The Story of My Life: With her letters (1887-1901) and a supplementary account of her education, including passages from the reports and letters of her teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan, by John Albert MacyKeller, Helen
General
The Story of My Life: With her letters (1887-1901) and a supplementary account of her education, including passages from the reports and letters of her teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan, by John Albert Macy
Keller, Helen
Deafblind women -- United States -- Biography; Keller, Helen, 1880-1968
During our walks she keeps up a continual spelling, and delights to
accompany it with actions such as skipping, hopping, jumping, running,
walking fast, walking slow, and the like. When she drops stitches she
says, "Helen wrong, teacher will cry." If she wants water she says,
"Give Helen drink water." She knows four hundred words besides numerous
proper nouns. In one lesson I taught her these words: BEDSTEAD,
MATTRESS, SHEET, BLANKET, COMFORTER, SPREAD, PILLOW. The next day I
found that she remembered all but spread. The same day she had learned,
at different times, the words: hOUSE, WEED, DUST, SWING, MOLASSES, FAST,
SLOW, MAPLE-SUGAR and COUNTER, and she had not forgotten one of these
last. This will give you an idea of the retentive memory she possesses.
She can count to thirty very quickly, and can write seven of the
square-hand letters and the words which can be made with them. She seems
to understand about writing letters, and is impatient to "write Frank
letter." She enjoys punching holes in paper with the stiletto, and I
supposed it was because she could examine the result of her work; but we
watched her one day, and I was much surprised to find that she imagined
she was writing a letter. She would spell "Eva" (a cousin of whom she
is very fond) with one hand, then make believe to write it; then spell,
"sick in bed," and write that. She kept this up for nearly an hour.
She was (or imagined she was) putting on paper the things which had
interested her. When she had finished the letter she carried it to her
mother and spelled, "Frank letter," and gave it to her brother to
take to the post-office. She had been with me to take letters to the
post-office.
She recognizes instantly a person whom she has once met, and spells the
name. Unlike Laura Bridgman, she is fond of gentlemen, and we notice
that she makes friends with a gentleman sooner than with a lady.
She is always ready to share whatever she has with those about her,
often keeping but very little for herself. She is very fond of dress
and of all kinds of finery, and is very unhappy when she finds a hole in
anything she is wearing. She will insist on having her hair put in curl
papers when she is so sleepy she can scarcely stand. She discovered a
hole in her boot the other morning, and, after breakfast, she went to
her father and spelled, "Helen new boot Simpson (her brother) buggy
store man." One can easily see her meaning.
July 3, 1887.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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