                       THE BRAILLE MONITOR



                    Kenneth Jernigan, Editor
                Barbara Pierce, Associate Editor


     Published in inkprint, Braille, on talking-book disc, 
                        and cassette by 


              THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND 
                     MARC MAURER, PRESIDENT 
 


                         National Office
                       1800 Johnson Street
                   Baltimore, Maryland 21230 

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                National Federation of the Blind
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                   Baltimore, Maryland 21230 

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THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND IS NOT AN ORGANIZATION
SPEAKING FOR THE BLIND--IT IS THE BLIND SPEAKING FOR THEMSELVES



ISSN 0006-8829THE BRAILLE MONITOR
PUBLICATION OF THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND

                            CONTENTS
                                                       JUNE, 1992

THE EASTERN EUROPEAN CONFERENCE ON DISABILITIES
by Kenneth Jernigan

EQUALITY, DISABILITY, AND EMPOWERMENT
by Kenneth Jernigan

BLINDNESS: IS HISTORY AGAINST US?
by Kenneth Jernigan

BRAILLE BILLS: WHAT ARE THEY AND WHAT DO THEY MEAN?
by Fred Schroeder

BRAILLE BILL UPDATE

REACTION TO AMERICAN FOUNDATION FOR THE BLIND ARTICLE ON TEXAS
BRAILLE BILL

VARIATIONS ON A THEME: ILLINOIS FEDERATIONISTS FIGHT FOR THE
RIGHT TO BRAILLE LITERACY

REFLECTIONS FROM IDAHO: THE ROLE OF BRAILLE LITERACY

DIRTY TRICKS AND PRESSURE TACTICS IN OHIO
by Barbara Pierce

MISSISSIPPI GOVERNOR REDEFINES BLINDNESS
by Kenneth Jernigan

THE FEDERATION ON PARADE
by Kimberly McCutcheon

FEDERATIONIST HONORED BY LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

RECIPES

MONITOR MINIATURES









     Copyright National Federation of the Blind, Inc., 1992[3 LEAD PHOTOS/CAPTION: On May 6, 1992, nearly 200 librarians
attending the Biennial Conference of Librarians Serving Blind and
Physically Handicapped Individuals visited the National Center
for the Blind for a tour and luncheon. They arrived in five buses
(above) and poured through the Johnson Street building to gather
in the International Braille and Technology Center for the Blind
for a brief welcome from President Maurer and Dr. Jernigan. Then
they were divided into six groups for tours of the National
Center. With only a little over an hour to devote to these tours,
they were forced almost to trot, but many took the time to pick
up order forms and literature. One of the most popular stops was
the Technology Center (lower left). Everyone was in the dining
room by 12:30 (lower right), ready for a delicious lunch prepared
by Marie Cobb with help from several members of the Center staff.
We were delighted to welcome the librarians. The entire staff
worked hard to get ready for the visit and to display our
wonderful facility. Many librarians took an opportunity to tell
members of the staff how impressed they were and how surprising
it was that so few people could entertain them with such
efficiency and graciousness.]

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Dr. and Mrs. Jernigan found a little time for
sightseeing while they were in Czechoslovakia. They are pictured
here in Prague's famous Wenceslaus Square.]

         THE EASTERN EUROPEAN CONFERENCE ON DISABILITIES
                       by Kenneth Jernigan

     Sometime toward the middle of March this year, Sandra
Parrino (who is the chairman of the National Council on
Disability and who spoke at our 1990 convention in Dallas) called
to ask me to participate in a conference on disability which was
to be held in Prague, Czechoslovakia, April 13-15. She said that
the conference would be called the Eastern European Conference on
Disabilities and that it would include Czechoslovakia, Hungary,
and Poland. She wanted me to represent the blind and,
particularly, to speak about empowerment and the Americans with
Disabilities Act.
     I told her I would, so on April 10 Mrs. Jernigan and I
headed for Prague. We arrived on the afternoon of the 11th, and I
had some preliminary conversations with blind persons. The next
day (Sunday, April 12) we met with leaders of the Federation of
the Blind and Partially Sighted of Czechoslovakia. These were
truly the leaders of the blind of the country. Present were the
only blind member of the Czech Parliament; a college professor,
who teaches interpreting and whose English was at least as good
as mine; and seven or eight other people who were equally
impressive.
     They told me that during the 1930s and '40s the blind of
Czechoslovakia had made great progress in establishing
independent organizations of the blind. They said that when the
Communists took control in 1949, the organizations of the blind
were required to dissolve and merge with all other disability
groups into what was called "The Union of Invalids," or (to put
it more politely) "The Association of the Handicapped." The
organizations of the blind apparently had a good bit of property
(including the building where Parliament now meets), and this
property was largely confiscated. It was clear that the people
with whom I was meeting were tough, knowledgeable, and self-
reliant. They said that when the Communists were overthrown in
1989 (in what they called the "velvet revolution"), they
immediately re-established their independent organizations--
probably before it was legal to do so. They gave me a Braille
summary of facts about the Federation, which said in part:

     The Federation of the Blind and Partially Sighted of
Czechoslovakia is a collegiate, incorporating three nation-based
member organizations: Society of the Blind and Partially Sighted
in Czechoslovakia (claiming 12,000 members), Czech Blind and
Partially Sighted Union (with approximately 3,000 members), and
Union of the Blind and Partially Sighted in Slovakia (having
approximately 4,500 members). These organizations cultivate
everyday contacts with their membership and provide various
special services.
     The fundamental mission of the Federation lies in the
following: (1) To represent the blind and partially sighted
community in dealings with both the federal administration and
the federal parliament; (2) To coordinate international
relations; (3) To gather, process, and disseminate relevant
information on blindness and visual impairment from home and
abroad; (4) Effectively to influence the newly created
legislation related to the handicapped in general and the blind
in particular.
     The Federation is governed by the Executive Council,
consisting of an equal number of representatives from each member
organization. The Council is headed by the president. The
Executive Council appoints the Federation's executive secretary--
who, together with his secretariat, runs the day-to-day business
of the organization. The head office of the Federation is located
in Prague. The Federation represents organizations of the
Czechoslovak blind in matters outside of Czechoslovakia, which is
a member country of both the European Blind Union and the World
Blind Union.

     The Federation leaders with whom I talked elaborated on this
outline. They said that although they had formed independent
organizations in 1989, they had not come together as a Federation
until July 1, 1991. It is clear that they are proud of what they
have accomplished, and they have reason to be. They told me that
the old Union of Invalids (or Association of the Handicapped)
still exists and that the same bunch that has always run it still
pretty much does. It still includes blind people, but they and
their interests seem to be submerged in the larger entity. The
leaders of the Federation said they were getting back some of
their property, but they doubted that they would get it all,
especially the building where Parliament meets.
     As to the Eastern European Conference on Disabilities, the
leaders of the Federation had some interesting things to say.
They said that many months ago the Czech government had told the
various disability groups that a private American organization
would be making funds available for certain projects in
Czechoslovakia and that the various groups should submit
proposals. They said that sometime later the organizations were
unofficially and individually told that instead of funding
projects, the Americans would be funding the Eastern European
Conference on Disabilities. One of them remarked that this was a
disappointment to them, more what they would have expected from
the former regime. I explained to them that although the
conference was being held under the auspices of the National
Council on Disability (a government agency), it was being
privately funded. They indicated that they would send
representatives to monitor the conference.
     Subsequently at the conference I met a representative of the
Association for the Handicapped and was asked by him for an
interview for the magazine of that organization. The Federation
leaders advised me to give the interview, and I did.
     As to the conference itself, Sandra Parrino organized and
chaired it with real efficiency. Most of those who made
presentations were either government officials or representatives
of the disabled. There was simultaneous translation into English,
Czech, Hungarian, and Polish; and there was also interpretation
for the deaf. There was not, however, any Braille, a fact which
caused some remark. Besides appearing on a panel, I gave a brief
address entitled "Equality, Disability, and Empowerment."
     We are printing my address immediately after this article,
and Federationists will recognize portions of it from other
speeches I have made. However, much of the material is new, and
in any case I thought Monitor readers might like to know what I
said and how I said it.
     There are other things about the visit to Prague that I
think Federationists will find of interest. One of the people who
took part throughout the entire meeting and made at least one
formal presentation was the wife of Lech Walesa, the Polish
leader. Also the conference participants were invited to the
Palace for dinner on Tuesday evening, April 14, at which time we
were addressed by Vaclav Havel, the President of Czechoslovakia.
Mrs. Jernigan and I found this to be an extremely interesting
experience. The Palace (which is not always so in such cases) is
exactly what the name implies--a magnificent building beautifully
and ornately furnished.
     In view of the 1973 NFB banquet speech, "Blindness: Is
History Against Us," there is at least one other experience that
we had in Prague that cannot go unmentioned. Zisca is the
national hero of Czechoslovakia--and placed in a prominent
position on a hill atop an impressive stone column, under which
is the grave of Czechoslovakia's unknown soldier, there is a huge
bronze statue of Zisca riding a horse. As you would expect, I
went to visit the statue and tried my best to get at it for a
touch. Alas! The stone column was surrounded by a high metal
fence, and even though I tried, there was simply no way to get
over or through it. If I could have got past the fence, it was my
intention to try to find a way to get up the column to the
statue; but since I didn't get past the first hurdle, there was
no point in worrying about the second.
     I know that many Federationists have read or heard
"Blindness: Is History Against Us," but in the context of the
Prague visit I think it is worth reprinting in this issue of the
Monitor. It follows immediately after the speech on "Equality,
Disability, and Empowerment."
     Incidentally, I shared the history speech with the Czech
leaders of the blind, and they said that even though they all
knew Zisca as a national hero and a blind person, they had never
thought of using him to promote their own organization or self-
image. I think that will change. They said they would send me
additional material on Zisca, and I certainly hope they will.
     Because of the timing of the conference program and the
airline schedules, I was unable to come straight from Prague to
Baltimore, so Mrs. Jernigan and I spent one night in Amsterdam.
That, too, was a worthwhile experience. In fact, except for the
problems I have with flying (which are not inconsiderable) the
entire trip was both enjoyable and productive. As to flying, I
have found myself compelled to do much more of it of late than I
care to think about. However, I can only repeat that the Prague
experience was productive and helpful in forwarding our goals.


[PHOTO: Inside of Prague palace dining room--some conference
attendees are taking photos. CAPTION: The Eastern European
Conference on Disabilities was held in the medieval palace which
serves today as the home of the President of Czechoslovakia and
the seat of government. Pictured here is the state dining room,
known as the Spanish Gallery, where conference participants were
entertained to dinner by President Vaclav Havel (far left).]

[PHOTO: Kenneth Jernigan stands in the reception area of the
Prague palace with eight other gentlemen. CAPTION: Dr. Jernigan
(center) is pictured here with the Polish delegation to the
Eastern European Conference on Disabilities. Standing immediately
to Dr. Jernigan's right (third from left), is Zygmunt Lenyk, who
is a member of the Polish Parliament and who is blind.]

              EQUALITY, DISABILITY, AND EMPOWERMENT
                     An Address Delivered By
              Kenneth Jernigan, Executive Director
                National Federation of the Blind
       at the Eastern European Conference on Disabilities
                     Prague, Czechoslovakia
                         April 14, 1992

     The man was old and senile, and he ate without manners or
grace. His daughter was ashamed and ordered him to eat in a
corner apart from the others. There came a day when he broke his
plate, and the daughter was angry. "My son shall not see such
disgusting behavior," she said. "Since you eat like a pig, you
shall be treated like a pig. In the future you shall eat in the
yard from a trough." Her son was five, the thing in life she
loved most. He asked for a hammer and boards.
     "For what purpose?" she asked.
     "To build you a trough," he said, "so that I may feed you
when you are old."
     So it has been through the generations, each teaching the
next and then doubling back on itself for reinforcement--change
coming slow and learning difficult. Yet, there come bends in the
road, shifts in direction. It is not inevitable that each
generation take hammer and boards to build troughs for the next.
Among times there is a time that turns a corner, and everything
this side of it is new. Times do not go backward.1 For people
with disabilities the corner has been turned, and the time is
now.
     Today I want to talk with you about the Americans with
Disabilities Act, the first truly comprehensive piece of
legislation enacted in the current climate of social upheaval by
any country to help those with disabilities achieve full
membership in society. But I want to talk with you about more
than that. I want to talk about the true meaning of empowerment--
the method by which a group or segment of the population moves
from second-class citizenship to first-class status in society.
     No issue is of greater urgency to persons with disabilities
anywhere in the world than erasing the stigma of inequality--the
devastating imagery of what a sociologist once called "spoiled
identity"--which in varying degree descends upon all of us who
present a different appearance to the world, a visage or behavior
that departs in some observable way from what is regarded as
"normal." When that difference corresponds to a stereotype
already in place--such as the "helpless blind," the "deaf and
dumb," the "senile oldster," or the "pathetic cripple"--the
result traditionally has been abrupt dismissal from the ranks of
the so-called "normal" and forced exile (psychologically if not
physically) to the outer margins of the social order--the dumping
ground of public consciousness, wherein are confined the
unacceptable, the unfortunate, the unlike, and the unequal.
     Inequality, now as in the past, is an ascribed attribute--a
stigmatic condition attached to the disabled by virtue of their
perceived difference. This inequality is not a product of the
disability itself but of the labeling, as one theory has it. Or,
to put it another way, the condition of inequality is not a
feature of the disability but of the handicap. That verbal
distinction is a crucial one. For while the disability is
physical in origin, lodged in the body of the person, the
handicap is social, lodged in the body of society.
     If we are to deal realistically with our problems, we must
go to basics. So let us consider the nature of disability--or, in
my case, let me talk with you about the nature of blindness; for
that is the disability I know most about. Keep in mind, however,
that what I say about blindness could be said about many (if not
most) other disabilities--for very often the problems are the
same.
     The first thing I would say is that with all of our efforts
to educate the public, we still have a long way to go. The
average citizen's notions about blindness (whether in the United
States or elsewhere) are still predominantly negative. In 1976 a
Gallup poll showed that in my country blindness was the second
most feared condition which might occur to an individual. Only
cancer came ahead of it. Blindness was more feared than deafness,
more feared than mental illness, more feared than heart attack,
or anything else. But that was sixteen years ago. What about
today? Well, there has been a change--and one which at first
glance might seem to be positive. Blindness has now dropped to
the third most feared condition. But before we begin to cheer,
perhaps we had better consider what outranks it--AIDS and
cancer.    And this general verdict is confirmed in specifics. A
few years ago a teacher wrote to me: "Dear Sir," he said, "I can
find no criminal statistics in the Annual Uniform Crime Report in
which blind people are a part. I have assumed for twenty-five
years that blind people cannot become criminals due to this sight
limitation.
     "I teach a course in the correction and prevention of
delinquency and crime. A twenty-six-year investigation of
criminal phenomena has confirmed the Bible's statement that, 'If
ye were blind ye should have no sin (crime): John 9:41'...
     "If you have any statistics relative to either delinquent or
criminal behavior among the blind, I shall greatly appreciate a
review of them."
     By way of answer I sent this teacher a newspaper headlined,
"Blind Man Kills Landlady." I don't know what his reaction was.
     Not long ago the project coordinator for the National
Council of Teachers of English in the United States wrote to me
asking that I send material about blindness so that English
teachers throughout the country could help their students learn
proper attitudes. Naturally I was pleased. However, my enthusiasm
cooled when she went on to say that she felt it was important for
children to learn compassion while they were young.
     A few weeks ago I received from a blind man a letter, which
said in part:
     
     My niece's teacher (my niece is thirteen and sighted) gave
the class a homework assignment of blindfolding themselves for
half an hour that evening. The stated purpose of the assignment
was to provide the children with some idea of what it would be
like to be blind. As background information the teacher explained
that some of the things blind people are unable to do include the
following:
     1. Blind people are unable to have children because they are
unable to cope with bringing them up.
     2. Blind people are unable to travel alone or live alone.
     3. They cannot watch or enjoy television.
     4. They cannot tell the time.
     Furthermore, the teacher said, blind people would experience
difficulty achieving academic success. Therefore, good jobs are
largely out of their reach. The teacher also mentioned (and here
quite correctly, but not for the reasons she gave) that the blind
experience high levels of unemployment.

     This is the letter, but I don't have to depend on letters to
confirm the truth of what I have been telling you. It happens
every day in my own experience. At the annual conventions of the
National Federation of the Blind when we go to the newspapers to
talk about blindness as a problem of civil rights and try to get
coverage, we are more often than not referred to the medical
reporter; and when I go to the washroom in a restaurant, someone
usually tries to show me to the toilet stall for the handicapped.
Likewise, when I register at a hotel, the person at the desk
tries with increasing frequency to give me the room especially
designed for the handicapped.
     This points up a problem which we must recognize and try to
solve as we deal with the Americans with Disabilities Act and
with other attempts around the world to help people with
disabilities gain empowerment. There is, of course, nothing wrong
with having toilet stalls specially designed for the handicapped
or rooms for the handicapped in hotels. Quite the contrary. But
there is a great deal wrong with assuming that every person with
a so-called handicap needs exactly what every other person with a
handicap needs. When the Americans with Disabilities Act was
being considered by Congress, we of the National Federation of
the Blind insisted that it be amended to provide that no person
could be required to use the specially designed facilities,
devices, or alternatives required by the Act. Thus, certain seats
on buses or trains may be reserved for people with disabilities,
but persons with disabilities may not be forced to use those
seats. Rooms in hotels may be altered to meet the needs of
certain portions of the population with disabilities, but no
person with a disability may be denied the right to use other
rooms in the hotel.
     The Americans with Disabilities Act (though it is the most
far-reaching) is not the first attempt by the government of the
United States or by the private sector to deal with the problems
of the disabled. The experience we have had with the airlines is
a case in point, and it is instructive as to what we should try
to avoid as we implement the Americans with Disabilities Act and
similar legislation in other countries.
     Before the early 1970s people with disabilities in the
United States (when they wanted to travel by air) had
comparatively few problems with airline personnel. Some segments
of the population with disabilities had problems with the
physical configuration of airplanes and airports, but in general
not with airline personnel. Then came the stirrings of federal
legislation to give empowerment to the disabled, and there was a
great deal of talk about affirmative action.
     One would have thought that affirmative action would have
been a positive step, but it wasn't--at least, not for the blind
in dealing with the airlines. Airline personnel did not become
knowledgeable overnight or lose their prejudices just because
somebody told them to engage in affirmative action. Mostly (with
respect to air travel) the blind didn't need any affirmative
action. We were doing fine just as it was. But the airlines were
into affirmative action, so they had to think up something to do
to help us--whether we needed it or not and, for that matter,
whether we wanted it or not.
     They began by lumping all of what they perceived to be the
handicapped together--wheelchair users, the blind, the deaf, the
quadriplegic, the cerebral palsied, and everybody else they could
think of--including, very often, small children. Next they
cataloged what they believed to be the problems, needs, and
characteristics of each of these groups, and then assumed that
each item on the list applied to every member of every group they
had included in the category of the handicapped. The resulting
mythical composite was a monstrosity--totally helpless, totally
in need of custody, and totally nonexistent except in the minds
of the airline officials. There is not now (nor was there ever)
any such person as the "airlines' standardized handicapped air
traveler," and the problem comes from the fact that the airlines
(and, to some extent, the federal regulators) persist in acting
as if there is.
     So even though we have had in the United States almost two
decades of accelerated attempts to help people with disabilities
gain empowerment, culminating in the passage of the Americans
with Disabilities Act, problems with the airlines have not
stopped. In fact, it can be convincingly argued that they have
increased. The shameful treatment (as recently reported in the
New York Times) of Justin Dart, Chairman of the President's
Committee on Employment of People with Disabilities, is a
striking case in point. Mr. Dart, who uses a wheelchair, was (in
violation of public policy and federal law) denied the right to
board an airplane despite the fact that he protested vehemently
and was thoroughly articulate and knowledgeable about his rights
under the law. The Dart case underscores the fact that the
passage of a law is not enough. Even the determined
implementation of that law is not enough. There must be vigorous
public education, leading to a change in the attitudes of society
as a whole. And, above all, we must reject the sophistry which
would lump all segments of the disabled population together, the
sophistry which assumes that the problems of each are the
problems of all, the sophistry which then uses this fallacy as an
excuse to keep old attitudes intact by arguing that people with
disabilities are not capable of competing.
     Let me not be misunderstood. The Americans with Disabilities
Act can be a positive step forward--but it is not the total
solution to our problems. It (and similar legislation in other
countries) is only the foundation upon which we can and must
build. The real solution to our problems cannot be achieved until
there is a widespread change in public attitudes.
     Let me give you an illustration. The legal doctrine of
Contributory Negligence, as applied to the blind in the United
States, holds that if a blind person travels outside his or her
home and becomes involved in an accident, the blind person
(simply by being present) is automatically considered to be
negligent regardless of the circumstances of the accident. For
example, if a blind person were to cross a street in a pedestrian
crosswalk in accord with the traffic signal and were to be hit by
a car, the driver of that car might not be held responsible even
though the driver had disobeyed the traffic signal.
     That was the law in most parts of the country until the
blind (acting through the National Federation of the Blind)
secured passage by state legislatures of what is called the White
Cane Law, which specifically strikes down the doctrine of
Contributory Negligence. Every state in the nation now has such a
white cane law. Yet, hear the testimony of Barbara Pierce, the
president of the National Federation of the Blind of Ohio.
     "Having the White Cane Law on the books," she says, "is not
enough. I am reminded of this truth every time a motorist leans
out of a passing car to inquire of me when I am walking along a
street in my small town, 'Where are you trying to go?' First of
all, it is none of his or her business. Second, I am not trying
to go; I am going. When I am lost (if that should occur), I take
responsibility for asking directions.
     "There is," she goes on, "still a malignant manifestation of
the contributory negligence doctrine floating around in the
public mind. It may have vanished from the law books with the
passage of the White Cane statutes, but there are plenty of
people who have not yet got the word.
     "Early in March of this year," Barbara Pierce continues, "an
Ohio Federationist who uses a guide dog was crossing a busy
street in her small town. She had the green light, so she and her
dog stepped out boldly to cross the intersection. A young man,
who was not watching carefully, turned right on the red light and
struck both the woman and the dog. Neither was hurt badly, but
the woman was taken to the emergency room, where her husband (a
physician) eventually found her.
     "The attitude of the officials who dealt with the case is
demonstrated by one question the police officer who wrote up the
accident report asked the victim's husband: 'Can the dog read
traffic signs?' No one from the district attorney's office ever
contacted the woman to determine how serious her injuries were.
All of this should have prepared her for what happened in Mayor's
Court a few weeks later.
     "Pronouncing it as his opinion that no blind person could
independently cross streets safely, the mayor fined the driver a
nominal $10 and warned the blind woman not to travel alone in the
future. No one knew or cared about white cane laws or their
protection. It was obvious to the mayor, the district attorney,
and the defendant that somehow the blind woman had caused the
accident just by being on the street even though she had the
right of way and the legal right to be there. She is herself an
attorney by training, and you can be sure that she did not remain
silent.
     "She attempted to interest area newspapers in her story.
They were not interested. She and the National Federation of the
Blind of Ohio wrote letters to the mayor, the district attorney,
and the police urging in-service education programs for public
officials. They could not be bothered."
     So says Barbara Pierce, president of the Ohio affiliate of
the National Federation of the Blind, and her testimony is an
unpleasant reminder to all of us that it is not enough to be in
the right. Sometimes it is not even enough to have the law on
your side. It is important to keep in mind that we are farther
along the road to freedom than we have ever been--but it is
equally important to remember that we are not yet there.
     As with many so-called disabilities, the real problem of
blindness is not the physical loss of sight but the
misunderstanding and misconceptions which exist in the public
mind. It is not conjecture but fact that the blind (given equal
training and opportunity) can compete on terms of equality with
others. In short, the average blind child can hold his or her own
with the average sighted child; the average blind adult can do
the average job in the average place of business and do it as
well as a sighted person similarly situated; the average blind
grandmother of eighty-four can do what the average sighted
grandmother of that age can do. Of course, the above average can
compete with the above average, and the below average will
compete at that level. The techniques may be different, but the
overall performance and the ability to live a full life are
comparable. There are blind mathematicians, blind factory
workers, blind dishwashers, and tens of thousands of just
ordinary blind citizens to prove it. If the blind have reasonable
training and opportunity, blindness can be reduced to the level
of a mere nuisance.
     This is what I as a blind person representing the largest
organization of blind persons in the United States know, and I
repeat that much of what I have said about blindness also applies
to broad segments of the population of people with disabilities.
Yet, people with disabilities have traditionally and consistently
been excluded from the main channels of economic and social
participation in our society. With monotonous sameness we have
been put down and kept out. This is why we have found it
necessary to organize for collective action. This is why it was
important that the Americans with Disabilities Act (as amended)
be passed; why similar legislation in other countries should be
passed; and why these laws must be implemented, discussed, and
brought home to the conscience of the decision-makers and the
public at large. But this type of legislation is not a cure-all.
At best it is a catalyst and a foundation on which we can build.
     We have turned a corner of time, and there is a newness, a
window of opportunity for action. We must use the current period
of social change and re-examination of values as a means of
focusing public education and changing public attitudes--but
unless we act decisively and imaginatively, the window will
close. What good will the elimination of architectural barriers
do if we cannot eliminate the barriers in the minds and hearts of
our fellow citizens? It is a natural tendency for human beings to
resist change by rationalizing and building troughs, but it must
be our task to overcome that tendency. With the passage of the
Americans with Disabilities Act and similar legislation in other
countries and with the accompanying climate of inquiry and new
beginnings, I believe we will succeed. Surely the hope which has
been kindled in millions of hearts will not permit it to be
otherwise.
     As we approach the beginning of the twenty-first century, we
throughout the world who have disabilities confidently look
forward to a day at hand when we can truly have first-class
citizenship and real equality in society, just like the rest--
when we can have a good-paying job and the joys of a home and a
family of our own, just like the rest--when we can hold our heads
high in self-respect and the respect of others, just like the
rest--when we can earn our way and pay our dues and live our
freedom, just like the rest--when we can wake in the morning
without fear or poverty, just like the rest--when we can hope and
believe and dream, just like the rest--and especially when
whatever we have is ours as a matter of right, whether it be
great or small, not a dole portioned out to us by agencies of
government or private charities. We look forward to that day, and
we intend to have it because we have found the power of
collective action. And one thing more: We are absolutely
determined to put behind us forever any notions of second-class
status and custodial care. We are no longer prepared to eat from
troughs.
     But this is not a dream which we have for ourselves alone.
It can only come true if it is shared by those who are not
classified as disabled--by you in this room who do not have
disabilities and by others like you throughout the world. It is a
dream of a better, more caring, more just society than we have
ever known--and it is a dream that can come true. Let us look to
the future in partnership; let us live in mutual respect; let us
work together to make real the promise of equal opportunity for
all. This is the true meaning of empowerment. This is also the
true meaning of humanity.

                            FOOTNOTES

1. C. S. Lewis, Perelandra (Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.,
1944), page 62.



[PHOTO: Statue of Zisca, seated on horse. CAPTION: This
equestrian statue of Zisca, Czechoslovakia's national hero, is a
famous landmark in Prague. Mrs. Jernigan took this picture when
the Jernigans visited the popular tourist attraction.]

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Dr. Jernigan made an effort to reach the statue
of Zisca. He got to the top of the wall, but the metal fence
proved to be unscalable. He is pictured here on the wall with the
statue of Zisca visible over his left shoulder.]

                BLINDNESS: IS HISTORY AGAINST US?
                     An Address Delivered by
                        KENNETH JERNIGAN
           President, National Federation of the Blind
             At the Banquet of the Annual Convention
                   New York City, July 5, 1973

     Experts in the field, as well as members of the general
public, have differed greatly as to what the future may hold for
the blind. Some, seeking to tell it like it is, see us blundering
on forever in roles of economic dependency and second-class
citizenship. Others, more hopefully, predict a slow but steady
progress toward independence, equality, and full membership in
society. My own view is that this is not a matter for prediction
at all, but for decision. I believe that neither of these
possible outcomes is certain or foreseeable, for the simple
reason that the choices we make and the actions we take are
themselves factors in the determination of the future. In short,
we the blind (like all people) confront alternative futures: one
future in which we will live our own lives, or another future in
which our lives will be lived for us.
     But if the future is open and contingent, surely the past is
closed and final. Whatever disputes men and women may have about
the shape of things to come, there can be no doubt about the
shape of things gone by--the permanent record of history. Or can
there? Is there such a thing as an alternative past?
     We all know what the historical record tells us. It tells us
that, until only yesterday, blind people were completely excluded
from the ranks of the normal community. In early societies they
were reputedly abandoned, exterminated, or left to fend for
themselves as beggars on the lunatic fringe of the community. In
the late Middle Ages, so we are told, provision began to be made
for their care and protection in almshouses and other sheltered
institutions. Only lately, it would seem, have blind people begun
stealthily to emerge from the shadows, and to move in the
direction of independence and self-sufficiency.
     This is what history tells us--or, rather, that is what
histories and the historians have told us. And the lesson
commonly derived from these histories is that the blind have
always been dependent upon the wills and the mercies of others.
     We have been the people things were done to--and,
occasionally, the people things were done for--but never the
people who did for themselves. In effect, according to this
account, we have no history of our own--no record of active
participation or adventure or accomplishment, but only (until
almost our own day) an empty and unbroken continuum of desolation
and dependency. It would seem that the blind have moved through
time and the world not only sightless but faceless--a people
without distinguishing features, anonymous and insignificant--not
so much as rippling the stream of history.
     Nonsense! That is not fact but fable. That is not truth but
a lie. In reality the accomplishments of blind people through the
centuries have been out of all proportion to their numbers. There
are genius, and fame, and adventure, and enormous versatility of
achievement--not just once in a great while but again and again,
over and over. To be sure, there is misery also--poverty and
suffering and misfortune aplenty--just as there is in the general
history of mankind. But this truth is only a half-truth--and,
therefore, not really a truth at all. The real truth, the whole
truth, reveals a chronicle of courage and conquest, of greatness,
and even glory on the part of blind people, which has been
suppressed and misrepresented by sighted historians--not because
these historians have been people of bad faith or malicious
intent but because they have been people, with run-of-the-mill
prejudice and ordinary misunderstandings. Historians, too, are
human; and when facts violate their
preconceptions, they tend to ignore those facts.
     Now, we are at a point in time when the story of the blind
(the true and real story) must be told. For too long the blind
have been (not unwept, for there has been much too much of that)
but unhonored and unsung. Let us, at long last, redress the
balance and right the wrong. Let us now praise our famous men and
celebrate the exploits of blind heroes. Rediscovering our true
history, we shall, in our turn, be better able to make history;
for when people (seeing or blind) come to know the truth, the
truth will set them free.
     Let us begin with Zisca: patriotic leader of Bohemia in the
early fifteenth century, one of history's military geniuses, who
defended his homeland in a brilliant campaign against invading
armies of overwhelming numerical superiority. Zisca was, in the
hour of his triumph, totally blind. The chronicle of his
magnificent military effort--which preserved the political
independence and religious freedom of his country, and which led
to his being offered the crown of Bohemia--is worth relating in
some detail. Need I add that this episode is not to be found,
except in barest outline, in the standard histories? Fortunately
it has been recorded by two historians of the last century--James
Wilson, an Englishman writing in 1820, and William Artman, an
American writing seventy years later. What do you suppose these
two historians have in common, apart from their occupation? You
are right: Both were blind. The account of the career of Zisca
which follows has been drawn substantially from their eloquent
and forceful narratives.
     The Council of Constance, which was convened by the Pope in
the year 1414 for the purpose of rooting out heresy in the
Church--and which commanded that John Huss and Jerome of Prague
be burned at the stake--"sent terror and consternation throughout
Bohemia...."1 In self-defense the Bohemian people took up arms
against the Pope and the emperor. They chose as their commanding
general the professional soldier John de Turcznow-better known as
Zisca, meaning "one-eyed," for he had lost the sight of an eye in
the course of earlier battles. At the head of a force of 40,000
citizen-soldiers--a force not unlike the ragged army that would
follow General Washington in another patriotic struggle three
centuries later--Zisca marched into combat, only to be suddenly
blinded in his remaining eye by an arrow from the enemy.
     Here is where our story properly begins. For Zisca, upon his
recovery from the injury, flatly refused to play the role of the
helpless blind man. "...His friends were surprised to hear him
talk of setting out for the army, and did what was in their power
to dissuade him from it, but he continued resolute. `I have yet,'
said he, `to shed my blood for the liberties of Bohemia. She is
enslaved; her sons are deprived of their natural rights, and are
the victims of a system of spiritual tyranny as degrading to the
character of man as it is destructive of every moral principle;
therefore, Bohemia must and shall be free.'"2
     And so the blind general resumed his command, to the great
joy of his troops. When the news came to the Emperor Sigismund
"he called a convention of all the states in his empire ...and
entreated them, for the sake of their sovereign, for the honor of
their empire, and for the cause of their religion, to put
themselves in arms.... The news came to Zisca that two large
armies were in readiness to march against him.... The former was
to invade Bohemia on the west, the latter on the east; they were
to meet in the center, and as they expressed it, crush this
[rebel] between them."3
     By all the rules of warfare, by all conventional standards
of armament and power, that should have been the end of Zisca and
his rabble army. "After some delay the emperor entered Bohemia at
the head of his army, the flower of which was fifteen thousand
Hungarians, deemed at that time the best cavalry in Europe. 
...The infantry, which consisted of 25,000 men, were equally
fine, and well commanded. This force spread terror throughout all
the east of Bohemia."4 The stage was set for the fateful
climax--the final confrontation and certain obliteration of the
upstart rebel forces. "On the 11th of January, 1422, the two
armies met on a large plain. ... Zisca appeared in the center of
his front line [accompanied] by a horseman on each side, armed
with a poleax. His troops, having sung a hymn,... drew their
swords and waited for the signal. Zisca stood not long in view of
the enemy, and when his officers had informed him that the ranks
were well closed, waved his saber over his head, which was the
signal of battle, and never was there an onset more mighty and
irresistible. As dash a thousand waves against the rock-bound
shore, so Zisca rolled his steel-fronted legions upon the foe.
The imperial infantry hardly made a stand, and in the space of a
few minutes they were disordered beyond the possibility of being
rallied. The cavalry made a desperate effort to maintain the
field, but finding themselves unsupported, wheeled round and fled
... toward ... Moravia."5
     It was a total rout and an unconditional victory, but,
"...Zisca's labors were not yet ended. The emperor, exasperated
by his defeat, raised new armies, which he sent against Zisca the
following spring.... But the blind general, determined that his
country should not be enslaved while he had strength to wield a
sword, gathered his brave army "and met the enemy yet again,
despite fearsome disadvantages in numbers and equipment. "An
engagement ensued, in which the [enemy] were utterly routed,
leaving no less than nine thousand of their number dead on the
field."6
     The remaining branch of the grand imperial army, under the
command of Sigismund himself, next met a similar fate, and the
mighty emperor was compelled to sue for peace at the hands of the
blind general. Then there occurred the final magnificent gesture
of this extraordinary human being. As the historian Wilson
recounts the episode: "Our blind hero, having taken up arms only
to secure peace, was glad for an opportunity to lay them down.
When his grateful countrymen requested him to accept the crown of
Bohemia, as a reward for his eminent services, he respectfully
declined."7 And this is what Zisca said: "While you find me of
service to your designs, you may freely command both my counsels
and my sword, but I will never accept any established authority;
on the contrary, my most earnest advice to you is, when the
perverseness of your enemies allows you peace, to trust
yourselves no longer in the hands of kings, but to form
yourselves into a republic, which species of government only can
secure your liberties."8
     That is the true story of Zisca--military genius, patriot,
freedom fighter, statesman, and blind man. Extraordinary as his
heroism was, it exceeds only in degree the story of yet another
blind Bohemian--King John, the blind monarch who fell in the
historic Battle of Crecy, which engaged the energies and cost the
lives of many of Europe's nobility. This king had been blind for
many years. When he heard the clang of arms, he turned to his
lords and said: "I only now desire this last piece of service
from you, that you would bring me forward so near to these
Englishmen that I may deal among them one good stroke with my
sword." In order not to be separated, the king and his attendants
tied the reins of their horses one to another, and went into
battle. There this valiant old hero had his desire, and came
boldly up to the Prince of Wales, and gave more than "one good
stroke" with his sword. He fought courageously, as did all his
lords, and others about him; but they engaged themselves so far
that all were slain, and next day found dead, their horses'
bridles still tied together.
     In the country of the blind, it has foolishly been said, the
one-eyed man will inevitably be king. This, of course, is
nonsense. In fact, the very opposite has often been true. History
reveals that in the realm of the sighted it is not at all
remarkable for a blind man to be king. Thus, in 1851, George
Frederick, Duke of Cumberland, first cousin to Queen Victoria,
ascended the throne of Hanover under the royal title of George
the Fifth. That this blind king of Hanover was no imcompetent,
but distinctly superior to the ordinary run of monarchs, is shown
by the words of a contemporary historian, who said: "Though
laboring under the deprivation of sight, this Prince is as
efficient in his public, as he is beloved in his private,
character; a patron of the arts and sciences, and a promoter of
agricultural interests...he has acquired a perfect knowledge of
six different languages."9
     A strikingly similar account has been handed down to us of
the blind Prince Kitoyasu, who reigned as a provincial governor
in Japan over a thousand years ago and "whose influence set a
pattern for the sightless which differed from that in any other
country and saved his land from the scourge of beggary."10
Thoroughly trained in both Japanese and Chinese literature,
Prince Hitoyasu introduced blind people into society and the life
of the court. In ninth-century Japan, when the blind led the
blind, they did not fall into a ditch, but rose out of it
together.
     Let us turn now from the records of royalty to the annals of
adventure. Perhaps the most persistent and destructive myth
concerning the blind is the assumption of our relative inactivity
and immobility--the image of the blind person glued to his or her
rocking chair and, at best, sadly dependent on others for guide
or transport on routine daily rounds. "Mobility," we are led to
believe, is a modern term, which has just begun to have meaning
for the blind. To be sure, many blind persons have been cowed by
the myth of helplessness into remaining in their sheltered
corners. But there have always been others--like James Holman,
Esquire, a solitary traveler of a century and a half ago, who
gained the great distinction of being labeled by the Russians as
"the blind spy. "Yes, it really happened! This intrepid
Englishman, traveling alone across the steppes of Greater Russia
all the way to Siberia, was so close an observer of all about him
that he was arrested as a spy by the Czar's police and conducted
to the borders of Austria, where he was ceremoniously expelled.
     Here is how it happened. Holman lost his sight at the age of
twenty-five, after a brief career as a lieutenant in the Royal
Navy; but his urge to travel, instead of declining, grew
stronger. He soon embarked upon a series of voyages--first
through France and Italy, then (at one fell swoop) through
Poland, Austria, Saxony, Prussia, Hanover, Russia, and Siberia.
His real intention, as he later wrote, was to "make a circuit of
the whole world," entirely on his own and unaccompanied--an
ambition he might well have fulfilled had it not been for the
Czar's police and the Russian spy charges. He later published a
two-volume account of his travels and observations, and his own
reflections upon his Russian adventure are worth repeating: "My
situation," he wrote, "was now one of extreme novelty and my
feelings corresponded with its peculiarity. I was engaged ... in
a solitary journey of a thousand miles, through a country,
perhaps the wildest on the face of the earth, whose inhabitants
were scarcely yet accounted within the pale of civilization, with
no other attendant than a rude Tartar postillion, to whose
language my ear was wholly unaccustomed; and yet, I was supported
by a feeling of happy confidence...."11
     As Federationists know, there have been other blind
travelers in our own time quite as intrepid as James Holman. Yet,
Holman's story--the case of the "blind spy"--is important for its
demonstration that blind people could wear such seven-league
boots almost two centuries ago--before Braille or the long cane,
before residential schools or vocational rehabilitation, before
even the American Foundation for the Blind and its 239-page book
on personal management for the blind.
     But there is a more basic side to mobility, of course, than
the opportunity and capacity for long-distance traveling. There
is the simple ability to get about, to walk and run, to mount a
horse or ride a bicycle--in short, to be physically independent.
The number of blind persons who have mastered these skills of
travel is countless, but no one has ever proved the point or
shown the way with more flair than a stalwart Englishman of the
eighteenth century named John Metcalf. Indeed, this brash fellow
not only defied convention, but the world. Totally blind from
childhood, he was (among other things) a successful builder of
roads and bridges; racehorse rider; bare-knuckle fighter; card
shark; stagecoach driver; and, on occasion, guide to sighted
tourists through the local countryside. Here is an account of
some of his many enterprises:
     "In 1751 he commenced a new employment; he set up a stage
wagon betwixt York and Knaresborough, being the first on the
road, and drove it himself, twice a week in summer, and once in
winter. This business, with the occasional conveyence of army
baggage, employed his attention till the period of his first
contracting for the making of roads, which engagement suiting him
better, he relinquished every other pursuit.... The first piece
of road he made was about three miles ... , and the materials for
the whole were to be produced from one gravel pit; he therefore
provided deal boards, and erected a temporary house at the pit;
took a dozen horses to the place; fixed racks and mangers, and
hired a house for his men, at Minskip. He often walked to
Knaresborough in the morning, with four or five stone of meal on
his shoulders, and joined his men by six o'clock. He completed
the road much sooner than was expected, to the entire
satisfaction of the surveyor and trustees."12
     The story of "Blind Jack" Metcalf, for all its
individuality, is far from unique. Rather, it underscores what
even we as Federationists sometimes forget, and what most of the
sighted have never learned at all--namely, that the blind can
compete on terms of absolute equality with others--that we are
really, literally, the equals of the sighted. We have been kept
down by the myths and false beliefs about our inferiority, by the
self-fulfilling prophecies of the custodial system which has
conditioned the sighted and the blind alike to believe we are
helpless, but not by any innate lacks or losses inherent in our
blindness.
     Metcalf's accomplishments in applied science were probably
matched by those of a French army officer more than a century
before. Blaise Francoise, Comte de Pagan, was blinded in the
course of military service, shortly before he was to be promoted
to the rank of field marshal. He then turned his attention to the
science of fortifications, wrote the definitive work on the
subject, and subsequently published a variety of scientific
works, among which was one entitled "An Historical and
Geographical Account of the River of the Amazons" (which included
a chart drawn up by this military genius after he became blind)! 
Like the sighted, the blind have had their share of solid
citizens, namby-pambies, strong-minded individualists, squares,
oddballs, eggheads, and eccentrics. The sixteenth-century German
scholar James Shegkins, for instance, refused to undergo an
operation which was virtually guaranteed to restore his sight:
"In order," as he said, "not to be obliged to see many things
that might appear odious and ridiculous."13 Shegkins, a truly
absent-minded professor, taught philosophy and medicine over many
years with great success, and left behind him influential
monographs on a dozen scientific subjects.
     The success story of Dr. Nicholas Bacon, a blind lawyer of
eighteenth-century France, somewhat resembles that of our own
beloved founder, Dr.Jacobus tenBroek. Both were blinded in
childhood by bow-and-arrow accidents, and both went on to high
academic achievement in law and related studies. The strenuous
exertions which Bacon was forced to go through at each stage of
his climb are indicated by the following account:
     "When he recovered his health, which had suffered from the
accident, he continued the same plan of education which he had
before commenced.... But his friends treated his intention with
ridicule, and even the professors themselves were not far from
the same sentiment; for they admitted him into their schools,
rather under an impression that he might amuse them, than that
they should be able to communicate much information to him."
However, he obtained "the first place among his fellow students.
They then said that such rapid advances might be made in the
preliminary branches of education, but not ... in studies of a
more profound nature; and when ... it became necessary to study
the art of poetry, it was declared by the general voice that all
was over.... But here he likewise disproved their prejudices....
He applied himself to law, and took his degree in that science at
Brussels."14
     Years earlier--in the fourth century after Christ--another
blind man made an even steeper ascent to learning. He was Didymus
of Alexandria, who became one of the celebrated scholars of the
early church. He carved out of wood an alphabet of letters and
laboriously taught himself to form them into words, and shape the
words into sentences. Later, when he could afford to hire
readers, he is said to have worn them out one after another in
his insatiable quest for knowledge. He became the greatest
teacher of his age. He mastered philosophy and theology, and then
went on to geometry and astrology. He was regarded by his
students, some of whom like St. Jerome became church fathers,
with "a touch of awe" because of his vast learning and
intellect.      Didymus was not the only blind theologian to gain
eminence within the church. In the middle of the seventeenth
century, at almost the same moment Milton was composing Paradise
Lost, a blind priest named Prospero Fagnani was writing a
commentary on church law, which was to bring him fame as one of
the outstanding theorists of the Roman faith. At the precocious
age of 21,
Fagnani had already earned the degree of doctor of civil and
canon law, and in the very next year, he was appointed Secretary
of the Congregation of the Council. His celebrated Commentary,
published in six quarto volumes, won high praise from Pope
Benedict XIV and caused its author to become identified
throughout Europe by a Latin title which in translation signifies
"the blind yet farseeing doctor."
     These few biographical sketches plucked from the annals of
the blind are no more than samples. They are not even the most
illustrious instances I could have given. I have said nothing at
all about the best known of history's blind celebrities--Homer,
Milton, and Helen Keller. There is good reason for that omission.
Not only are those resounding names well enough known already,
but they have come to represent--each in its own sentimentalized,
storybook form--not the abilities and possibilities of people who
are blind but the exact opposite. Supposedly these giants are the
exceptions that prove the rule--the rule, that is, that the blind
are incompetent. Each celebrated case is explained away to keep
the stereotype intact: Thus, Homer (we are repeatedly told)
probably never existed at all--being not a man but a committee!
As for Milton, he is dismissed as a sighted poet, who happened to
become blind in later life. And Helen Keller, they say, was the
peculiarly gifted and just plain lucky beneficiary of a lot of
money and a "miracle worker" (her tutor and companion, Anne
Sullivan).
     Don't you believe it! These justly famous cases of
accomplishment are not mysterious, unexplainable exceptions--they
are only remarkable. Homer, who almost certainly did exist and
who was clearly blind, accomplished just a little better what
other blind persons after him have accomplished by the thousands:
that is, he was a good writer. Milton composed great works while
he was sighted, and greater ones (including Paradise Lost) after
he became blind. His example, if it proves anything, proves only
that blindness makes no difference in ability. As for Helen
Keller, her life demonstrates dramatically what great resources
of character and will and intellect may live in a human being
beyond the faculties of sight and sound--which is not to take
anything at all away from Anne Sullivan.
     In the modern world it is not the poets or the humanists,
but the scientists, who have held the center of the stage. As
would be expected, the stereotyped view has consistently been
that the blind cannot compete in these areas. How does this
square with the truth?
     Consider the case of Nicholas Saunderson--totally blind from
infancy--who succeeded Sir Isaac Newton in the chair of
mathematics at Cambridge University, despite the fact that he had
earlier been refused admission to the same university and was
never permitted to earn a degree! It was the great Newton himself
who pressed Saunderson's appointment upon the reluctant Cambridge
dons; and it was no less a personage than Queen Anne of England
who made it possible by conferring the necessary degree upon
Saunderson. Later he received a Doctor of Laws degree from King
George II, a symbol of the renown he had gained as a
mathematician. Among Saunderson's best subjects, by the way, was
the science of optics--at which he was so successful that the
eminent Lord Chesterfield was led to remark on "the miracle of a
man who had not the use of his own sight teaching others how to
use theirs."15
     For another example, consider John Cough, a blind English
biologist of the eighteenth century, who became a master at
classification of plants and animals by substituting the sense of
touch for that of sight. Or consider Leonard Euler, a great
mathematician of the same century, who (after becoming blind) won
two research prizes from the Parisian Academy of Sciences, wrote
a major work translated into every European language, and devised
an astronomical theory which "has been deemed by astronomers, in
exactness of computation, one of the most remarkable achievements
of the human intellect."16 Or, for a final illustration, consider
Francois Huber, blind Swiss zoologist, who gained recognition as
the pre-eminent authority of the eighteenth century on the
behavior of bees. The famous writer Maurice Maeterlinck said of
Huber that he was "the master and classic of contemporary
apiarian science."17
     Even after all of this evidence, there will be many (some of
them, regrettably, our own blind Uncle Toms) who will try to deny
and explain it all away--who will attempt to keep intact their
outworn notions about the helplessness of the blind as a class.
So let me nail down a couple of points: In the first place, is
all of this talk about history and the success of blind
individuals really valid? Isn't it true that most blind people
throughout the ages have lived humdrum lives, achieving neither
fame nor glory, and soon forgotten? Yes, it is true--but for the
sighted as well as for the blind. For the overwhelming majority
of mankind (the blind and the sighted alike) life has been
squalor and hard knocks and anonymity from as far back as anybody
knows. There were doubtless blind peasants, blind housewives,
blind shoemakers, blind businessmen, blind thieves, blind
prostitutes, and blind holy men who performed as competently or
as incompetently (and are now as forgotten) as their sighted
contemporaries.
     "Even so," the doubter may say, "I'm still not convinced.
Don't you think the track record for the blind is worse than the
track record for the sighted? Don't you think a larger percentage
of the blind have failed?"
     Again, the answer is yes--just as with other minorities.
That's what it's all about. Year after year, decade after decade,
century after century, age after age, we the blind were told that
we were helpless--that we were inferior--and we believed it and
acted accordingly. But no more! As with other minorities, we have
tended to see ourselves as others have seen us. We have accepted
the public view of our limitations, and thus have done much to
make those limitations a reality. When our true history
conflicted with popular prejudice, the truth was altered or
conveniently forgotten. We have been ashamed of our blindness and
ignorant of our heritage, but never again! We will never go back
to the ward status of second-class citizens. There is simply no
way. There are blind people aplenty--and sighted allies, too--
(many of them in this room tonight) who will take to the streets
and fight with their bare hands if they must before they will let
it happen.
     And this, too, is history--our meeting, our movement, our
new spirit of self-awareness and self-realization. In our own
time and in our own day we have found leaders as courageous as
Zisca, and as willing to go into battle to resist tyranny. But we
are no longer to be counted by ones and twos, or by handfuls or
hundreds. We are now a movement, with tens of thousands in the
ranks. Napoleon is supposed to have said that history is a legend
agreed upon. If this is true, then we the blind are in the
process of negotiating a new agreement, with a legend conforming
more nearly to the truth and the spirit of the dignity of man.   
And what do you think future historians will say of us--of you
and me? What legends will they agree upon concerning the blind of
the mid-twentieth century? How will they deal with our movement--
with the National Federation of the Blind? Will they record that
we fell back into the faceless anonymity of the ages, or that we
met the challenges and survived as a free people? It all depends
on what we do and how we act; for future historians will write
the record, but we will make it. Our lives will provide the raw
materials from which their legends will emerge to be agreed upon.
     And, while no man can predict the future, I feel absolute
confidence as to what the historians will say. They will tell of
a system of governmental and private agencies established to
serve the blind, which became so custodial and so repressive that
reaction was inevitable. They will tell that the blind ("their
time come 'round at last") began to acquire a new self-image,
along with rising expectations, and that they determined to
organize and speak for themselves. And they will tell of Jacobus
tenBroek, how he, as a young college professor, (blind and
brilliant) stood forth to lead the movement like Zisca of old.   
They will tell how the agencies first tried to ignore us, then
resented us, then feared us, and finally came to hate us--with
the emotion and false logic and cruel desperation which dying
systems always feel toward the new about to replace them.    They
will tell of the growth of our movement through the forties and
fifties, and of our civil war--which resulted in the small group
that splintered away to become the American Council of the Blind.
They will tell how we emerged from our civil war into the
sixties, stronger and more vital than we had ever been; and how
more and more of the agencies began to make common cause with us
for the betterment of the blind. They will tell of our court
cases, our legislative efforts, and our organizational struggles-
-and they will record the sorrow and mourning of the blind at the
death of their great leader, Jacobus tenBroek.
     They will also record the events of today--of the 1970s--
when the reactionaries among the agencies became even more so,
and the blind of the second generation of the NFB stood forth to
meet them. They will talk of the American Foundation for the
Blind and its attempt (through its tool, NAC) to control all work
with the blind, and our lives. They will tell how NAC and the
American Foundation and the other reactionary agencies gradually
lost ground and gave way before us. They will tell of new and
better agencies rising to work in partnership with the blind, and
of harmony and progress as the century draws to an end. They will
relate how the blind passed from second-class citizenship through
a period of hostility to equality and first-class status in
society.
     But future historians will only record these events if we
make them come true. They can help us be remembered, but they
cannot help us dream. That we must do for ourselves. They can
give us acclaim, but not guts and courage. They can give us
recognition and appreciation, but not determination or compassion
or good judgment. We must either find those things for ourselves,
or not have them at all.
     We have come a long way together in this movement. Some of
us are veterans, going back to the forties; others are new
recruits, fresh to the ranks. Some are young; some are old. Some
are educated, others not. It makes no difference. In everything
that matters we are one; we are the movement; we are the blind.  
Just as in 1940, when the National Federation of the Blind was
formed, the fog rolls in through the Golden Gate. The eucalyptus
trees give forth their pungent smell, and the Berkeley hills look
down at the bay. The house still stands in those hills, and the
planes still rise from San Francisco to span the world. But
Jacobus tenBroek comes from the house no more, nor rides the
planes to carry the word.
     But the word is carried, and his spirit goes with it. He it
was who founded this movement, and he it is whose dreams are
still entwined in the depths of its being. Likewise, our dreams
(our hopes and our visions) are part of the fabric, going forward
to the next generation as a heritage and a challenge. History is
not against us: the past proclaims it; the present confirms it;
and the future demands it. If we falter or dishonor our heritage,
we will betray not only ourselves but those who went before us
and those who come after. But, of course, we will not fail.
Whatever the cost, we shall pay it. Whatever the sacrifice, we
shall make it. We cannot turn back, or stand still. Instead, we
must go forward. We shall prevail--and history will record it.
The future is ours. Come! Join me on the barricades, and we will
make it come true.

                            FOOTNOTES

1. Wilham Artman, Beauties and Achievements of the Blind (Auburn:
Published for the Author, 1890), p.265.
2. James Wilson, Biography of the Blind (Birmingham, England:
     Printed by J.W. Showell, Fourth Edition, 1838), p.110. 3.
Artman,
3. op. cit., p. 265.
4. Ibid., p.266.
5. Ibid., p.267.
6. Ibid., p.268.
7. Ibid., pp.268-269.
8. Wilon, op.cit., p.115
9. Mrs. Hippolyte Van Landeghem, Exile and Home: Advantages of
     Social Education of the Blind (London: Printed by W. Clowes
& Sons, 1865), p.95.
10. Gabriel Farrell, The Story of Blindness (Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 1956), p.7.
11. Wilson, op.cit., p.262.
12. Ibid., pp.100-101
13. Artman, op.cit., p.220.
14. Wilson, op.cit., p.243.
15. Farrell, op.cit., p.11.
16. Artman, op.cit., p.226.
17. Farrell, op.cit., pp.12-13.



[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Fred Schroeder.]

       BRAILLE BILLS: WHAT ARE THEY AND WHAT DO THEY MEAN?
                     by Fredric K. Schroeder

     From the Associate Editor: Fred Schroeder has been a leader
in the organized blind movement for a number of years. He
currently serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the
National Federation of the Blind. He is also an experienced
professional in the field of work with the blind. Trained as a
teacher of blind children and an orientation and mobility 
specialist, he directed the low incidence programs in the
Albuquerque, New Mexico, public school system before becoming the
Director of the New Mexico Commission for the Blind. He is a
professional in the blindness field with excellent credentials,
down-to-earth common sense, and a sense of humor that gives him
perspective. But first and foremost, he is a blind consumer, and
his ability to remember that truth keeps his feet planted firmly
in reality. In the following article he describes what Braille
bills are and places them in the context of the struggle of blind
people for equal opportunity. Here is what he has to say:

     In 1940, when the blind organized to promote their social
and economic integration, there was a dramatic albeit predictable
response from the field of work with the blind. Professionals
harbored real resentment against clients who presumed to speak
out on their own behalf. The conflict centered on the simple
question of who would speak for the blind. Would it be the blind
themselves, or would it be those in the blindness profession, who
through training and practice had come to regard themselves as
the true experts on the needs of blind people?
     For more than fifty years this conflict has continued
focusing on a series of issues which in turn have represented the
latest battleground in the ongoing conflict. We have struggled
over freedom of association; the institutionalization of
oppressive practices through the creation of the National
Accreditation Council; minimum wages for blind workers; and, most
recently, freedom of choice in the provision of rehabilitation
services. In each case and at each step, the right of self-
determination has been at the center of the fray; yet as blind
people we have never faltered in our conviction that we alone are
best able to appraise our own needs and determine our own
futures.
     In the late 1970s the National Federation of the Blind began
to call for the teaching of cane travel to young blind children.
What appeared to skilled cane travelers to be the self-evident
advantage of teaching young children to travel
independently escaped most blindness professionals, who met our
demands with open hostility. The orientation and mobility
professionals believed that cane travel should be restricted to
high-school-aged students and perhaps the occasional middle
school student. The concept of training young children to use the
white cane was viewed as irresponsible and denounced as the
political agitation of a radical group of malcontents.
     Yet the blind, recognizing the importance of self-confidence
and the skills to put that confidence into practice, began
working with parents and young children to show them the
advantages of independent travel. Finally the self-evident
benefits of early cane training began to penetrate the
orientation and mobility profession. Eventually, the idea of
early cane training ceased to be radical as mobility
professionals began tentatively experimenting with the idea. At
the end of a decade of blind people's pressing for early cane
training, the orientation and mobility profession announced a
startling revelation: the profession--all by itself, without any
help from anyone--had miraculously discovered that young children
could in fact master independent cane travel. Late in 1988 the
Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness, a publication of the
American Foundation for the Blind, carried an article discussing
cane training for young blind children. Incredibly it was
purported that this article was the first time anyone had
discussed the possibility of cane training for preschoolers.
     It is disappointing that progress in the field of work with
the blind seems always to follow the pattern of blind people's
pressing for change and the professionals' stubbornly resisting
progress. The most recent example of this pattern can be seen in
the Braille literacy controversy. In the early 1980s the National
Federation of the Blind began drawing attention to the increasing
level of illiteracy among blind students graduating from our
nation's schools. Much of the decrease in literacy can be traced
to the low vision movement of the 1970s, which
inculcated in modern pedagogy the age-old myth that to see a
little was somehow better (almost more virtuous) than to see not
at all. For twenty years young blind children were dissuaded from
learning and reading Braille in favor of relying ineffectively on
limited vision to read print. While it is not necessary to
catalogue this tragedy in detail, it is fair to say that a whole
generation of blind people have suffered diminished opportunity
as a result of inadequate Braille training.
     Needing a mechanism for focussing public attention on the
Braille crisis, the National Federation of the Blind created the
concept of Braille legislation, which would establish public
policy on the right of blind persons to become literate and
productive. The first Braille bill was passed in Minnesota just
five years ago in 1987. As with other controversies throughout
the years, the blind have led the fight while professionals
denied that a problem existed.
     In the five years since the first Braille bill was passed,
eleven states have followed suit: Arizona, Kansas, Kentucky,
Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, South Carolina,
Texas, and Virginia have joined the ranks of states committed to
greater opportunities for blind children.
     Not surprisingly, a number of myths have developed
concerning Braille bills and their effects. The most common of
these is the charge that Braille bills mandate Braille
instruction for all legally blind children. While this charge is
intended to demonstrate the irrationality of the Federation's
viewpoint, one is tempted to ask what is wrong with wanting
legally blind children to learn Braille. Neither parents nor
teachers cringe when they realize that sighted children are
expected to learn print, nor is there a passionate demand to
consider the sighted child's individuality. Yet the concept of
teaching legally blind children to read Braille is offered as
another example of the radical and irrational nature of the
organized blind. 
     Regardless of whether all blind children should or should
not be taught Braille, none of the nation's twelve Braille
statutes contains such a requirement. No Braille bill in any
state requires the teaching of Braille to all legally blind
children. The strongest legislation sets forth a presumption that
legally blind children will read Braille unless the Individual
Education Plan (IEP) team determines otherwise, while other
legislation mandates only that Braille be considered in the
educational planning for blind children. The real purpose of
Braille bills is to serve as a statement of public policy,
recognizing the need for literacy among the blind, paralleling
the need for literacy among the sighted.
     As Braille bills have developed, a number of logical
extensions have become incorporated into more recent pieces of
legislation. One of the most controversial is the requirement for
competency testing for teachers of blind children. With the
National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped
(NLS) on the verge of releasing a Braille competency test, such a
requirement has become practical and easy to administer. While it
is intuitively reasonable that teachers of blind children should
be able to read and write Braille, it must be remembered that the
educational establishment has de-emphasized the code for more
than twenty years. As a result many teachers of blind children
are no longer able to read and write Braille efficiently and have
been trained to believe that Braille is the least desirable
choice. Teachers trained during this period probably received
poor training in Braille reading and writing initially and
subsequently found little if any use for it in their teaching.
Braille legislation requiring competency testing strikes a
responsive chord among many of today's blind children and their
parents. Predictably, significant numbers of teachers of blind
children oppose Braille bills, asserting that their competence to
read and write Braille is unrelated to their ability to teach
blind children. As a result these teachers have testified in
opposition to competency testing as an unimportant and
counterproductive element in Braille legislation.
     A relatively new element appearing in Braille legislation
concerns a requirement for textbook manufacturers to produce
material in electronic media in a form readily translatable into
Braille. This provision first surfaced in the Texas Braille bill
in May of 1991. While it was anticipated that this provision
would spark serious opposition from textbook publishers, in fact
the opposite has proven to be the case. Although a number of
technical problems still exist, the concept of computer-
translatable texts promises to make Braille more readily
available than ever before.
     As with other controversies throughout the past half-
century, the pattern remains consistent. First the blind promote
an idea which sparks professional opposition. Through
perseverance the idea achieves some implementation and success.
After a while, the validity of the idea is recognized, and
finally members of the profession jump on the bandwagon, eager to
take credit for having thought it up themselves. In 1987 the idea
of Braille bills was strongly opposed by many in the blindness
profession, yet the National Federation of the Blind persisted in
carrying the first one through the Minnesota legislature.
Gradually Braille bills became less controversial, and today
large segments of the blindness field have ceased opposing
Braille bills and, in fact, have formed coalitions to work
cooperatively toward promoting them. Progress does occur, albeit
slowly and painfully.
     The pattern of the blind's pressing for change and the
profession's resisting that change continues. As blind people we
refuse to suffer another lost generation. Literacy is a
fundamental right, and we will not have our potential and that of
today's blind children artificially depressed through inadequate
training. Blind children can compete and assume a productive role
in society. Generations of blind people have proven the truth of
this statement, and the next generation must be given the tools
to continue the struggle for true equality. Braille bills are an
expression of public policy and a manifestation of blind people's
determination to live normal lives as fully participating members
of society. Momentum is gathering as more and more states enact
Braille legislation, thereby joining the growing Braille literacy
movement. In many ways this movement has become an expression of
our confidence in the true ability of blind children and our
willingness to ensure them equality of opportunity. We must
translate this commitment into expressions of public policy and,
perhaps more to the point, into the day-to-day training that
blind children receive.


[PHOTO/CAPTION: On April 14, 1992, Kentucky's Governor signed the
state's Braille literacy legislation into law. At the ceremony
which marked this momentous occasion for Kentucky's blind
children, those who were chiefly responsible for accomplishing
this milestone gathered to celebrate the event. Pictured here
from left to right are Will Evans, Superintendent of the Kentucky
School for the Blind; Hilda Caton, Coordinator of Programs for
the Visually Impaired, University of Louisville; Betty Niceley,
President of the National Federation of the Blind of Kentucky;
Brereton Jones, Governor of Kentucky; Robbie Castleman, the State
Representative who introduced House Bill 370; and Charles Allen,
Legislative Chairman of the NFB of Kentucky.]

[PHOTO/CAPTION: NFB of S.C. Braille bill signing.]

                       BRAILLE BILL UPDATE

     In November of 1990 the Board of Directors of the National
Federation of the Blind decided that the organization should
develop language for a model Braille bill that could be used by
state affiliates around the country in working with their
legislatures to create laws that would protect the right of blind
children to full literacy. Since then several state affiliates
have succeeded in achieving passage of the model Braille bill,
and a number of others are working on the project. Of course,
several states had passed Braille Bills prior to the development
of the model bill language, and some of these are now working to
strengthen their laws. Here is a list of the states with Braille
literacy legislation on the books: Arizona, July 1, 1991; Kansas,
1991; Kentucky, signed into law April 14, 1992; Louisiana, 1988;
Maryland, passed April 2, 1992; Minnesota, 1987; Missouri,1990;
South Carolina, signed into law May 20, 1992; South Dakota, 1991;
Texas, September 1, 1991; Virginia, 1990.
     Here is the list of states with Braille bills currently
under consideration: California; Colorado; Connecticut; Illinois;
Iowa; Louisiana, considering amendments to the current act;
Massachusetts; Michigan; Minnesota, amendments to make current
law conform to the model Braille bill have passed the Senate;
Nebraska; Ohio; Washington State; and Wisconsin. Here are reports
on the most recent successes:

                              TEXAS
                         by Glenn Crosby

     July 31, 1991, was proclaimed Braille Literacy Day in the
State of Texas by Governor Ann Richards. The official
proclamation, written in both print and Braille, was presented to
members of the National Federation of the Blind of Texas during a
celebration in the Lieutenant Governor's Reception Room in the
state capitol.
     The news media were there in force to see President Glenn
Crosby thank Senator Mike Moncrief, Representative Elliott
Naishtat, and the scores of Federationists who had worked hard to
see that the Braille Literacy Act was passed during the regular
session of the Texas Legislature, which ended in May of 1991.
More than fifty representatives and senators were present to
celebrate the fact that the Texas Braille literacy legislation
has become the model for the rest of the country.
     Many professionals have attempted to take credit for the
hard work done by the blind in Texas, but everyone who worked on
passage of this piece of legislation recognizes that the
Federation was the moving force behind it. If members of the NFB
hadn't written a model law and if many other state affiliates had
not worked so hard to pass Braille laws before we did, the Texas
law would probably not have been adopted.
     Dr. Phil Hatlen, superintendent of the Texas School for the
Blind, presented testimony in favor of the legislation, and the
National Federation of the Blind of Texas appreciates his support
on this issue. But the testimony of blind people who had been
denied Braille training because they had some residual vision and
that of the totally blind people who demonstrated that
proficiency in the use of Braille allowed them to be credible
witnesses because they were able to read from notes as
efficiently as other witnesses are what made the real difference.
The legislature knows that the blind of Texas are the reason that
this law was enacted, and so does the governor. They all thanked
the blind for bringing the problem to their attention, and the
proclamation was presented to the National Federation of the
Blind of Texas. It will grace the Federation's office wall rather
than that of any professional in the state.
     Since the law was adopted last May, the NFB of Texas has
been working with the Texas Education Agency to implement the
law's provisions dealing with the definition of functional
blindness, certification of Braille proficiency for teachers of
the blind in Texas, and availability of textbooks in electronic
media so that they can be translated into Braille. Jeff Pearcy
and Tommy Craig of Austin have served on committees which dealt
with the first two items, and Eura Mae Harmon of Amarillo serves
on the Texas Commission on Braille Textbook Production, which
will work on making Braille textbooks more available.
     Aside from the work with the Texas Education Agency, the
affiliate is also working with the sponsors of the Braille
literacy law, Senator Mike Moncrief and Representative Elliott
Naishtat, to make several public service announcements to be used
on television stations throughout the state. These will inform
the public that this law has been passed and will provide the
toll-free number of the NFB of Texas so that parents and teachers
who have questions about the legislation can contact us. We also
hope to promote the use of Braille with these messages by showing
blind people using Braille in various circumstances while the
announcement is being made.

                         SOUTH CAROLINA
                       by Donald C. Capps

     The NFB's model Braille bill passed the South Carolina
General Assembly on February 27, 1992, and was signed into law in
a public ceremony by the Governor on May 20. The South Carolina
affiliate arranged to have the model Braille bill introduced into
the joint House Senate Committee on People with Disabilities in
January of 1991, but complications developed during the year when
the parent of a blind child decided that the law would mean that
her child would be compelled to learn Braille against her wishes.
She then disseminated a good bit of misleading information
throughout the legislature and stirred up what opposition she
could in an effort to derail the bill. In early January of this
year the National Federation of the Blind of South Carolina
shifted into high gear to insure that the bill would be passed.
Each of the thirty-four Federation chapters spoke with local
legislators, and the affiliate developed a Braille literacy
brochure, which was given to each lawmaker who attended the
organization's annual legislative dinner on January 15. The
brochure was also sent to every representative and senator who
had not attended. Ample use was also made of Braille Monitor
articles about the importance of Braille literacy, and letters
and other contacts by Federation experts on Braille literacy from
across the country poured into legislators' offices. The result
of all this effort was that in less than six weeks from the date
of the legislative dinner the bill had passed both the House and
the Senate and was on its way to the Governor for signing. The
South Carolina affiliate worked hard to pass this law, but we
could not have done it without the expertise and support of the
entire membership of the National Federation of the Blind.

                            KENTUCKY
                        by Betty Niceley

     On March 30, 1992, the Kentucky Senate passed the state's
version of the Federation's model Braille bill. By that date
every committee and both houses of the legislature had passed the
bill unanimously. Governor Brereton Jones signed it into law in a
public ceremony on April 14. The explanation for all this
unanimity was simple: the National Federation of the Blind of
Kentucky had been working for many months behind the scenes to
bring all the parties into agreement. 
     As frequently happens, the special education teachers who
work with blind and visually impaired youngsters had been
extremely nervous about the legislation. Recognizing that their
own Braille skills were weak or, in some cases, non-existent,
they began by opposing the bill. But Dr. Hilda Caton, Coordinator
of Programs for the Visually Impaired at the University of
Louisville and a Braille researcher at the American Printing
House for the Blind, was enthusiastic about the proposed
legislation from the beginning. She said repeatedly and publicly
that "the Federation has been right about Braille literacy all
along." Her vocal support was extremely helpful, for she has
trained most of the teachers of blind students working in the
state today and is therefore highly respected by them. 
     Will Evans, Superintendent of the Kentucky School for the
Blind, invited representatives from the Federation to a meeting
to discuss with teachers the provisions of the bill. David
Murrell, one of the authors of the bill's language; Dr. Caton;
and I, as President of the NFB of Kentucky, attended the meeting
to address teacher concerns. We had expected to face the teachers
from the School for the Blind only, but the twenty-one vision
teachers from Jefferson County were there as well. The entire
meeting lasted about four hours. One young teacher complained
that she would have to return to school to master Braille
sufficiently to become certified. Who was going to pay for that?
The Superintendent suggested that she could surely study on her
own to get the necessary practice. At that she began a long
recital of her duties and said that she did not have the time to
do work independently, to which Dr. Caton replied in her gentle
drawl, "Honey, if you don't have time to learn Braille, you're in
the wrong job." 
     Another teacher stood up at one point and said that he was
legally blind, but he would have to be dragged kicking and
screaming into learning Braille. My response was a statement to
the entire group that this teacher's negative attitude was the
best reason I could think of for beginning early Braille
instruction with legally blind children. 
     Eventually a small group retired to work on compromise
language that would reassure the teachers without diluting the
bill. Several times Dr. Caton was appealed to by the teachers to
suggest new language. She kept repeating, "I thought the original
language was fine." At last, however, everyone agreed on a text,
and letters of endorsement were submitted by the School for the
Blind and by the Jefferson County teachers. The model bill sailed
through the legislative process under the skillful and watchful
supervision of the NFB of Kentucky's invaluable Legislative
Chairman, Charles Allen and his equally dedicated wife Betty. 

                            MARYLAND
                        by Sharon Maneki

     The National Federation of the Blind of Maryland first
introduced a state Braille bill in 1986. The concept was
violently opposed by the staff of the Maryland School for the
Blind and by the state's Department of Education, and because of
the opposition the bill was defeated. During the intervening
years a great deal of patient effort has gone into educating
Department of Education personnel about the issue of literacy for
blind children and about the National Federation of the Blind.
Recently the Department established an advisory committee to
develop guidelines for determining which students should be
taught Braille and which should be taught print. The NFB agreed
to work with this committee, and at the same time the Department
agreed to send a representative to be a part of a task force
formed by the Federation to write a literacy bill for blind
students. Representatives from the School for the Blind, from the
special education programs of the three largest school systems in
the state, and from the American Council of the Blind, as well as
from the Department of Education, joined with the NFB in writing
the bill, completed late last fall. 
     In January the Federation devoted its annual legislative day
in the state capital to talking about Braille literacy with
Representatives and Senators. Two members of the ACB spent a
couple of hours working on the bill that day alongside the forty
Federationists, and the School for the Blind representative to
the task force visited a Senator or two, but most of the work was
done by the Federation. The Department of Education had helped to
write the bill, and though no one stepped forward from the
Department to discuss the issue with legislators, it was commonly
understood that the bill would not be opposed by Department
officials. 
     Then, two days before Senate committee hearings were to
begin in mid-February, the Department introduced several
amendments, the most important of which would have altered the
bill's presumption that Braille would be taught unless print was
clearly indicated; the Department version provided merely that
Braille would be considered. The amendment struck at the heart of
the Federation's legislation, and the amended version was the one
that the Senate passed. 
     In the meantime a House committee was preparing to hear the
original version, which had been introduced simultaneously in
that chamber. The Department of Education indicated to House
committee members that it would like its amendments to be added
to the House version, but this time the legislators asked for an
opinion from the Attorney General about whether the presumption-
of-Braille provision of the NFB bill conflicted with the
federally guaranteed right to an Individual Education Plan. The
Attorney General ruled that it did not, and as a result the House
passed the bill without the weakening amendments that the Senate
had attached. Next each chamber considered the other's version of
the bill. The House of Representatives passed the Senate bill
after it removed the amendments, but the Senate passed the House
bill without insisting upon adding them. The blind had won! The
legislative roller coaster ended on April 2, and the Governor is
scheduled to sign the bill into law in early May. It will take
effect on October 1, 1992. 
     The law is not everything that the organized blind wanted.
National Library Service competency certification has not been
mandated in the legislation, but Federationists are prepared to
go back to strengthen the certification standards if necessary.
In addition, the law does not address the question of requiring
publishers to provide text materials in electronic media for
rapid Braille production. But the heart of the model Braille bill
is intact: legally blind and functionally blind students now must
be offered Braille in Maryland.

     There you have the report on the most recent victories in
the NFB's battle for Braille literacy. Twenty states have Braille
legislation on the books or are considering it, and several other
NFB affiliates are getting ready to have literacy bills
introduced. Increasingly these bills are versions of the model
Braille bill first written by the Federation. State by state
blind people are taking responsibility for seeing that the next
generation of blind students will not face the functional
illiteracy that has plagued so many blind adults and children
today. More and more, and with increasing authority, we are
changing what it means to be blind.


[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Norma Crosby.]

          REACTION TO AMERICAN FOUNDATION FOR THE BLIND
                  ARTICLE ON TEXAS BRAILLE BILL

     From the Editor: As the new balances of influence and action
take shape in the blindness field, it would be surprising indeed
if some turbulence did not occur. A case in point involves the
Texas Braille Bill. Norma Crosby (who, as Monitor readers know,
is one of the leaders of the National Federation of the Blind of
Texas) expresses in the following letter to President Maurer her
annoyance with what she perceives to be inaccurate claims and
inappropriate reaching for credit by the American Foundation for
the Blind. Here without editorial comment is what she has to say:

                                                   Houston, Texas
                                                   March 18, 1992

Dear President Maurer:
     Enclosed you will find a copy of the Fall, 1991, AFB News (a
publication of the American Foundation for the Blind). It is a
dreadful piece of journalism which is filled with inaccuracies.
It implies that the Texas Braille Bill Literacy Act was more or
less the idea of the American Foundation for the Blind, and if
you didn't know better, you might think that the whole concept of
Braille literacy in Texas was theirs.
     Needless to say, we of the NFB of Texas are not amused by
this slanted journalism. In discussing Braille bills the
Foundation says, "In another literacy initiative, AFB played a
major role in advocating for a Braille bill which was signed into
law in the state of Texas in June."
     Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, when AFB
discovered that this piece of legislation had been introduced,
Mary Ann Siller, Southwest Regional Educational Consultant for
AFB, made contact with the sponsor of the bill and indicated that
they had some major problems with it, and she indicated that they
were opposed to the proposed law because it "didn't take into
account the rights of teachers."
     AFB only became involved with the law when we, in an effort
to assure passage, agreed to meet with all parties who had
concerns about the bill. They never played a major role in
advocating for this legislation. In fact, when it was time for
testimony on the issue, they were not present. However, they did
show signs of claiming credit early on by calling the proposal
"our bill." But Jeff Pearcy set them straight by pointing out
that the NFB of Texas had brought the bill to the legislature,
and he and Tommy Craig let them know that we would make the final
decision about which proposed changes were acceptable.
     The article also indicates that AFB did the organizing of
meetings relative to this bill. In fact, it says:
     "In another distinction from other Braille bills, Siller
notes that the final law brought a diverse constituency together
around a complex issue. AFB organized meetings and
teleconferences among representatives from AFB, the National
Federation of the Blind, the American Association of Publishers,
Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired, Texas Education
Agency, University of Texas at Austin Special Education
Department, the American Printing House for the Blind, and other
producers of materials in Braille and alternative formats."  They
did no such thing. They did attend some of those meetings, and to
that extent they were involved in the process. But, once again, I
point out that they only became involved in the process as
participant with negative feelings about the proposed
legislation.
     The only "professional" who was willing to stand up and be
counted on this issue was Dr. Phil Hatlen of the Texas School for
the Blind and Visually Impaired. He supported the legislation
from the beginning, and he worked in good faith to insure that it
would become law. He testified on behalf of the bill, and at
every opportunity, he gives (and has consistently given) the NFB
credit for having brought the bill to the legislature. There may
be times in the future when we will have disagreements with Dr.
Hatlen. However, in this instance he worked well with the members
of our organization to pass a good piece of legislation.
     The AFB should be ashamed for taking such liberties with the
truth. This is a major piece of legislation, and the blind of
this state and this country are the ones who caused it to be
law.  The tide is turning, and we are winning the law for
literacy. I am very proud to have been a part of the battle. But
I am equally concerned by the fact that we still have a long way
to go in being able to work constructively with some of the
professionals in the field.

                                                       Sincerely,
                                                     Norma Crosby

     There was a time (and not very many years ago at that) when
the blind of this country were in what can only be called a state
of war with the American Foundation for the Blind and a number of
other agencies. Happily (with notable exceptions) that time no
longer exists. Increasingly cooperative relations are being
established between the organized blind and a growing number of
the public and private agencies, but there are still bumps in the
road and problems to be solved. Hopefully we can go the rest of
the way to substantial unity in the blindness field. Otherwise,
the prospects for the blind, and especially for the agencies,
look less than promising.
     We have printed Norma Crosby's letter, pointing up a
troublesome situation. To achieve balance and in order that
Monitor readers may judge for themselves, we also print the
material from the Fall, 1991, AFB News to which she refers. Here
it is:

              AFB Develops Long Range Literacy Plan
                       by Fay Jarosh Ellis

     NEW YORK--When AFB first announced the launch of a public
education campaign to create awareness about literacy for persons
who are blind or visually impaired, individuals--from U.S.
Senators to teachers and literacy volunteers--called and wrote to
pledge their support. In view of that support, and what it
reflects about the needs for such a focus, AFB has established a
task force to develop a long-range literacy plan. Chaired by Mary
Ellen Mulholland, director of publications and information
services, and Kathleen M. Huebner, Ph.D., director of national
consultants, task force members include Susan J. Spungin, Ed.D.,
associate executive director for program services; Scott
Marshall, governmental relations director; Diane Wormsley, Ph.D.,
Western Regional Center director; Mary Ann Siller, Southwest
regional education consultant; Dawn Turco, Midwest regional
education consultant; Leslye Piqueras, national low vision
consultant; Doris Dieter, director of planned giving; Alberta
Orr, national consultant on aging; and Glenn M. Plunkett,
governmental relations specialist.
     The National Braille Literacy Mentor Project, spearheaded by
AFB's Western Regional Center, is one of several agencywide
initiatives included in the literacy plan. Conceived as a vehicle
for developing and disseminating materials to support instruction
in Braille, the project aims to establish a national database of
expert Braille users and Braille teachers, publish a book which
includes successful Braille teaching and learning strategies, and
create a model for Braille instruction that will be used in
summer training programs at residential schools for the blind.   
In addition, project staff hope to establish a mentor program by
matching expert Braille users and teachers with others in their
area who need to learn or refine their Braille skills.  Dr. Diane
Wormsley, who is administering the project, reports that the
initial call for expert Braille users and teachers has met with
enthusiastic response from professionals all over the country.
And queries about the project steadily increase.
     In the next stage of the project, each database participant
will be surveyed and interviewed to solicit their successful
instructional methods. Says Dr. Wormsley: "There is a vast oral
tradition among our teachers, some of whom have since retired,
about how to teach Braille. We hope to glean these tips from our
surveys, techniques which may have once been passed along from
one teacher to the next in an informal way without ever being
recorded in written form. Through the database, our publication,
and summer training programs, we hope to make it easier for
teachers, parents, and blind and visually impaired persons to
learn and teach Braille to others."

                          Braille Bills

     In another literacy initiative, AFB played a major role in
advocating for a Braille bill which was signed into law in the
state of Texas in June. "The Texas law is decidedly different
from other Braille bills now pending in other state
legislatures," said Mary Ann Siller, "because it does not
categorically mandate Braille instruction for all legally blind
students, and it addresses the problem that many blind students
face in getting Braille textbooks in a timely manner." (See
"Excerpted Provisions from the Texas Braille Bill.")
     Specifically, the law requires that teachers of blind
children be assessed and evaluated on their Braille skills, and
that a special committee be established to study and design
software to facilitate the production of print materials in the
literary Braille code.
     In another distinction from other Braille bills, Siller
notes that the final law brought a diverse constituency together
around a complex issue. AFB organized meetings and
teleconferences among representatives from AFB, the National
Federation of the Blind, the American Association of Publishers,
Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired, Texas Education
Agency, University of Texas at Austin Special Education
Department, the American Printing House for the Blind, and other
producers of materials in Braille and alternative formats.
     "For professionals, the new law provides standards for
assessing the appropriate learning media for students; and for
students, the law will make it easier to get Braille textbooks on
a timely basis," said Siller. "More importantly, this law puts
the literacy needs of our blind and visually impaired kids on the
front burner of domestic issues and policy. That has not happened
in Texas since the 1970s."
     Indeed, making literacy a national priority is the goal of
the AFB literacy plan which will include future projects in the
area of information exchange, research, program models,
publications, videos, technological access, public education,
public relations, and government relations.

        Excerpted Provisions from the Texas Braille Bill

 Each functionally blind student's individualized education
program shall specify the appropriate learning medium based on an
assessment report, and ensure that instruction in Braille will be
provided by a teacher certified to teach students with visual
handicaps.
 The Texas Education Agency shall determine the criteria for a
student to be classified as functionally blind.
 As a condition of certification to teach students with visual
handicaps, the State Board of Education by rule shall require
satisfactory performance on an examination prescribed by the
board that is designed to assess competency in Braille reading
and writing skills according to standards adopted by the board.
 The Texas Education Agency shall require a publisher of a
textbook adopted by the State Board of Education to furnish the
agency with computer diskettes for literary subjects in the
American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) from
which Braille versions of the textbook can be produced. The
publisher will furnish the agency with computer diskettes in
ASCII for nonliterary subjects, e.g., natural sciences, computer
science, mathematics, and music, when Braille specialty code
translation software is available.
 The State Board of Education shall appoint a 12-person
commission consisting of computer software developers, producers
of Braille textbooks, specialists in Braille education,
publishers of elementary and high school textbooks,
representatives of the Texas Education Agency, and at least one
consumer or an advocate for consumers of Braille materials to
expedite the implementation of Braille translation software for
nonliterary subjects. The commission will be established for a
two-year period and abolished as of September 1, 1993.


[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Peter Grunwald.]

         VARIATIONS ON A THEME: ILLINOIS FEDERATIONISTS
             FIGHT FOR THE RIGHT TO BRAILLE LITERACY

     From the Associate Editor: The effort to pass a Braille
literacy bill takes a different form in each state. Sometimes, as
happened in Kansas, all the knowledgeable parties agree on what
should be done, and the bill sails through the legislative
process guided by an informed and constructive hand. Sometimes
competing bills must be merged and compromises made before any
helpful legislation can be enacted. And very often the Federation
finds itself alone, fighting entrenched self-interest and inertia
as well as ignorance and myth in an effort to protect the right
of blind children to an appropriate education. 
     Every battle is unique, and most have barely begun. It is
instructive for us all to know what is happening in other states
so that we can benefit from past experience. What follows is an
interim report from Illinois. Peter Grunwald, one of the leaders
of the NFB of Illinois, has been leading the charge there. Here
is the letter he wrote explaining the situation to Dr. Jernigan: 

                                                Chicago, Illinois
                                                February 27, 1992

Dear Dr. Jernigan:
     Last November we received news that appeared to mean that
our efforts to pass a Braille bill would gain unexpected support.
I was asked by a group of teachers of the blind and other
professionals to meet with them regarding proposed Braille
legislation based on the Texas Braille bill. They indicated that
they support such legislation and asked to meet to discuss plans
and to address some specific issues. We were, of course, pleased
with this development; it certainly would be nice not to have to
pass a bill over the objection of those whose job it would be to
implement it.
     The first two meetings seemed positive enough; the
discussion was sometimes uninformed and trivial but, for the most
part, kept on track and moved forward with apparent agreement. By
the third meeting, however, it was clear that there were
problems. Dick Umsted, Superintendent of the Illinois School for
the Visually Impaired (ISVI) in Jacksonville, was absolutely
determined that all the language regarding publishers' supplying
computer diskette versions of textbooks to be used for production
of Braille copies should be removed and replaced with a simple
statement that the State of Illinois would participate in a
program operated by the American Printing House for the Blind. I
told the group that nothing in the language of our proposed bill
would prevent the State Board of Education from participating in
the APH program when it is developed, should that seem
advantageous. On the other hand, I said that mandating
participation in a program which did not yet exist and of which
we knew virtually nothing seemed at least to be putting the cart
before the horse and certainly irresponsible. Mr. Umsted was
adamant, however, and he swayed the other professionals.
     Mr. Umsted's single-minded determination on this issue
frankly gave me the impression that there is more involved than
honest conviction. While there is certainly a potential role for
a national clearinghouse, whoever might fill such a role would
obviously stand to gain much in influence, and a mandate under
law that the clearinghouse's services be used is uncomfortably
close to a monopoly. Obviously APH has much to gain in this
endeavor, and I believe Mr. Umsted may be carrying water for
them. I would not be surprised to learn that others are doing the
same.
     I am enclosing two pieces of correspondence for your
information. The first (to Jean Osterby) gives a sense of the
meetings which have taken place; the second (to Dr. Tinsley), is
an attempt to acquire a more detailed account of the current
status of the APH plan. 

                                                       Sincerely,
                                                   Peter Grunwald

     That was Mr. Grunwald's letter to Dr. Jernigan, and his
enclosures laid out the NFB of Illinois's position clearly. The
first was written to Jean Osterby, Chair of the Illinois Vision
Leadership Council, the organization with which Mr. Grunwald had
been meeting and to which members refer as the Braille Bill
Committee. Here is the letter:

                                                Chicago, Illinois
                                                February 24, 1992

Jean Osterby
Northwest Illinois Association
Geneva, Illinois

Dear Jean:
     I am writing you at this time to share with you my current
perceptions of the functioning of the Braille Bill Committee (as
it has been called). I have been troubled for some time, but upon
hearing a tape of the discussion of Braille bill issues at the
Illinois School for the Visually Impaired Advisory Committee
meeting of February 21, my impressions have been crystallized,
and I believe the time is right to bring them to your attention. 
Last November I was most pleased to learn from Cathy Randall that
you and other teachers and professionals were interested in and
supportive of the Texas Braille bill and wanted to work toward
adoption of similar legislation in Illinois. I
enthusiastically agreed to meet with you and the others, and a
meeting date of December 2 was chosen.
     At the opening of the December 2 meeting I went to some
length to outline the leadership role of the National Federation
of the Blind in the adoption of Braille bills in various states
during the past several years, including the Texas Braille bill.
I indicated that we in the NFB were excited to learn that
Illinois's professionals were actively interested in such
legislation, since the pattern in other states had more often
been the adoption of legislation over the strong opposition of
the education community. 
     I indicated that we were glad to welcome all of you aboard
our train, since more passengers might speed the desired arrival,
and more ideas might design a better train. However, since this
had been our issue and since we had been until recently virtually
the bill's only champion, we were not about to relinquish the
controls of the train. I told the group of our resolution adopted
at our September, 1991, NFB of Illinois convention and said that
I was bound to operate within the policies contained in that
Resolution. 
     I indicated that we were actively discussing introduction of
a bill with an interested member of the State Senate and intended
to have a bill introduced at the earliest opportunity. (Dick
Umsted asked if I would identify the possible sponsor, and I said
at that time that I could not.) I told the group that we were
glad to discuss any questions and concerns anyone might have
about the Texas Braille bill and indicated that we would
certainly discuss changes to address agreed concerns. I
emphasized, however, that we were not interested in straying very
far from the Texas model and were completely unwilling to stray
from its intent. 
     My recollection of the balance of that meeting is that we
all discussed a general direction for further discussion. We
agreed to have a follow-up meeting January 3, at which we would
go through the Texas bill section by section, discuss questions
and concerns, and presumably arrive at mutual understandings.
     At the January 3 meeting we actually began to go through the
bill. We got through Sections 1 and 2. Much of the time was spent
changing every occurrence of "blind students" to "students who
are blind." (I indicated that I did not understand the
significance or relevance of this change, but I made no
objection.) One occurrence of "medium" was changed to
"medium/media," an alteration with which I concurred. We also
discussed a number of other concerns, particularly those
regarding multiply handicapped blind students. I explained why I
thought those concerns were already addressed in the Texas model,
and it was my impression that there was consensus that this was
so. At any rate, no changes were proposed regarding these
concerns, and at the end of the meeting we agreed that Sections 1
and 2 had been thoroughly addressed. Another meeting was
scheduled for January 23 to discuss remaining sections and any
other concerns.
     At the January 23 meeting I indicated that arrangements had
been finalized with a sponsor. At another point, there was
discussion of having the Illinois State Board of Education
introduce the Braille bill, to which I responded that this had
not been and would not be our intent. Considerable time was spent
discussing the sections regarding computerized production of
Braille textbooks. Dick Umsted led in pushing for specific
endorsement of the American Printing House for the Blind's
proposed program. I expressed concern that, while there was
certainly something to be said for the notion of a national
clearinghouse approach, the APH plan was by no means finalized,
and there is much we do not yet know. I said that there is no
reason why (assuming the adoption of the Texas model) the State
Board of Education could not participate in the APH program. On
the other hand, I said that it seemed to me that to endorse by
legislation a program which did not yet exist and whose benefits
were not yet measurable seemed to be at least putting the cart
before the horse. I believe I made it clear at the time that I
did not support this approach. In case I did not make it clear,
let me do so now: the NFB of Illinois does not support
endorsement of the American Printing House's proposed program by
writing participation in it into the law.
     I indicated at the beginning of the January 23 meeting that
I had to leave in order to catch the 6:05 p.m. train. Apparently,
after I left, another meeting was set for the following week in
conjunction with the Association for Rehabilitation and Education
of Blind and Visually Impaired (AER) meeting in Bloomington.
According to the summary material which you sent, at that meeting
some of the issues discussed regarding Sections 1 and 2 at the
January 3 meeting were revisited and changes adopted. I have
concerns regarding these changes. But leaving aside the merits,
it cannot be said that I agreed to them, because I was unaware of
them and indeed was not present.
     To return (at last) to the meeting of the Illinois School
for the Visually Impaired Advisory Committee, I heard
considerable discussion of a mystery bill, which had been
introduced without anyone's knowledge. This is, of course, our
bill. We indicated in December that we intended to introduce a
bill, and we discussed progress in January. I always indicated
that we would support amendments which might address agreed
concerns, and this of course remains true. I also heard you, Tony
Heinz, and Dick Umsted refer to the role of the Braille Bill
Committee as being to prepare a draft for introduction by the
State Board of Education. Let me reiterate that, as I indicated
at each of our meetings, that was not and is not the NFB of
Illinois's intention. Finally, I heard discussion implying that
there had been total consensus regarding the output of the
Braille Bill Committee thus far. The previous paragraphs would
certainly imply that I do not concur with such a
characterization.
     All this having been said, I remain confident that people of
good will can arrive at an understanding and that it is by no
means too late for this to occur. I think that if we are indeed
to move in this direction, there must be real understanding of
each participant's views and some restraint in characterizing the
positions of others. Perhaps in the interest of harmony at our
meetings, I have not been sufficiently forceful in stating the
NFB's positions (although a lack of forcefulness is not something
of which I have often been accused) and thus have contributed to
a misunderstanding. Be this as it may, misunderstandings
certainly do exist and must be resolved.
     I have discussed these matters with Steve Benson, President
of the NFB of Illinois, during the past several days; and we have
agreed that another forum may be the best approach for resolving
such differences. He has agreed to contact you with a proposal
for such a forum for discussion. I am sure that such discussions
can put things back on track and that we can once again move
toward finding areas of concurrence leading to an agreed Braille
bill.

                                                       Sincerely,
                                                    PeterGrunwald

cc: Steve Benson

     There you have the letter to Jean Osterby, and on the same
day Mr. Grunwald wrote to Dr. Tuck Tinsley, President of the
American Printing House for the Blind. Here is that letter:

                                                Chicago, Illinois
                                                February 24, 1992

Dr. Tuck Tinsley
American Printing House for the Blind
Louisville, Kentucky

Dear Dr. Tinsley:
     The National Federation of the Blind of Illinois (NFBI) has
been actively pursuing the enactment of legislation in Illinois
which would improve the quality and availability of Braille
instruction to blind students throughout the state. We have used
the Texas Braille bill (with which you are doubtless familiar) as
a model, secured a sponsor, and arranged its introduction into
the State Senate.
     During the course of discussion regarding the bill, some
representatives of the education community raised the subject of
the American Printing House's proposed role as a clearinghouse
for computerized data from which Braille copies of textbooks may
be produced. There is certainly merit in the notion of a central
clearinghouse. Potentially a great deal of duplication of effort
might be avoided. Yet there is much that remains unknown
regarding the ultimate potential and the current status of your
efforts in this regard. Therefore, it would be most helpful if
you would review for us your goals and objectives for this
proposal in general and its current status. Additionally, would
you please respond to these specific concerns:
     1. With which publishers have you currently reached
agreements regarding your clearinghouse proposal? What steps are
you taking to increase the number of publishers who will
participate?
     2. What is the nature of your agreements with publishers?
What carrots and sticks are there to encourage their
participation and their compliance with the agreements?
     3. Illinois does not have state-adopted textbooks. In fact,
each school district is free to choose the most obscure titles
for reasons of true merit, politics, whim, etc. How can
Illinoisans be assured that all of the textbooks in use will be
available through your proposed clearinghouse?
     4. What technical standards will be in use for your
proposal? What mechanism exists to develop these standards?
     5. What charges or fees do you anticipate for the services
of your proposed clearinghouse? What statements, agreements, or
contracts will exist between APH and the recipients of its
clearinghouse services?
     We are confident that legislation such as we have introduced
would have an important and beneficial effect on blind students
in Illinois. Your information may well help avoid some
unnecessary controversy and thus assist the process in moving
forward. Therefore, I thank you in advance for whatever
assistance you may be able to provide, and I look forward to your
response.

                                                       Sincerely,
                                                   Peter Grunwald

cc: Steve Benson, Marc Maurer, Kenneth Jernigan

     That was Pete Grunwald's letter to the head of the American
Printing House for the Blind, and on March 23, he received a
response from David Bice, APH's Publisher Liaison. Here it is:

Dear Mr. Grunwald:
     Dr. Tuck Tinsley, President of the American Printing House
for the Blind, has given your letter of February 24, 1992, to me
for responses to your questions concerning the American Printing
House for the Blind's role as a clearinghouse for permissions and
electronic data from publishers. I have enclosed a copy of the
proposed agreement between the American Printing House for the
Blind, Recording for the Blind, and publishers. This, in addition
to answers to your specific questions, should help clarify what
is occurring with this issue.
     I believe you need a brief history of our efforts in
providing a national depository for permissions and electronic
data. This past July the National Association of State Textbook
Administrators, to which Illinois sends a representative,
endorsed our proposal for a central depository. This endorsement
included a recommendation to the major textbook companies to help
implement such an agreement.
     In August two presidents of major textbook companies and two
state textbook administrators came to Louisville to serve as an
advisory board for implementing the recommendation from the July
meeting. The following October Dr. Tinsley and I appeared before
the Board of Directors of the School Division of the Association
of American Publishers in New York to explain our proposal, the
enclosed document, to these eight presidents of textbook
companies. Recording for the Blind officials then appeared before
the group in November to confirm our cooperative approach.
     The AAP Board in December, 1991, voted to endorse the
proposal. Don Eklund, Executive Vice-President of the School
Division of AAP, and Buzz Ellis, Chairman of the Board, then
announced the endorsement to the over 300 textbook publishers
present at the School Division of AAP Annual Meeting in Boston in
January, 1992.
     Dr. Tinsley and Ritchie Geisel, President of Recording for
the Blind, then sent a joint letter to the presidents of every
major textbook producer in the United States. This letter was
mailed the second week of February. This leads to the point of
answering your questions.
     1. One major company signed the agreement on March 7, 1992.
We know of four others that are close to signing the agreement.
We are in contact with publishers on a continual basis by
telephone, mail, and in person. On Monday, March 16, I met with
three presidents and Don Eklund in Chicago to continue our
discussions.
     2. The nature of the agreement is in the enclosure. I have
found that the majority of publishers, especially the presidents,
are eager to see this type of agreement work. The stick I have
used is the right of visually impaired students to be treated
equally with sighted students. The carrots are giving the
publishers the right to list in other catalogs the availability
of Braille textbooks and relieving them of the vast amount of
paperwork in releasing permissions.
     3. We are well aware that twenty-seven states do not have
state adoptions and have particular problems in supplying
textbooks. Despite the right to choose the most obscure
textbooks, most school districts use books produced by major
publishers. These publishers supply more than 90 percent of the
textbooks nationwide. Smaller publishers will remain a problem
for at least two more years. We cannot guarantee every textbook,
but by establishing a national clearinghouse, we can help you
come closer to reaching that goal.
     4. The simple acquisition of ASCII computer files is not the
total answer to placing Braille textbooks in the classrooms. It
is one step. The files are not necessarily complete, nor are they
in order. We are presently working with publishers, the Texas
Braille Commission, and computer groups to organize standards for
receiving ASCII files. We have sent two representatives to the C-
Sun Conferences on Computer Standards to discuss your very
concerns.
     5. At this time we envision two levels of dispensing ASCII
files to states. First will be the files as we obtain them. These
files will be transmitted to state agencies without cost. We will
be the depository for publishers to relieve them and you of
requests from across the country for the materials. Permissions
will be done electronically and be instantaneous. Second, will be
edited ASCII. If we edit and organize the files, we will pass
those actual costs to the states and agencies. We have not yet
addressed the issue of a contract or agreement with states though
I can assure you any statement will be made in the interest of
the students.
     I hope the above is helpful to you in serving the needs of
visually impaired students in Illinois. Please telephone or write
me if you need further clarification or answers to other
questions.

                                                       Sincerely,
                                                    David A. Bice
                                                Publisher Liaison

cc: Dr. Tuck Tinsley

     There is much to be said for having one or two organizations
take initiative for creating and administering the kind of
clearinghouse for text material ready for conversion to Braille,
large-print, or computer disc texts for blind students. It is a
mammoth task, fraught with many complex technical and legal
difficulties. If the American Printing House and Recording for
the Blind are prepared to work collegially to create the clearing
house and supervise its activities in a way that will make
materials quickly and relatively inexpensively available to blind
students and their teachers, more power to them. 
     However, such a program should not be written into state
law, particularly before the clearinghouse is in a position to
provide accessible text materials to those who need them.
Moreover, the time might come when the APH clearinghouse was
closed or became unduly expensive or cumbersome to use. It would
be far better for state education personnel to be left free to
negotiate the best means by which to procure text books in
alternative media.
     The American Printing House for the Blind and Recording for
the Blind are to be commended for their energetic efforts to work
with publishers to solve the technical problems associated with
providing accessible disc copies of text books for use by blind
students. This said, however, it continues to be important for
the organized blind movement to remain vigilant in order to
insure that everyone continues to act in the best interest of
blind students. That is what the members of the National
Federation of the Blind of Illinois are doing.



[PHOTO: Mary Ellen Halverson seated at table. CAPTION: Mary Ellen
Halverson.]

[PHOTO: Betty Sabin standing at podium. CAPTION: Betty Sabin.]

                     REFLECTIONS FROM IDAHO:
                  THE ROLE OF BRAILLE LITERACY

     From the Associate Editor: Members of the National
Federation of the Blind of Idaho are preparing to have a Braille
bill introduced in the state's legislature. As part of that
preparation, the affiliate devoted the Fall, 1991, edition of its
publication, Gem State Milestones to the subject of Braille
literacy. The following comments have been excerpted from several
articles appearing in that issue of the newsletter. They
demonstrate how important Braille literacy has always been,
continues to be, and will be in the years ahead, despite the
technological innovations that some maintain have made Braille
obsolete. Mary Ellen Halverson is the Editor of the Gem State
Milestones. Betty Sabin is the second vice-president of the
National Federation of the Blind of Idaho, and Suzie Hanks is the
well-informed mother of a blind child. Here is what they have to
say: 

                   Braille--A Well Kept Secret
                     by Mary Ellen Halverson

     By the time I was in junior high, I was legally blind, and
my parents were reading most of my assignments to me. I took
notes in my classes during junior and senior high and then
struggled to read them in the evenings. I dreaded quizzes and
tests for two reasons: first, I might not be able to read the
sometimes light print, and second, I was very embarrassed because
I had to read and write with the material two or three inches
from my face. During those years not one school official, not one
teacher, not even a sight saving teacher ever suggested that I
learn Braille. In fact, the resource teacher told me that I was
fortunate that I could still read large print and did not have to
learn Braille like a totally blind boy she knew. I am sure that,
by the time we were in high school, that young man was reading
far more efficiently and confidently than I was. I'm so glad that
today schools are awakening to the needs of blind children.

                Should My Children Learn Braille?
                         by Betty Sabin

     The school says that my children can read print and should
do so as long as possible. The teacher says about the same thing.
She adds that they can always use cassettes when reading becomes
too difficult. They both say that it would be too hard for my
girls to learn Braille and print at the same time. Some say that
every child has the right to be introduced to Braille. Some say
that using talking devices is helpful but does not contribute to
functional literacy. I'm confused!
     Here are my thoughts as a blind parent of two daughters, who
are blind. A student who is just learning the skills of spelling
and grammar is at a disadvantage when using spoken formats.
Therefore, writing well becomes difficult at best. A student who
reads print slowly and with a lot of strain is not able to
comprehend as much as one who reads Braille comfortably at a
normal speed. As children reach the higher grades and their
increased reading requirements, assignments become more difficult
for visually impaired print readers even when they have reading
aids available. My daughters, who did not learn Braille, have
found this to be true. They were able to keep up with their
classmates in the early grades, but in high school it was taking
all day to complete reading assignments. They could read for
short periods only without getting headaches. If they had known
Braille, they would have been able to read assignments in about
the same amount of time as their classmates. If Braille is
presented with a positive attitude, it is not any more difficult
to master than other skills children learn. I believe that
children with useable residual sight should be taught to read
both print and Braille. They can then choose which skill is most
efficient for the task at hand.
     Deciding whether to write print or Braille presents a
similar problem. A legally blind person who writes print only may
not be able to write fast enough to take notes in class or may
not be able to read them back later. Adequate Braille skills
eliminate this problem.

                    Katie Goes to First Grade
                         by Suzie Hanks

     We moved to Idaho three years ago when Katie was three. We
were concerned about her receiving an adequate program.
     In Minnesota Katie had a twice-weekly visit from her teacher
for the visually impaired, a twice-weekly visit from her mobility
and orientation instructor, and once-a-week visits from an
occupational therapist and an infant stimulation specialist.
These services were provided through our local school district.
     In Idaho we quickly realized that the three- to five-year-
old program in the public schools was just starting and we had to
be innovative and creative. We enrolled Katie in the Child
Development Center and asked the School for the Deaf and Blind to
provide consultation services. The Boise school district agreed
to provide orientation and mobility instruction as well as
consultation with the staff.
     Creativity and flexibility have been the key to Katie's
program ever since. She is now in first grade at Liberty
Elementary School, and we have been pleased with her program.
     Katie attends regular classes except for her Braille
lessons, which are held in a resource room. The school district
provides the services of an instructor for the visually impaired
for an average of ninety minutes a day, who also gives weekly
mobility lessons. Three teacher's aides are starting Braille
lessons so they can help adapt material and teach Katie.
     Though Katie does not read Braille at this time, her school
books are Brailled, and the classroom aide adapts and Brailles
handouts and art projects. Katie's classmates have an opportunity
to be introduced to Braille.
     We think of Katie's teachers, the administration, and
ourselves as a team. We work fairly well together because we
share a vision of Katie's future--one of independence. We may
disagree on how much emphasis one part of her school program
should receive or when certain skills should be introduced, but
the team shares the common goal of helping Katie become an
independent, happy adult. This allows us to treat each other's
ideas and feelings with respect and allows for compromise. We
believe that Katie's blindness should not limit her future. Her
school program, like those of all other students, should help her
reach her full potential.
     I believe the following ideas help when dealing with school
districts:
     1) Be sure you and the school personnel see the same future
for your child.
     2) Prioritize those skills you want your child to achieve.
     3) Prioritize services you wish the school to provide.
     4) Focus on those at the top of the list; this is a long-
term relationship. Don't battle over the trivial.


[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Barbara Pierce.]

            DIRTY TRICKS AND PRESSURE TACTICS IN OHIO
                        by Barbara Pierce

     It was Dr. Samuel Johnson who remarked, "Depend upon it,
Sir. When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it
concentrates his mind wonderfully." Institutionally speaking, NAC
(the National Accreditation Council for Agencies Serving the
Blind and Visually Handicapped) has, during the year that has
elapsed since nearly half its members voted to dissolve it in
order to avoid bankruptcy, been enjoying all the advantages of
that concentrated mind, to which Dr. Johnson referred. First,
drastic budget cutbacks that alone could stop the organization's
financial hemorrhage had to be devised and immediately
implemented. The moment that task seemed to be in hand, it was
time to prepare for NAC's petition to the U.S. Department of
Education for evaluation by the National Advisory Committee on
Accreditation and Institutional Eligibility. (See the April,
1992, issue of the Braille Monitor.) At this writing, in early
May, the Secretary of Education has not yet ruled on that
petition--but at best NAC has won itself only two years of
continued Department of Education recognition under extremely
close fiscal and programmatic supervision. 
     No sooner had NAC officials survived that close call--if,
indeed, it has been survived--when they learned that the Ohio
Rehabilitation Services Commission (RSC) had voted unanimously to
remove NAC's name from its list of approved accrediting bodies.
(See the March, 1992, issue of the Braille Monitor.) This was a
danger with implications even more immediately disastrous than
the threat that the Department of Education would drop NAC since
no agencies maintain their NAC accreditation solely because of
the Department of Education list; whereas, with NAC off the Ohio
list several agencies would have had to seek other accreditation
if they wished to continue doing business with the state
rehabilitation agency. The Ohio threat was very real. If NAC
could do anything to save the situation, it must be tried. NAC's
first effort failed miserably. (See the April, 1992, issue of the
Braille Monitor.) The joint legislative committee with
jurisdiction over administrative rule-making in Ohio state
government refused to instruct the Rehabilitation Services
Commission that it could not remove NAC from the agency's list of
accrediting bodies. 
     With that avenue closed, NAC's only chance for reversal of
the RSC decision was appealing to the Commission itself at its
April meeting, during which the seven-member body was scheduled
to rubber-stamp its February decision. NAC and its cadre of well-
wishers set to work. Chief among these was the Director of the
Vision Center of Central Ohio, Richard Oestreich, who lobbied
hard within the ranks of the Ohio Association of Rehabilitation
Facilities (OARF) and the board members of the Ohio chapter of
the Association for Education and Rehabilitation for the Blind
and Visually Impaired (OAER). It should be noted, incidentally,
that the board of the Ohio AER chapter is largely composed of
staff members and associates of the few NAC-accredited agencies
in the state. Oestreich urged the people he lobbied to write
letters to the Commissioners asking them to reverse their
February 18 action and restore NAC to the Ohio list of approved
accrediting bodies. 
     Sources close to the situation report that Mr. Oestreich's
request that the rehabilitation facilities group pass a
resolution instructing its president to write a letter to the
Commissioners, communicating its opposition to the Commission's
removal of NAC from the list, took place at OARF's March meeting
with no opportunity for RSC staff members to state their case for
having recommended the removal of NAC. I later talked with an
OARF member who had voted for the Oestreich resolution. By the
time of his conversation with me, he had had a chance to listen
to the case made by RSC staff members, and his comment was to the
effect that the Association had clearly acted without hearing all
the facts. When he heard from staff the depth and extent of their
research into and concern about NAC's questionable ability to
provide objective accreditations, along with its shaky financial
viability, he was dismayed and shocked. He inquired with what
struck me as somewhat naive incredulity, "Why didn't we hear any
of this information from the staff?" The staff wasn't invited to
present its side of the question because that would not have
suited Mr. Oestreich's purpose, and under the influence of his
collegial arm-twisting and political pressure, the pro-NAC vote
passed overwhelmingly--and the letters to the Commissioners
materialized. 
     Phone calls also came in. The National Federation of the
Blind of Ohio had decided not to discuss the issue with the seven
Commissioners until the day of the Commission meeting. We did
provide our written testimony, including a copy in Braille for
the one member of the Commission who is blind, but beyond that we
chose to refrain from lobbying the Commissioners. We knew that
the RSC staff understood the problems with NAC about as well as
blind consumers did, and besides, the Commission had already
unanimously made the decision to remove NAC from its list. The
April 21 vote was supposed to be a formality only. But Dr.
William Weiner (Chairman of the Department of Blind
Rehabilitation, Western Michigan University, and President of the
Association for Education and Rehabilitation of the Blind and
Visually Impaired, one of NAC's Sponsoring Members) contacted the
only academic on the Commission and, as she later explained to
her Commission colleagues, assured her that NAC's financial
problems were behind it and that it was going to be able to do
good work in the future. That was all she needed. Never mind that
Dr. Weiner's objectivity was compromised by his organization's
long-standing endorsement of NAC and that her own agency staff
had independently come to the opposite conclusion; she was ready-
-even eager--to hop onto the NAC bandwagon. 
     The most interesting and distressing phone calls of all,
however, were made to the blind member of the Commission. He
served at one point on the Board of Trustees of Richard
Oestreich's agency and, though professing to be open-minded on
the NAC issue, had obviously been the only Commissioner with
reservations about the panel's February 18 decision. During the
commission meeting on April 21 he told his colleagues the
following unsubstantiated story. He said that about ten days
earlier he had received a phone call from a man who would
identify himself only as "Tom from the NFB." There are three
members of the Ohio affiliate whose first names are Tom. Two are
hard-working members of their local chapters with very little
knowledge of or interest in matters beyond the local scene. The
third is Tom Anderson, Second Vice President of the National
Federation of the Blind of Ohio and an outspoken advocate for a
number of causes, one of which is the NFB. Tom is well known in
legislative circles, and everyone who knows him recognizes that
he would not hesitate to pick up the phone and contact
agovernmental official if he thought a conversation would benefit
those whom he was trying to assist. According to the
Commissioner, Tom from the NFB told him that he had better vote
to keep NAC off the Ohio list of accrediting bodies or he would
be sorry. He said that his caller assured him that the NFB was
very powerful, and Mr. Jernigan could have him removed from the
Commission when the time came for reappointment. The conversation
lasted for about ten minutes, he said, and was filled
withvariations on this theme.
     The entire conversation so incensed the commissioner, he
said, that he wanted his colleagues to know that in the future he
would never vote in favor of any issue if the NFB supported it.
In this instance, however, Tom (Tom Anderson, that is--and there
could be no other) declared earnestly that he had not made any
such call. He prepared an affidavit following the Commission
meeting in order to go on record as denying that he had engaged
in such an unscrupulous and heavy-handed action. Here it is: 

                  Affidavit of Thomas Anderson

     I, Thomas Anderson, being first duly sworn, depose and state
as follows:
     (1) My name is Thomas Anderson. My address is 64 E. Judson
Ave., Youngstown, Ohio 44507. I am the Second Vice President of
the National Federation of the Blind of Ohio.
     (2) On April 21, 1992, I was present at the monthly meeting
of the Ohio Rehabilitation Services Commission, held at Crosswood
Center. I heard Commissioner Eric Parks describe a telephone call
which he had received ten days before. The caller, who identified
himself only as "Tom from the NFB," threatened Mr. Parks with
reprisals unless he voted to give final approval to the
administrative rule which, among other things, would have removed
the National Accreditation Council from the list of approved
accrediting bodies for agencies contracting with the RSC.
     (3) I have known since late February of the unanimous
February 18 vote of the Commission to remove NAC from its list,
and until April 21 I had no reason to doubt that a majority of
the members of the Commission would vote to affirm its action of
two months before.
     (4) I learned with interest, but no surprise, of the
decision of the Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review on March
10. Despite the testimony of the NAC supporters, I considered
that the Commission's original decision would stand. 
     (5) At the April 4 meeting of the Board of Directors of the
National Federation of the Blind of Ohio, Barbara Pierce,
President of the organization, briefly reported that some efforts
were being made to muster support for reversing the Commission's
action of February 18. She urged interested members to attend the
April 21 RSC meeting to demonstrate consumer support for the
revised administrative rule. I did not know of Richard 
Oestreich's solicitation of OARF and OAER letters of support for
NAC until I was told about them on April 21.
     (6) I have not at any time discussed the administrative rule
on agency accreditation with any of the Commissioners in person
or on the telephone. I have never spoken with Mr. Parks on the
telephone.
     (7) Attached to this affidavit is a copy of my personal
telephone bill covering the period during which Mr. Parks reports
that someone identified as Tom called him. It clearly shows that
no call was made to (614) 268-4003, which is the number Mr. Parks
gave as his listing to members of the Consumer Advisory Council
at its March meeting. Barbara Pierce, a member of that council,
has supplied me with this number for purposes of this statement. 

                                                --Thomas Anderson

                         Acknowledgement

     I, Mary Catherine Sanders, a Notary Public in and for the
State of Ohio, certify that Thomas Anderson, personally known or
satisfactorily proved to me to be the same, personally appeared
before me and took oath in due form of law that the statements
made in the foregoing affidavit are true and correct this 30th,
day of April, 1992.
                      ____________________
     There you have the text of Tom Anderson's affidavit, and the
telephone bill attached indicated that he had made no long
distance calls at all during the billing period. During the days
following this alleged call by "Tom from the NFB," the
Commissioner reported that he received four or five more calls
from men and women refusing to identify themselves except to say
that they were members of the Federation. He said that they, too,
threatened him with loss of his Commission seat if he did not
vote to oppose NAC. 
     Members of the National Federation of the Blind knew nothing
of all this telephone activity prior to hearing it described at
the April 21 Commission meeting. The Commissioner certainly made
no effort to contact anyone in the Federation in order to
ascertain whether Federationists were responsible for the calls.
But knowing that NAC would undoubtedly send a spokesperson from
out-of-state, we asked James Gashel, Director of Governmental
Affairs for the National Federation of the Blind, to join us at
the April 21 meeting to present testimony. We also encouraged
blind consumers from across the state to attend the open
Commission meeting to make certain that the Commissioners
understood how important this issue was to blind Ohioans. 
     From the beginning of the meeting it was clear that the
Commissioners were nervous, though we could not understand why
they should be upset. There were somewhat more than thirty
Federationists in the meeting room, but we had filed in quietly
and were conducting ourselves with decorum. 
     The Commission chairwoman began by lecturing the audience
about proper behavior and warning us that anyone who misbehaved
would be escorted from the room immediately. If I had not known
where I was, I would have concluded that I was in a junior high
school assembly or at a NAC annual meeting as one of a room full
of NFB observers listening to jittery NAC officials. 
     When the chairwoman asked who wished to speak during the
Commission's consideration of the NAC agenda item, seven people
raised their hands: Ruth Westman, now Executive Director of the
National Accreditation Council; Paul Schroeder, Director of
Governmental Affairs for the American Council of the Blind; Ken
Morelock, Executive Director of the ACB of Ohio; Hank Baud,
Executive Director of the Cincinnati Association for the Blind
(CAB); James Gashel, Director of Governmental Affairs for the
National Federation of the Blind; Phillip Copeland, Member of the
Board of Trustees of the Center for the Visually Impaired,
Elyria, Ohio; and Barbara Pierce, President of the National
Federation of the Blind of Ohio. The chairwoman proposed to call
the speakers in the order listed and give each no more than five
minutes. Ms. Westman asked if she could divide her time in half
so that at the close she could refute any arguments made by the
Federation. This modification was agreed to by the Commission,
and the comments began. 
     Ms. Westman did not choose to make any statement but instead
asked if there were questions from the Commission. It was obvious
that there were not, but with a little help from the Commission,
Ms. Westman managed to occupy the two and a half minutes. After
working into his introduction the claim that the ACB was the
largest consumer organization of blind people, Paul Schroeder
next read a statement in praise of the general concept of
accreditation for agencies in the blindness field. Ken Morelock,
Volunteer Executive Director of the ACB of Ohio, was then led to
the table, where he apologized for his Braille skills. He had
clearly been assigned the job of bashing the NFB. He began by
saying that he understood that the April issue of the Braille
Monitor had described him as the "Pining Executive Director of
the ACB of Ohio." Since the word used to describe him had been
"volunteer," his comment made very little sense, and that
characterization could appropriately be made of his entire
statement. 
     Hank Baud, the new Executive Director of the Cincinnati
Association for the Blind, told the Commission that he had
brought along his agency's most recent NAC self-study, which he
described as being three inches thick. The burden of his comment
was that an agency that takes the NAC self-study process
seriously can get a valuable result by working hard. Since the
most recent CAB reaccreditation was done before Mr. Baud's
predecessor left the agency, he himself had by coincidence headed
the on-site review team that assessed the Cincinnati Association.
He assured the Commissioners that the entire process had been
undertaken with great seriousness and dedication to improving
service delivery. Baud said nothing at all about the value of NAC
accreditation. In fact, he was at some pains to stress that he
was speaking of the self-study process only. 
     Through all of this testimony the Commissioners sat
listening attentively and respectfully. As the presentation
shifted into Federation hands, however, several of the panel
began indulging in behavior that discomfited a number of people
in the room who could see them, including several seated at the
head table. As James Gashel reviewed some of the more troubling
aspects of NAC's fiscal and programmatic plight and Phil Copeland
reported on the increase in his agency's business with the state
agency in the years since it disassociated itself from NAC, the
Commissioners remained relatively polite, indulging in only a
little whispering. 
     When I rose to speak, however, the atmosphere altered. I
wanted Commission members to understand that blind consumers felt
deeply about this issue. They had no way of knowing how many of
the people in the room were there because of their concern about
NAC and the damage it is doing to blind people. I therefore asked
those who were present in support of the Commission's February 18
decision to stand for a moment. As I began to make this request,
the Commissioner who was about to report his fury at receiving
phone calls supposedly from members of the Federation began
violently shaking his head and making hand gestures to the
chairwoman indicating that she should stop this demonstration of
support. In response to his plea, she told me that our action was
not necessary. I insisted gently that people had come from across
the state and that the Commission should know who they were and
how they felt. As soon as the group was standing, she immediately
told them to be seated again. Her tone was filled with anxiety
and annoyance. At one point during my remarks she indulged
herself in a spate of eye-rolling until she noticed that several
members of our group were watching her performance with attention
and surprise. After that she contented herself with trying to
catch the eye of the Administrator of the Rehabilitation Services
Commission in order to exchange comradely grimaces, but he
refused to participate in the game. 
     When the Commission members began discussing the issue among
themselves and listening to their own staff members, several
continued to display what can only be called rudeness. Whispered
conversations were conducted with such obviousness that the one
member of the Commission who continued to have misgivings about
NAC's fiscal viability actually paused in making his statement of
concern in what seemed to be momentary astonishment at his
colleagues' lack of attention. Throughout all this restiveness
and inattention to discussion of the issue under consideration,
the chairwoman made no effort to curb her colleagues or even to
refrain from muttered conversations herself. The audience--the
same group whom she had lectured about proper behavior and
threatened with removal from the room--comported themselves with
courtesy and listened in silence, despite the growing impression
that they were, as Linus used to say in the "Peanuts" comic
strip, "living in a stacked deck." 
     The dissenting Commissioner continued to insist that there
was no indication that NAC can survive financially and that, if
it is not viable, it can't possibly provide meaningful
accreditation. No one contradicted his arguments, but it was
clear that a majority of the Commissioners had no interest in
looking objectively at the evidence or listening to RSC staff
members, who continued to recommend that NAC be removed from the
list.
     But what was the turning point and what is the justification
for the charge of dirty tricks? I do not doubt that the blind
commissioner received the phone calls he said he received--but I
am certain that they did not come from anybody connected with the
Federation. Why? In the first place Federationists have enough
sense to know that such tactics would backfire. As the
commissioners reflect on the matter, they will realize this too.
The will know that, as the saying goes, they have been had, and
they will doubtless not appreciate it.
     In the second place the telephone call hoax is exactly the
kind of shabby conduct one would expect from NAC supporters. Some
may call it political savvy, but the more astute will call it
dirty tricks and lack of integrity. Some may call it
"professionalism" (witness the behavior of Mr. Oestreich and Dr.
Wiener, national president of AER), but there are more suitable
names for such pressure tactics. Despite NAC's apparent last-
minute escape in Ohio, it did not really escape at all. The noose
grows tighter every day. The telephone call charade is simply
another nail in the NAC coffin, another reason why more of NAC's
few remaining agencies will continue to depart from it in
increasing numbers. Everyone (including NAC itself) knows that
NAC is dying. The only question is how long it will take and how
much damage will be done to the blind and the blindness system
before the obscenity comes to an end. 
     But back to the April 21 meeting: The NAC victory in Ohio
was provisional at best. It only brought the organization back in
a weakened condition to where it was before February.
Furthermore, NAC had to spend a considerable amount of its
dwindling treasury of human and monetary resources to arrive at
that point. The war of attrition (a war that NAC knows it cannot
win) will continue. As proof of this thesis, the Ohio
commissioners agreed that they would look at the situation again
in no more than two years and sooner if new financial information
comes to light. The meeting recessed for lunch, and
Federationists filed out to regroup for the next confrontation
with NAC. 
     No one had offered evidence that NAC accreditation has any
intrinsic value. No one provided proof that NAC's financial
position is strong. We heard lots of rhetoric about the noble
concept of accreditation and passionate assurance that NAC has
turned the financial corner. But blind Ohioans are not convinced.
We understand the ways in which NAC has compounded the damage
done to blind people by bad agencies, and we are tired of shabby
treatment and dirty tricks passed off as professionalism and
integrity. We will continue to point out the absurdities of NAC's
claims to stability and programmatic excellence, and we will do
what we can to discourage Ohio agencies from throwing away their
funds on NAC accreditation. Those who are about to die are not
the only ones to master the discipline of a concentrated mind;
those who are fighting for the right to live free and equal know
how to focus their wits as well.



            MISSISSIPPI GOVERNOR REDEFINES BLINDNESS
                       by Kenneth Jernigan

     During the last weekend in March of this year I attended the
convention of the National Federation of the Blind of
Mississippi, and it was a good one. The day before the convention
started Sam Gleese, president of the NFB of Mississippi; E. U.
Parker, first vice president of the affiliate; and I paid a visit
to Royal Maid, a large sheltered workshop in Hazlehurst,
Mississippi. We were courteously treated and impressed by the
scope of the operation, but when we asked for financial data
about the workshop (data which by federal law should have been
available to us), we were politely refused. I don't know (and I
am not suggesting) that Royal Maid has anything to hide, but I am
saying that they should not be above the law. If, as is the case,
the law requires that they make financial disclosures upon
request, then they should do it--and the members of the NFB of
Mississippi intend to see that they come up to the line. In the
meantime they are subject to federal monetary penalties for their
refusal to obey the law.
     Speaking of the law, something else worthy of comment
occurred while I was in Mississippi. State services for the blind
is part of a larger department of rehabilitation, which has a
nine-member policy board. Certain members of the board are named
by statute, but the law provides that one of the nine must be
visually impaired to represent the interests of the blind and
visually impaired. It had been widely anticipated that the
governor would appoint Carter Gable, a blind man from Jackson,
but during the weekend of our convention the office of the
governor announced that a sighted woman (a former long-time
employee of the state department of rehabilitation) was being
given the position.
     To say the least, the blind of the state felt betrayed. In
fact, they were outraged. Regardless of the virtues, sterling
character, or pleasant personality which this woman (one Mildred
Farmer, somebody that very few people had ever heard of) might or
might not possess, she cannot represent the interests of the
blind. Of course, one could argue that since she wears glasses,
she is visually impaired--but unless one is fond of bizarre jokes
or short on mental capacity, such an argument is not likely to be
taken seriously. Certainly the blind didn't take it seriously,
and it is doubtful that the members of the legislature or the
general public will either.
     Nor did the press take it seriously. In a column in the
April 9, 1992, Clarion Ledger, Deborah Mathis took the governor
to task. Here is what she had to say:

                 Does Glasses Wearer Constitute
               "Visually Impaired" Board Nominee?

     Since there is an expense of political currency attached to
every gubernatorial appointment, there is usually some degree of
competition and suspense among those who hope to win the chief
executive's nod. It can get vicious sometimes, but that level of
contentiousness is usually reserved for the plum positions--the
most powerful, high-profile policy-making posts.
     However, occasionally controversy seeps onto blander turf,
as in the case of Governor Kirk Fordice's nomination to the state
Board of Rehabilitation Services.
     The governor has nominated Mildred Farmer, a Jackson
businesswoman whose personal and professional histories are
steeped in social and civic services: 25 years with what was then
the Vocational Rehabilitation Division of the state Education
Department; 10 years with the Veteran's Administration;
involvement in programs for the disabled and in a project to help
former mental patients make the transition into mainstream
living.
     But it's not Farmer's reputation that's led some people to
question the appropriateness of her appointment. Rather, it's
that, as a member of the board, Farmer would be expected to
represent blind Mississippians, and she, herself, is not one of
them.
     It may sound nitpicky and hypersensitive, but know this:
However trivial the point may seem, it's the law.
     The 1991 state statute establishing the board says one seat
is reserved for a person who is visually impaired or the parent
of such a person. Farmer has been nominated to replace a woman
who fit that description.
     So, this is where it gets sloppy.
     To both the Mississippi chapter of the National Federation
of the Blind and the Mississippi Council of the Blind, "visually
impaired" is taken to mean "blind." Surely, says Council
President Bonnie Thompson, that was the legislative intent, the
spirit of the law.
     But the governor's office has leaped on a technicality to
defend the appointment: Farmer is visually impaired; she's
nearsighted and wears glasses.
     Sam Gleese, the NFB president in Jackson, laughs at that.
Not because he finds it funny, but because he finds it absurd.   
"Mrs. Farmer is not a representative spokesperson for the blind
constituency," said Gleese. "She has not had the experiences that
the blind community has had. And although she has worked for
rehabilitation (services) in the past, we worry that she would
look at it from a bureaucratic standpoint rather than from a
consumer's point of view."
     Although likewise concerned, Thompson is willing to give the
nomination a chance.
     "From all we can gather, (Farmer) is certainly a fine
person," Thompson said. "She does seem to be very community-
minded."
     Indeed she does. Besides, it's not as though she has no
familiarity with blindness. According to Farmer, her late husband
had serious visual problems and her aged mother does now. She
has, as she says, "been closely associated with the severely
visually impaired."
     But, again, that's not the basis of the dispute. What's left
unresolved--what, perhaps will remain that way--is whether the
lawmakers really meant "visually impaired" (which Farmer
technically is) or whether they meant "blind" and were just
trying to be politically correct.
     I'd put my money on the latter scenario.
     Surely the drafters meant for the position to go to a blind
person--an unsighted person. Surely the governor's office knows
that. Surely most people can understand why the two organizations
that represent the blind are offended that, once again, it
appears they're being "looked after" by someone.
     And surely Mrs. Farmer, for all her good heart, knows
wearing glasses is as poor a passport to qualifying as would be a
Coppertone tan if the job called for a "person of color."
     But in all probability Mildred Farmer will be seated on the
Vocational Rehabilitation Board and, given her reputation, I
would expect she would serve well.
     Yet, potent doubts remain: Can she really know what a blind
person experiences? Isn't the best advocate for any group a
person who can not only sympathize but empathize?
     And, is the case made when the governor and the nominee
can't understand why the blind community is so upset about this?
                      ____________________
     This is what the column in the Clarion Ledger says, and it
doesn't take a lot of smarts to see that we are dealing with a
flim-flam, the same kind which the blind have often faced in the
past. However, there is a new element in the equation in
Mississippi. We have a dynamic, savvy group of leaders in the NFB
and a growing affiliate. Blacks and whites are working together
as colleagues and brothers and sisters, so nobody can divide us
by introducing the race question. E. U. Parker, state first vice
president, knows his way around state political circles and has
connections second to none. Sam Gleese, the state president, is
energetic, willing to work, and determined. Add to this the
street smarts possessed by the leadership, and this latest
shenanigan by the governor is likely to strengthen the blind
instead of doing major harm.
     At the Saturday session of the state convention the head of
the rehabilitation department (John Cook) made a presentation.
When he was asked whether the fact that Mildred Farmer had been
appointed had anything to do with her former employment at the
rehabilitation department and whether he had used influence to
get the job done, he blew his cool. He made a few snippy remarks
and left the room before anybody could respond. When someone went
out into the hall and asked him to come back, he said he didn't
have time because he had to go make another speech. It didn't
help his image, and it didn't add to his credibility even if
every word he said was true. The coincidence was too fortuitous--
besides which surely two or three more minutes wouldn't have
mattered. Moreover, the recordings of the convention will show
that the comments made to Mr. Cook were courteous and that he was
treated with respect.
     The NFB of Mississippi is, indeed, on the move. Sam Gleese
was re-elected president, and the future looks bright for the
blind of the state.


[PHOTO: Pickup truck decorated as a leprechaun for the St.
Patrick's Day parade in Denver. CAPTION: The completed leprechaun
float created by members of the National Federation of the Blind
of Denver and the students at the Colorado Center for the Blind
is pictured here immediately before the 1992 St. Patrick's Day
Parade in Denver, Colorado.]

                    THE FEDERATION ON PARADE
                     by Kimberley McCutcheon

     From the Associate Editor: Kimberley McCutcheon is a member
of the staff at the Colorado Center for the Blind and an
enthusiastic Federationist. Here is her description of the CCB
adult rehabilitation program's preparation for and participation
in the 1992 St. Patrick's Day parade in Denver:

     It started as a tiny germ of an idea in the depths of a
Colorado winter. Of course the CCB had taken part in last year's
St. Patrick's Day parade, amidst drizzling rain and unflagging
enthusiasm. Could we make a float this year? Last year we marched
proudly, canes and dog harnesses gaily decorated with the green
and white of St. Pat's; but what about making a float this year?
Last year we all felt a thrill of pride as we marched past the
crowds of delighted parade observers who clapped and cheered for
our spirit and determination; but what about making a float this
year?
     As the snow piled higher on the sidewalks and streets, the
idea blossomed and came closer to fruition. Trina Boyd, the
Colorado Center for the Blind's travel teacher, began marshalling
her troops by contacting the NFB's Denver chapter president Julie
Deeden, who issued the first challenge at January's Denver
chapter meeting. From that point on, there was no doubt that the
National Federation of the Blind would be in the parade, and we
would build a float!
     The design for the float was a leprechaun lying on his
stomach. His body was a pickup truck, and his arms were wrapped
around the truck's hood. His hat was perched atop the cab, which
had a face drawn on the windshield. Over the next four weeks we
purchased fifty-eight feet of chicken wire and fashioned it into
leprechaun arms, legs, and hat. Denver chapter members and
Colorado Center staff and students stuffed over 15,000 paper
napkins into the holes in the chicken wire legs, arms, and hat of
our leprechaun friend.
      To me, the most meaningful part of the parade, the float,
and the entire adventure was the many, many hours spent laboring
together in camaraderie and lively exchange of ideas during the
time-consuming task of stuffing our leprechaun, made pleasant by
familiarity and renewed friendships with fellow Federationists.
     The day of the parade dawned bright and clear, a perfect
spring day--truly a day in which a pickup truck could be
transformed into a leprechaun of unique character. At 7:30 a.m.
the transformation began as a hardy crew of volunteers,
flourishing cans of spray paint and flexing strong muscles,
hoisted our green friend, frame and all, onto the truck. After
driving slowly to downtown Denver, the team reassembled to put
the final flourishes on our float. As the time reached 10:00
a.m., the rest of our company began to gather. We waited our turn
to enter the parade and laughed amiably as the children passing
our float asked their parents what our exhibit was.
     At noon, as our green-clad assembly got underway and as
cheers and applause rose spontaneously from the people-lined
streets, it seemed to me that all our labors had birthed this
marvelous day, on which we of the NFB could march proudly, side
by side, united in purpose. We tipped and waved our green derbies
in appreciation for the shouted messages of encouragement: "Glad
you're here!" and "Way to go!" Yet my thoughts kept returning to
those evenings and weekends when, blind and sighted alike, we
Federationists gathered together to work with steady purpose and
sure goal, inch by inch fashioning more than a float, creating a
symbol to remind us that anything we put our minds to can be
accomplished if we work together!













                 ******************************
     If you or a friend would like to remember the National Federation of the
Blind in your will, you can do so by employing the following language:
     "I give, devise, and bequeath unto National Federation of the Blind,
1800 Johnson Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21230, a District of Columbia
nonprofit corporation, the sum of $_____ (or "_____ percent of my net estate"
or "The following stocks and bonds: _____") to be used for its worthy purposes
on behalf of blind persons."
                 ******************************

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Donald Curran, Associate Librarian for
Constituent Services at the Library of Congress, presents a
twenty-five-year pin to Thomas Bickford.]

          FEDERATIONIST HONORED BY LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

     From the Associate Editor: In the early seventies, when I
joined the National Federation of the Blind, the banquet
recordings to which I listened with rapt attention all featured
Federation songs sung with much enthusiasm by the throngs of
conventioneers. The singing was always led by Tom Bickford, who
had a wonderful voice and an encyclopedic knowledge of the words.
I later learned that Tom, who was a semi-professional musician,
was very active in the late sixties in conducting the contest to
choose a Federation song. In fact, President Maurer recalls that
at the 1969 convention in Columbia, South Carolina, Tom Bickford
and his tape recorder were to be found everywhere, Tom inviting
people to listen to the contest entrants in preparation for
voting. 
     In those years Tom Bickford had been an employee of the
Library of Congress for only a few years. Now he has completed
twenty-five years of service. His actual title is Quality
Assurance Specialist, Recorded Products. The following article
appeared this spring in the L.C. Journal, the publication of the
Library of Congress. It was written by one of the staff writers
of the National Library Service. Here is the article as it
appeared:

           Tom Bickford Marks Twenty-Fifth Anniversary

     Tom Bickford commemorates twenty-five years of federal
service in February, all but a few months of it spent with the
National Library Service for the Blind and Physically
Handicapped. Working in the Quality Assurance Section of NLS,
Bickford's major responsibility is the final review of talking-
book master tapes just before circulation copies are produced.
     At the time of this interview, Bickford had tapes of two
books cued up on the open-reel machines he uses simultaneously,
tacking from one to the other, listening sometimes at high
speeds--the equivalent of 350 words per minute in print. One of
the books was Mark Helprin's novel, A Soldier of the Great War,
read by Ed Blake, a narrator Bickford knows and admires. "He
lived in ten different countries," Bickford comments, "and he
knows his Romance languages well. Plus, he has a gift: he can
fake languages."
     Accuracy in the pronunciation of words and phrases in
foreign languages and obsolete, exotic, technical, obscure, or
regional English is essential, and Bickford will send books back
for correction if necessary. He does abundant research in the
course of his reading--checking, verifying, solving puzzles in
what he calls "paleolinguistics" through the textual evidence of
rhymes, errors, and etymologies. He is not averse to drawing upon
the expertise of scholars at local universities. 
     Bickford respects the artistic integrity of individual
narrators and appreciates stylistic individuality. Nevertheless,
the performance of the narrator of the second book Bickford is
reviewing is felt to be slightly substandard: she speaks
erratically, clustering words in a manner disruptive to the flow
of thought. Although he will not reject the completed book,
Bickford will provide written criticism in the hope of improving
future performance by this narrator.
     Bickford's background in languages has been of inestimable
value to him in this work. His main second language is Russian,
which he has studied at the graduate level; he has also formally
studied German, French, and Serbian. From the study of music he
has gained a phonetic sense of Italian and Church Latin; from
living on the West Coast he has developed a passable ear for
Spanish; from having been born in China and spending the first
seven years of his life there, he has a critical appreciation of
the Chinese language--although his skills, he admits, are a bit
rusty.
     Bickford's parents were Presbyterian missionaries to China
during the extraordinary time between the World Wars. His
childhood was spent in and around Beijing, and he recalls Chinese
as spoken by his Chinese amah--or nanny. Bickford's father spent
part of the Second World War interned as a civilian prisoner.
     Bickford received a B.A. from Occidental College in Los
Angeles in 1956 and a master's (1961) from the University of
Iowa, followed by an interlude of Russian studies at Georgetown.
He enjoyed folk music during these days and performed semi-
professionally, playing occasionally in the District's celebrated
folk club, the Cellar Door. At the beginning of his federal
employment, in February, 1967, Bickford worked for a short time
with the Internal Revenue Service, then joined NLS.
     Along with his family and his church, Bickford names the
National Federation of the Blind (NFB) as an important influence
in his life. He has been a member of the Federation for thirty-
six years and has held a variety of offices in different parts of
the country. He is currently treasurer of the Sligo Creek chapter
in Maryland. Bickford takes pride in his role in effecting the
passage in the early 1970s of Public Law 92-515, the so-called
white cane law, of the District of Columbia. This important
legislation provides for equal access by blind and physically
disabled persons to public places, buildings, and conveyances and
prohibits discrimination against blind and physically disabled
persons in housing and employment.
     Bickford relishes travel and has made trips to Mexico and
Guatemala, Europe, and the quondam Soviet Union, in addition to
having crossed the United States three times. Considerable travel
is entailed in his attendance at state and national NFB meetings.
     Bickford has written articles for the NFB publication the
Braille Monitor--including a piece in which he shares a set of
recipes for a German coffee cake--Kchen--"the second nicest
thing my mother-in-law gave me." Until a shade tree lately
overshadowed his garden, Bickford raised vegetables. He is
currently pondering alternative horticultural strategies.
     All of his formal studies and self-directed education have
been useful to him in his work. "You are always learning in this
job," Bickford says. "You have to be open to learning every day."
Bickford, as the saying has it, wears his erudition lightly; but
his erudition is real, and his love of knowledge is infectious.


[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Sondra Williams.]

[PHOTO: Jennifer Feingold (wearing sleep shades and using cane)
prepares shishkebabs on a charcoal grill. CAPTION: Students at
the Colorado Center for the Blind learn many cooking skills.
Pictured here Jennifer Feingold, a Center student, tends
shishkebabs on a charcoal grill.]

                             RECIPES

     This month's recipes come from Colorado. The first four 
were submitted by Sondra Williams, President of the Royal Gorge
chapter of the National Federation of the Blind of Colorado. The
last three come from the Colorado Center for the Blind, where
students learn, among other things, to become skilled and
confident cooks. The several student favorites reprinted here and
contributed by Kimberley McCutcheon, the CCB cooking teacher,
demonstrate why cooking class at the Colorado Center is so
popular. 

                          ZUCCHINI CAKE
                       by Sondra Williams
Ingredients:
2 cups sugar
1 cup oil
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2-1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt 
1 teaspoon soda 
1 teaspoon baking powder 
1 teaspoon cinnamon
3 cups zucchini, peeled, seeded, and grated
1 cup (6 ounces) chocolate chips
1 cup chopped nuts, optional

     Method: Combine sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla; beat until
creamy. Stir in flour, salt, soda, baking powder, and cinnamon.
Add the zucchini and mix well. Pour into 9 x 13-inch well-greased
and floured pan. Sprinkle top with 1 cup chocolate chips. Bake at
350 degrees for 40 to 50 minutes.

                         SALMON SURPRISE
                       by Sondra Williams

Ingredients:
1 pound can salmon, drained, reserve liquid
1 can condensed cream of mushroom soup
1/2 cup soft bread crumbs
1/2 cup catsup
2 eggs, slightly beaten

     Method: Drain salmon, adding enough water to liquid to equal
1/2 cup. Mix salmon, its liquid, and 3/4 cup of the undiluted
soup with the remaining ingredients and spoon into greased
custard cups or casserole dish. Bake approximately 35 minutes in
350 degree oven. Unmold onto platter (or leave in dish). Cover
with a sauce made from the remaining soup diluted with milk and
heated.

                          CARAMEL CORN
                       by Sondra Williams

Ingredients:
2 cups brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup light corn syrup
2 sticks margarine (1/2 pound)
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
7 quarts popcorn, popped and unsalted

     Method: In a sauce pan, mix all ingredients, except baking
soda and popcorn, and bring to boil, stirring constantly until
syrup reaches the hard-ball stage (about 5 minutes). This occurs
when a small amount of the hot syrup dropped from a spoon into a
cup of cold, clear water forms a hard ball. Remove pan from heat
and stir in the soda. Immediately pour over popcorn in shallow
pans. Bake in 200 degree oven for 1 hour, stirring every 15
minutes. Pour out onto table or counter, and separate when cool.

                   BAKED CHICKEN IN WINE SAUCE
                       by Sondra Williams

Ingredients:
1 chicken, cut into pieces
1/2 cup celery, chopped
1/2 cup onion, chopped
salt, pepper, and paprika to taste
1/2 cup white wine
1 can cream of mushroom soup

     Method: Place chicken in greased baking dish. Add the celery
and onion. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and paprika. Mix wine with
mushroom soup, and pour over chicken. Bake uncovered for
approximately 1 hour at 350 degrees. 
     For variety, place 1 cup uncooked rice in bottom of pan. Add
2-1/4 cups water and 1 teaspoon salt. Carefully place chicken
pieces on top. Add celery, onion, seasoning, and soup mixture.
Cover with foil for about 45 minutes, then uncover for several
minutes more in order to brown.

                        SZECHWAN CHICKEN
                     by Kimberly McCutcheon

     Whenever students at the Colorado Center want to do
something more challenging in the kitchen, this is one recipe I
suggest. Besides, it is fabulous!

Ingredients:
1 pound skinned, boned breast of chicken
1 egg white
1-1/2 tablespoons corn starch
1/8 cup hot green peppers, shredded
1/4 cup green onion, chopped
1 tablespoon garlic, minced
1 tablespoon dry sherry
1 teaspoon white vinegar
1 teaspoon sugar
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 cups peanut oil
sprigs of fresh cilantro

     Method: Partially freeze the chicken to facilitate slicing.
Cut the chicken into lengthwise strips, as thin as possible. Beat
the egg white lightly, then beat in the corn starch. Add the
shredded chicken and stir to coat well. Let the coated chicken
stand in the refrigerator five hours. In a bowl combine the hot
green pepper, green onions, garlic, and chopped ginger. In
another bowl combine the sherry, vinegar, sugar, and soy sauce.
Stir to blend thoroughly. Have a wok filled with the oil and heat
to medium. Just before serving, fluff up the chicken shreds with
fingers, then add to a sieve or small wire basket. Lower into the
oil and cook only until the chicken shreds turn white (they also
become firm when touched lightly and quickly), about one minute
or less. Do not brown. Lift the basket from the oil. Remove all
but 2 tablespoons of oil from the wok and heat to high. Add the
chicken and green onion mixture. Stir to blend, then add the
sherry and vinegar mixture. Cook briefly, stirring rapidly and
constantly, until the mixture is bubbling and thoroughly hot.
Garnish with cilantro.  Serves 2 to 6.

                     CHICKEN AND PASTA SALAD
                        by Regine Sediva


     Regine is a student at the Colorado Center for the Blind and
is graduating in May. This summer recipe is one of her family's
favorites and now one of the Center's favorite main-dish salad
recipes.

Ingredients:
4 cups Rotelle pasta, uncooked
1 tablespoon oil
1 1/2 teaspoons curry powder
2/3 cup mayonnaise
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon dried tarragon leaves, crushed
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
6 cups chicken, cooked and cubed
1 1/2 cups cooked broccoli
3/4 cup chopped sweet red pepper (or substitute green pepper
     for half the red) 

     Method: Cook and drain pasta according to the package
directions. Place in large bowl. Heat oil in small skillet. (I
use olive oil.) Add curry powder. Cook, stirring until spice is
fragrant, about 20 seconds. Transfer to small bowl. Add
mayonnaise, salt, tarragon, and black pepper. Mix well. Add
chicken, broccoli, and sweet red pepper to pasta. Stir in
seasoned mayonnaise. Chill. Serves 4 to 6.

                       COPPER DOLLAR SALAD
                         by Wayne Miller

     Wayne Miller is a long-time leader in the National
Federation of the Blind of Colorado and was a student at the
Colorado Center last year.

Ingredients:
2 pounds carrots
1 onion
1 bell pepper
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup vinegar
1 teaspoon mustard
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/2 cup oil
1 can condensed cream of tomato soup
1 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon salt

     Method: Scrape and slice carrots thinly. Add to boiling
water and cook 15 minutes. Drain water. Finely chop onion and
pepper and add to carrots. Combine next 8 ingredients and bring
to a boil. Pour over carrots, pepper, and onion. Mix well and
refrigerate at least 12 hours. Makes about 12 servings.

                     CCB BOOT CAMP BEEF STEW

     When the students at the Colorado Center for the Blind cook
a hearty meal for visitors to the Center, we need a large
quantity by the time you count staff, students, and visitors. The
following is a Center favorite.

Ingredients:
6 tablespoons shortening
5 pounds sirloin steak, cubed
1/3 cup flour for dredging meat
3 medium onions, sliced
3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
1/2 teaspoon pepper
4 bay leaves
1/2 teaspoon cloves
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
1 quart hot water
a #10 can tomatoes (weighs about 6 1/2 pounds)
3 each chicken and beef bouillon cubes
1/2 cup flour
10 carrots, scraped and sliced
full bunch celery, diced
5 pounds potatoes, peeled and quartered
1/2 teaspoon salt, or more to taste
Optional: 
1 pound fresh mushrooms, sliced or whole
2 green peppers, sliced
1 1/2 cups red wine
1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley

     Method: Melt shortening in large pot on medium high heat.
Add meat coated with 3 tablespoons flour, a little at a time in
order to brown evenly. Do not allow the pieces of meat to touch
while browning. Push browned pieces to the side or remove from
pan while turning and browning new pieces. Add onions, garlic,
seasonings, hot water, chicken and beef bouillon cubes, and
tomatoes. Cover tightly and cook over low heat for two hours, or
until meat is tender. Mix the 1/2 cup of flour with a cup of
water until smooth and add slowly to meat mixture, stirring
constantly until liquid thickens. Add vegetables, salt, and the
optional ingredients you have chosen. Cook for 30 minutes or
until vegetables are tender. Serves 25.


                   * * MONITOR MINIATURES * *

**Correction:
     In the April, 1992, issue of the Braille Monitor we
published a picture of four students who took part in a skit
titled "The Young and the Skill-less" during this year's
Washington Seminar. Only three names were listed. Pam Dubel, a
1991 scholarship winner and one of the leaders of the National
Association of Blind Students, was accidentally omitted. Those in
the photograph should have been identified (left to right) as
Heather Kirkwood (Kansas), David Cohen (Ohio), Pam Dubel (New
York), and Holly Pilcher (Massachussetts).

**Convention Door Prize Reminder:
     Door prizes provide fun and liveliness to convention
proceedings each year. Individuals, local chapters, and state
affiliates who are planning to contribute prizes to the 1992
convention are reminded to label them in print and Braille and
bring them to Diane McGeorge, door prize chairman, at the
convention in Charlotte or send them to Hazel Staley, President
of the NFB of North Carolina. Her address is: 5310 Farm Pond
Lane, Charlotte, North Carolina 28212.

**Stereotyper Available:
     We have been asked to carry the following announcement: "One
used stereotype machine for embossing zinc plates or metal signs
is available from Lutheran Braille Workers, Inc. Nonprofit
organizations preferred. Available FREE except for shipping
charges and transportation arrangements. For more information
please contact: LeRoy Delafosse, Lutheran Braille Workers, Inc.,
Post Office Box 5000, Yucaipa, California 92399, or phone: (714)
795-8977."

**Participation in Test:
     From the Editor: We have been asked to carry the following
announcement from Mark Kilwein of Indianapolis, who says in his
accompanying letter:

     "I am trying to recruit subjects for a research project
which will serve as my doctoral dissertation in clinical
psychology at Ohio State University. I've been having a very hard
time finding volunteers, mostly because legally blind college
students are not concentrated in any one place. I'm hoping to
take advantage of the convention to get a number of volunteers."

     Here is the announcement that Mr. Kilwein asks that we run:

     Individuals who are legally blind and who are currently
attending a college or university are requested to volunteer for
a scientific study concerned with better understanding the ways
in which visually impaired people categorize basic objects. I
will be administering the questionnaire at the NFB convention in
Charlotte and would like to set up an appointment to meet with
those who are interested. It's easy, takes less than forty
minutes, and pays $5.00. Please write: Mark L. Kilwein, M.A.,
9341 San Jacinto Drive, Indianapolis, Indiana 46250; or call
collect (317) 595-9224.

**Braille 'n' Speak at Charlotte Convention:
     Deane Blazie, President of Blazie Engineering, has asked us
to carry the following announcement concerning the NFB convention
in Charlotte this summer. Here it is:

     Blazie Engineering will be at the convention in force. We
will be updating Braille 'n' Speaks with new features, so bring
your machines. We will offer many of our products for sale at the
convention, including the Braille 'n' Speak, the Braille 'n'
Speak 640, and the upgrade from the Braille 'n' Speak to the
Braille 'n' Speak 640. We will have a good supply of accessories.
     Take a Braille 'n' Speak for a test drive in Charlotte--
Blazie Engineering will be bringing fifty Braille 'n' Speaks to
the convention in Charlotte to loan anyone who would like to try
one out. You must be registered at the convention and provide
some identification. The loan will be on a first-come-first-serve
basis, so look for us in the exhibit hall and give Braille 'n'
Speak a try.

**Wedding Bells:
     From the Editor: Over the years many Federationists have
known my secretary, Miss Myrick. My secretary is no longer Miss
Myrick, for on April 11, 1992, she was married to Robert
Boeshore. The Boeshores were married at St. Luke's Lutheran
Church, and Mrs. Boeshore is now busily back at work as usual.
     We also had another wedding at the National Center for the
Blind. Some of you know Miss Finneyfrock, who works in the
accounting department, and a number of you have yet to meet her.
In any case she was married at the Democratic Club in Baltimore
on April 4, 1992, to Leonard Paul Swiger, Jr., to whom she had
been engaged for the past four years.
     So romance is blooming at the National Center for the Blind.
Congratulations to the newlyweds.

**Norton Utilities 6 Quick Reference Now Available in Braille:
     We have been asked to print the following:
     Utilities are enhancement tools. They make it easier for
computer users to perform certain clerical tasks, such as
manipulating files, rearranging things in memory, or reorganizing
disks. One of the most popular enhancement tools on the market
today is Norton Utilities.
     National Braille Press has just completed--simultaneously
with the release of the print version--the Norton Utilities 6
Quick Reference by Que Corporation. This compact guide is an
instant reference for the most often used commands, options, and
latest enhancements of this best-selling utilities program. Make
computer and file management fast and easy with Que's Norton
Utilities 6 Quick Reference!
     Norton Utilities 6 Quick Reference is divided into two
parts. The first covers the Norton Utilities, and the second
covers NDOS. Each part provides an alphabetical listing of
commands. Because it is a quick reference, this book is not
intended to take the place of the extensive documentation
included with the Norton Utilities. Instead, it provides specific
information likely to be needed instantly like the syntax to
execute commands and the switches available for them. 
     This versatile reference guide helps you become familiar
with the features and shortcuts that can make PC maintenance more
efficient and effective. This resource covers such features as
NDOS, file management, and data-recovery commands. Now you can
put essential information at your fingertips with Norton
Utilities 6 Quick Reference for just $9.95--the same price as the
print edition! 
     Prepaid orders can be placed with National Braille Press, 88
St. Stephen Street, Boston, Massachusetts 02115; or call (617)
266-6160.

**RFB Update:  
     We have been asked to print the following reminder and list
of newly available titles: 
     You probably have fond memories of school days that may have
included books on tape from Recording for the Blind. RFB does
produce taped books from grade four level up, but you should know
that its 79,000 audio books and more than 300 on computer disk
aren't just for students--they're for anyone who is blind or
visually impaired and who likes to read.
     RFB joined forces last July with Computerized Books for the
Blind of Missoula, Montana, and now offers more than 300 books on
low-density disk for use with a personal computer and adaptive
software (synthetic speech, Braille, or enlarged print). Books
are available on 3.5-inch diskettes for IBM and compatible
computers and Macintosh and Apple formats as well as on 5.25-inch
floppy disks for IBM and compatibles. You can order a free
electronic information kit by contacting RFB and specifying the
type of disk you'd like. Electronic text titles (E-text, for
short) are for sale and become yours to keep.  Included are a
variety of computer manuals as well as dictionaries, a thesaurus,
several law books, and even two versions of the Bible.
     If you used RFB in the past but it's been a few years since
you borrowed a book from us, it's quick and easy--and free--to
reactivate your membership.  Simply call the toll-free Customer
Service number, (800)221-4792, or write to RFB's registrar, at 20
Roszel Road, Princeton, NJ 08540.  Give us your name, address,
your original RFB I.D. number (if you have it), your birth date,
and the years you used RFB.  In most cases your account will be
reactivated and ready for your next book order in twenty-four
hours.
     A few years ago RFB instituted a one-time $25 registration
fee entitling members to lifetime use of the organization's
library and other services. Registering for the first time is
simple.  Fill out an application (available by calling or writing
RFB) and return it with the $25 registration fee. The application
form documents your disability and provides us with your address,
phone number, and other important information.
     By the way, the toll-free number has new, expanded hours 
for book orders or other customer service inquiries. You can call
between 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. Eastern Time Monday through Friday. 
Books can also be ordered by fax, at (609)987-8116, or by mail,
to 20 Roszel Road, Princeton, NJ 08540. 
     Here's a glimpse of what's new on the RFB shelves. E-text
books are designated by EA or EP shelf numbers.

                             E-text

EA295, The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway, Charles
     Scribner's Son Publisher, 1988, 1 disk, $10.
EA354, Stedman's Pocket Medical Dictionary, by William Hensyl,
     Williams & Wilking Publisher, 1987, 19 disks, $50
EP017 Microsoft MS-DOS: Operating System, Version 5.0, Microsoft
     Corporation Publisher, 1991, 5 disks, $27
EA010, Mastering Wordperfect 5.1, Alan Simpson, Sybex Inc.
     Publisher, 1990, 5 disks, $27.
EP032, The Norton Utilities, Version 6, Symantec Corporation
     Publisher, 1991, 6 disks, $29.

                          Audiocassette

CD711, Beethoven On Beethoven: Playing His Piano Music His Way,
     William S. Newman, W. W. Norton Publisher, 1991.  
CE204, Mark Twain's Own Autobiography, Mark Twain, University of
     Wisconsin Press, 1991.

[PHOTO/CAPTION: Frances Radcliff rocks two infants in the nursery
of the Calvary Church, where she volunteers every Sunday
morning.]

**Honored:
     Sharon Gold, President of the National Federation of the
Blind of California, came across the following article about
Frances Radcliff, who is a faithful and dedicated Federationist.
She worked for many years as a rehabilitation teacher in
California. Her students report that she was an excellent
teacher, always believing in them and expecting more of them than
they dared to expect of themselves. She is not as active as she
once was, but she still contributes wherever she finds a need she
can fill. Here is the story that appeared in the May, 1991, issue
of the church newsletter "At Calvary":
     This month's Golden Apple Award goes to Frances Radcliff,
one of the nursery's faithful workers. Every Sunday morning at
8:00 a.m. you will find Frances in a rocking chair, keeping one
of the babies happy.
     Frances has been serving in the nursery for about three
years. She wanted to do something for the Lord. When she tried
working in the nursery, she says that she knew right away "it was
the place for me."
     Frances likes working in the nursery because it enables the
young mothers to go to the worship service and to teach in other
classes. She also says, "I would be happy to leave my child
there. I can go home and feel happy knowing that each baby got
good care."
     Frances was born in Oklahoma and grew up in Arkansas. At the
age of nine years, she went to a boarding school for the blind.
She received the Lord when she was thirteen. Frances went on to
Fresno State College and did her graduate work at the University
of California at Berkeley.
     When she finished her training, she worked as a vocational
guidance counselor for the blind with the State Department of
Rehabilitation in Long Beach. She also worked in prevention of
blindness.
     Long Beach was where she met and married her husband. When
her husband died in 1966, Frances came to Santa Ana. Frances has
no children of her own, but she says, "I have lots of kids who
need lots of care."
     Frances began attending Calvary Church in 1976 at the
invitation of her next-door neighbors. She immediately felt at
home in our non-denominational, missionary-minded church.
     Although Frances is now retired, she remains very active.
She still manages a scholarship fund for blind college students.
She goes to Bible studies. She is part of the Daytime Missionary
Fellowship with many senior adults.
     As Frances puts it, "I work with the babies, and I work with
the seniors. Those in the middle will just have to make it on
their own."

**For Sale:
     We have been asked to print the following:
     Larry Evans has for sale an Optacon Model R-1D in good
condition. Must sell. You can contact him at the phone number
listed at the end of this miniature. Fred Jones would like to buy
an RC Smith Braille Writer. If you have one of these Braille
writers, please contact him at (314) 449-9999.

**Braille Menus Available:
     Victor Hemphill, an active member of the National Federation
of the Blind of Illinois and founder of Volunteer Braille
Services of Merisa, Illinois, has asked us to print the
following:
     The Cracker Barrel restaurant chain has completed
distribution of Braille and large-type editions of both their
breakfast and dinner menus to all franchise restaurants. Each
location has been supplied with several copies of each menu in
both formats.
     The Braille menus are embossed on 11 1/2 by 11-inch paper
and are spiral bound. A table of contents immediately behind the
title page makes it possible to locate quickly any item in any
category.
     The large-type menus are printed in 24-point Helvetica type
on white 8 1/2 by 11-inch bond paper. They are also spiral bound
with index covers and contain a table of contents.
     I hope that, as Federationists travel on business or
pleasure or just decide to eat out now and then, they will make
it a point to visit the nearest Cracker Barrel Restaurant and let
the manager know they appreciate having their menus in a format
they can use easily.  The Cracker Barrel restaurant chain has
locations in the following states: Alabama, Florida, Georgia,
Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan,
Mississippi, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina,
Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.

**National Church Conference of the Blind:
     We have been asked to print the following:
     The 1992 meeting of the National Church Conference of the
Blind will take place Sunday, July 26, to Thursday, July 30, at
the City Center Holiday Inn in Little Rock, Arkansas. The
conference theme is "God's Word for the '90s."
     In addition to the daily Bible studies and the Thursday
evening banquet with special guest Lucy Ching, this year's
conference will include seminars on "Methods of Studying the
Bible" and "Dangers of the New Age Movement."
     For registration information and more details, please
contact The Reverend Frank Finkenbinder, Membership Secretary,
National Church Conference of the Blind, P.O. Box 163, Denver,
Colorado 80201; or call (303) 455-3430.

**Braille Transcription Service Available:
     We have been asked to print the following:
     "I will Braille scannable print material or files provided
on 3-1/2-inch disks for use with an IBM compatible computer. I
can produce material in either Grade I or Grade II Braille at .20
per page. When ordering, please include payment. Send all
correspondence to Pat Wise, 424 South Main Street, Fostoria, Ohio
44830. Please include your phone number with orders. Brailled
material will be shipped free matter for the blind unless other
arrangements are made with me. You will be notified of the
shipping cost if the free matter privilege is not used."

[PHOTO: Portrait. CAPTION: Eileen Tscharner.]

**Honored:
     Eileen Tscharner, First Vice President of the National
Federation of the Blind of South Dakota, was recognized by the
Rapid City Chamber of Commerce for her volunteerism. She and four
others were given the "Wind Beneath Our Wings" award during a
banquet hosted by the Health and Human Services Committee of the
Chamber on March 27, 1992. Her picture and biographical sketch
was published in the "Outstanding Performance Awards" booklet.
The inscription on her plaque reads as follows:

                   The Wind Beneath Our Wings
                          Presented to
                        Eileen Tscharner
                National Federation of the Blind
                     For outstanding efforts

     You have accepted the challenge to soar above the world and
to overcome barriers to success that would have caused others to
falter and fail. You have been decisive where others have
hesitated. You are recognized as a leader for your efforts. You
have inspired us all like the majestic eagle.
     For all you have done to make this a better place, thank
you.

                                   Rapid City Chamber of Commerce
                              Health and Human Services Committee
                               Outstanding Performance Award 1992

     The biographical entry in the booklet reads: 
     Eileen Tscharner, National Federation of the Blind of South
Dakota. Since her vision loss in 1987, Eileen has undergone
intensive training in the alternative skills of blindness, held a
job in the furniture business, and become a full-time volunteer
with the National Federation of the Blind of South Dakota. She
participates in her local church activities and community
organizations and travels throughout the state as the Vice
President of the National Federation of the Blind of South
Dakota. Her blindness has certainly not restricted her.
     Eileen was raised with her two brothers on a farm near
Hemmingford, Nebraska. She married her husband Jack in 1947 and
moved to Rapid City following the close of the semester at
Chadron State College, where they were students. They held
various jobs until 1960 when they purchased Jack's Camera Shop--a
business they operated until Jack's death in 1978. Eileen is the
mother of two sons, Chris and Dan.
     Eileen has volunteered 1,161 hours on behalf of blind
persons in South Dakota during 1991. She assists with white cane
travel lessons, gives encouragement to those who are losing
vision, and provides the role model of a truly independent person
who has become blind in later life.
                      ____________________
     We in the Federation add our congratulations to those of the
Chamber of Commerce. We are proud to have Eileen Tscharner as our
sister and colleague in the organized blind movement.

**Food for Thought:
     From the Associate Editor: The following poem appeared
recently in a recent issue of Insight, the publication of the
National Federation of the Blind of South Dakota. Think about it.

                       Winners and Losers

A winner says, "Let's find out!"
A loser says, "Nobody knows."
When a winner makes a mistake, he says, "I was wrong."
When a loser makes a mistake, he says, "It wasn't my fault."
A winner goes through a problem.
A loser goes around it but never gets past it.
A winner makes commitments.
A loser makes promises.
A winner says, "I'm good, but not as good as I ought to be."
A loser says, "I'm no worse than a lot of other people."
A winner tries to learn from those who are superior to him.
A loser tries to tear down those who are superior to him.
A winner says, "There must be a better way to do it!"
A loser says, "That's the way its always been done around here."
Which are you?