Congratulations to Peaches Brownlee, a seventh grader of Alabama Institute of the Deaf and the Blind (AIDB) – known as Alabama School for the Deaf – for accepting the honor and a complimentary copy of a bilingual book titled Deaf Cinderella!
Deaf Cinderella is inspired to know that the AIDB first founder – James A. Watterson who happened to be Deaf and spoke ASL – opened a private school for the Deaf (now AIDB) in Alabama in 1849. AIDB was then incorporated on February 9, 1852. Watterson graduated from New York School for the Deaf-Fanwood in 1840.
Watterson and AIDB’s second founder, Joseph H. Johnson, an English-speaking hearing ally (who opened the doors on October 2, 1858 and incorporated February 4, 1860), shared the same belief and vision that ASL Rose has – the importance of Deaf education including teaching in American Sign Language, reading, and writing. Deaf Cinderella wants to thank AIDB for maintaining that belief and vision!
Two other Deaf schools that also shared the same belief and vision are the Black School of AIDB and the Helen Keller School of AIDB. Black School of AIDB was incorporated on February 7, 1891 and admitted Black students to AIDB on January 4, 1892. Years later, it was closed on September 1, 1969. The Helen Keller School of AIDB was created in 1949 due to the growing need of serving DeafBlind. It received the first referral in 1954. When the program opened, it was the fourth such program in the nation. In 1980, several programs, including the DeafBlind program, were consolidated to become The Helen Keller School of Alabama. The Helen Keller School was of course named after a DeafBlind woman, Helen Keller, who was born in Tuscumbia, Alabama.
AIDB certainly had a long history from 1849 till today!
Thank you, Scott Ward and an anonymous friend, for making the difference in Brownlee’s signing, reading and writing! ♥️
Thank you, AIDB, for the pictures!
Any donation does make a difference! To get more info on how Brownlee got into an ASL Rose’s DO action program, see here: https://aslrose.com/do/
