","date_gmt":"2014-09-15T12:48:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/preserving\/?p=2708"},"modified":"2014-09-15T10:33:01","modified_gmt":"2014-09-15T14:33:01","slug":"the-extraordinary-education-of-laura-dewey-bridgman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/2014\/09\/15\/the-extraordinary-education-of-laura-dewey-bridgman\/","title":{"rendered":"The extraordinary education of Laura Dewey Bridgman"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Carte-de-visite of Laura Bridgman<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<\/dt>\n<\/dl>\n

Before the remarkable accomplishments of Helen Keller, there was Laura Dewey Bridgman (1829-1889), a deaf and blind woman\u00a0from New Hampshire, who amazed educators and the American public with her exceptional achievements in\u00a0language and education. She was the first\u00a0deaf and blind person to ever be taught language formally, having lost her sight and hearing at the age of 2 from a bout with scarlet fever.\u00a0Bridgman began her education in 1837 at the recently\u00a0established Perkins School for the Blind. Samuel Gridley Howe, the first director, had developed an embossed version of the alphabet as a tool for teaching language to the blind. He actively sought out Laura Bridgman and convinced her family to have her move to the school at the age of eight. During her time at Perkins,\u00a0Howe taught Bridgman language by first using words before individual letters. He would place\u00a0paper labels on everyday objects such as forks, spoons,\u00a0knives, or keys, with the names of the item\u00a0printed in raised letters. Bridgman\u00a0would\u00a0feel the labels by themselves, learning to\u00a0associate the raised letters with the corresponding item. With time,\u00a0she was able to quickly identify the correct label when given\u00a0a mixed pile of objects. From there, she was taught the individual letters of the alphabet to spell and write.\u00a0Bridgman was\u00a0a miraculous success, studying\u00a0reading, writing, geography, arithmetic, history, grammar, algebra, geometry, physiology, philosophy, and history, and\u00a0along the way,\u00a0changed the way the world viewed the education of women and\u00a0the deaf and blind.<\/span>\u00a0Her story was published in numerous outlets\u00a0and even\u00a0Kate Keller, mother of Helen Keller, read about Bridgman through an account by Charles Dickens, thereafter giving her the motivation\u00a0to seek out the assistance of Anne Sullivan, a former pupil at Perkins.<\/span><\/p>\n

In January 1842 Charles Dickens\u00a0visited the Perkins Institution, intrigued by the story of Laura Bridgman. He\u00a0described his meeting with the 12 year old Bridgman\u00a0in his American Notes<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

“Her social feelings, and her affections, are very strong; and when she is sitting at work, or at her studies, by the side of one of her little friends, she will break off from her task every few moments, to hug and kiss them with an earnestness and warmth that is touching to behold. When left alone, she occupies and apparently amuses herself, and seems quite contented; and so strong seems to be the natural tendency of thought to put on the garb of language, that she often soliloquizes in the\u00a0finger language, slow and tedious as it is. \u00a0But it is only when alone, that she is quiet: for if she becomes sensible of the presence of any one near her, she is restless until she can sit close beside them, hold their hand, and converse with them by signs. In her intellectual character it is pleasing to observe an insatiable thirst for knowledge, and a quick perception of the relations of things. In her moral character, it is beautiful to behold her continual gladness, her keen enjoyment of existence, her expansive love, her unhesitating confidence, her sympathy with suffering, her conscientiousness, truthfulness, and hopefulness.”<\/em><\/p>\n

With the fame of Laura Bridgman, reproductions of her compositions became interesting for educators and the public. Below is a rare surviving facsimile of her handwriting, demonstrating the Howe alphabet with its angular forms and absence of capitals.<\/p>\n

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\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 Rare facsimile of the handwriting of Laura Bridgman<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

One of the earlier biographies of Laura Bridgman from 1878.<\/p>\n

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Description:<\/dt>\n
Bridgman, Laura Dewey. Fac simile of the handwriting and composition of Laura Bridgman. Boston : Thayer’s Lith., [between 1840 and 1851?].<\/span><\/dd>\n
Persistent Link:<\/dt>\n
http:\/\/nrs.harvard.edu\/urn-3:FHCL:5118514<\/a><\/dd>\n
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Repository:<\/dt>\n
Widener Library<\/dd>\n
Institution:<\/dt>\n
Harvard University<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

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Description:<\/dt>\n
Bridgman, Laura Dewey. photograph. Boston, Massachusetts, c 1865.<\/span><\/dd>\n
Persistent Link:<\/dt>\n
http:\/\/hollis.harvard.edu\/?itemid=|misc\/via|FAL94506<\/a><\/dd>\n
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Repository:<\/dt>\n
Special Collections,\u00a0Fine Arts Library<\/dd>\n
Institution:<\/dt>\n
Harvard University<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

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Description:<\/dt>\n
Lamson, Mary Swift. Life and education of Laura Dewey Bridgman :the deaf, dumb, and blind girl. Boston : New England Pub. Co., 1878.<\/dd>\n
Persistent Link:<\/dt>\n
http:\/\/nrs.harvard.edu\/urn-3:GSE.LIBR:3475684<\/a><\/dd>\n
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Repository:<\/dt>\n
Gutman Education\u00a0Special Collections\u00a0<\/span><\/dd>\n
Institution:<\/dt>\n
Harvard University<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Before the remarkable accomplishments of Helen Keller, there was Laura Dewey Bridgman (1829-1889), a deaf and blind woman\u00a0from New Hampshire, who amazed educators and the American public with her exceptional achievements in\u00a0language and education. She was the first\u00a0deaf and blind person to ever be taught language formally, having lost her sight and hearing at the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2559,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2559"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2708"}],"version-history":[{"count":61,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2791,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2708\/revisions\/2791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/preserving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}