Helen Keller
Helen Adams Keller (June 27, 1880 – June 1, 1968) was an American author, activist and lecturer. She was the first deafblind person to graduate from college.The story of how Keller’s teacher, Anne Sullivan, broke through the isolation imposed by a near complete lack of language, allowing the girl to blossom as she learned to communicate, has become known worldwide through the dramatic depictions of The Miracle Worker.
What is less well known is how Keller’s life developed after she completed her education. A prolific author, she was well traveled, and was outspoken in her opposition to war. She campaigned for women’s suffrage, workers’ rights and socialism, as well as many other progressive causes.
Early childhood and illness
Helen Keller, age 8, with her tutor Anne Sullivan while vacationing on Cape Cod, July 1888 (photo discovered in 2008)Helen Keller was born at an estate called Ivy Green[1] in Tuscumbia, Alabama, on June 27, 1880, to Captain Arthur H. Keller, a former officer of the Confederate Army, and Kate Adams Keller, a cousin of Robert E. Lee and daughter of Charles W. Adams, a former Confederate general.[2] The Keller family originates from Germany, and at least one source claims her father was of Swiss descent.[3] She was not born blind and deaf; it was not until nineteen months of age that she came down with an illness described by doctors as “an acute congestion of the stomach and the brain”, which could have possibly been scarlet fever or meningitis. The illness did not last for a particularly long time, but it left her deaf and blind. At that time her only communication partner was Martha Washington, the six-year-old daughter of the family cook, who was able to create a sign language with her; by age seven, she had over 60 home signs to communicate with her family.