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NC Association
of the Deaf
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1st NCAD Conference: 1908
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Greensboro Daily News. August 21, 1908 |
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Greensboro Daily News. August 21, 1908. Friday.
DEAFMUTES OF STATE ORGANIZE: Association Partly Perfected at Raleigh - Another Meeting Today.
1st NCAD Convention
Present: Mr. E. McKee Goodwin , Superintendent of N. C. School for the Deaf and Dumb in Morganton and John Edwin Ray, Superintendent of N. C. School for the Blind in Raleigh
Raleigh, N. C., Aug. 20. - The North Carolina Association of the Deaf was organized here today with D. R. Tillinghast, of Morganton, President, organization to be completed at the final session tomorrow. About 100 deaf-mutes and graduates of the state schools here and at Morganton, are attending the meeting.
John C. Miller, of Morganton, who has been the prime mover in assembling the deaf-mutes for organization, called the meeting to order, and P. L. Ray, of Greensboro, was made temporary chairman, and Robert S. Taylor, of Mt. Olive, temporary secretary.
Committees were appointed for various purposes to report tomorrow and the delegates spent the afternoon on the street cars seeing the city with John E. Ray, superintendent of the state school here, as conductor, indicating points and sights of interest in the sign language.
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News and Observer. August 22, 1908 |
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News and Observer (Raleigh, N. C. ) August 22, 1908. Saturday.
ORGANIZATION OF THE STATE'S DEAF: First Convention Closed Yesterday Afternoon.
TILLINGHAST PRESIDENT: Constitution adopted, Officers Elected and Resolutions Passed - Object of the North Carolina Association of the Deaf to Promote the Welfare of the Deaf - To Meet Biennially.
The North Carolina Association of the Deaf was organized yesterday in the auditorium of the State School for the Blind, and the first officers of the association are as follows:
President: D. R. Tillinghast, Morganton
Vice-President: W. H. Chambers, Knoxville, Tenn.
Secretary: Robert S. Taylor, Mount Olive
Treasurer: Peter L. Ray, Greensboro.
Executive Committee: John C. Miller, Morganton; O.W. Underhill, Raleigh, and Needham Summerlin, Goldsboro.
This morning session began at 10 o'clock and there were interesting discussions in the sign language, conducted by Prof. E. McK. Goodwin, superintendent of the school at Morganton: Prof. John E. Ray, principal of the State School for the Blind: Mr. O. W. Underhill, of this city, and Mr. D. R. Tillinghast of Morganton. Considerable time was consumed in the adoption of the constitution. It states the purpose of the association, which as to promote the welfare of the deaf of the State. The association will meet every two years.
Important resolutions were adopted, one of the most far-reaching being as follows:
Resolved, That it is the opinion of this association that it should be unlawful for any board of directors of the State institution to elect to office of employment in the institution of which they have charge any relative, of blood or marriage, to any member of the board or of the superintendent.
Other resolutions adopted by the association will be published in Sunday's News and Observer.
Officers of the Association:
Mr. D. R. Tillinghast, who was elected president of the association, is 66 years old; he is a graduate of the school of the Deaf in New York, known as the Fanwood school, but was a pupil in the Raleigh School for the Deaf and Blind before the Civil War. During the war he was unable to come home from the New York School, as the armies would not allow any traveling between the North and South. So he remained in the school at Fanwood, first as a pupil and afterwards as a teacher, till after the close of the war, when he was called to Raleigh to teach the deaf. Here he remained till the Morganton school was opened and then went there along with most of the other teachers of the deaf in the Raleigh school. He taught at Morganton twelve years and was chaplain of the school for one year. He is now engaged in farming and gardening near Morganton.
Mr. P. L. Ray, the treasurer of the association, is one of the oldest graduates of the Raleigh School for the Deaf and Blind. He attended Gallaudet College - the national college for the deaf in Washington, D. C., for one year, and then went into the printing business. He has followed the printer's trade for forty or more years, and is considered one of the fastest typesetters in the South. Before going to college he was an assistant teacher in the Raleigh school. He is 64 years old and lives in Greensboro.
Mr. Robert S. Taylor, the secretary of the association, is 32 years old. He lost his hearing at 13 years of age. He attended the public schools of Duplin county before becoming deaf and afterwards the State School for the Deaf at Morganton for two years. He then went to Gallaudet college in Washington city, from which he graduated, taking the class honor in 1901 with the degree of B. A. He received the master's degree from the same college in June of this year. During his senior at college he was the editor-in-chief of the college magazine and also the head of several other college organizations. After graduating from college for one year he taught printing and was editor of the Florida School Herald, in the Florida school for the Deaf at St. Augustine. He also taught a class in the Louisiana School for the Deaf for one year. He has been farming, truck-growing and poultry raising at Mt. Olive, at which place he owns a fine farm of 112 acres. He is a frequent contributor to newspapers and magazines, from which work he gains a goodly income.
The Rev. John Walter Michaels, the much beloved evangelist to the deaf in the South, was born in Petersburg, VA in 1852 and raised in Richmond. He entered the Virginia School for the Deaf at Staunton, VA at the age of eight and graduated eight years later. He entered Gallaudet College in Washington, D. C. in 1868 and left three years later to accept a position as teacher at the Staunton school. He taught there two years and was appointed to the principalship of the Arkansas State School for the Deaf at Little Rock, Ark., which he held for twenty-five years. He was called by the Home Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention to take up work as an evangelist to the deaf. His field covers the entire South, including Cuba and Mexico. He is known and much beloved by almost every living deaf in the South. He reports that his work is very successful. Last Thursday night he delivered a most interesting and touching sermon and twelve were converted into faith.
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News and Observer. August 23, 1908 |
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News and Observer (Raleigh, N. C. ) August 23, 1908. Sunday.
A CRITICAL STUDY OF FACTS INVITED: By the State Association of the Deaf.
AN INQUIRING IS ASKED FOR: "It is the Sense of this Body That the Rapid Elimination of Deaf Teachers is the Result, not of Progress Against Fogyism, but Rather of a Battle of the Strong Against the Weak -A Battle Which Ought Not to be Waged at the Expense of a Generous Public."
The deaf of North Carolina in convention assembled in this city, after effecting the permanent organization of the North Carolina Association of the Deaf, adopted a set of resolutions challenging the attention and consideration of all people in the State interested in the welfare of their "brethren in silence."
This meeting, which came to a close Friday afternoon, was the first ever held by the deaf of this State and the event was one never-to-be-forgotten by those who were present. It was a great success in every particular, inspiring to those who participated, educational to those who visited the sessions.
The resolutions will doubtless attract the attention of all interested in the education of the deaf and in the progress of the deaf of the deaf community. They are as follows:
Whereas, this gathering of the representative deaf people of North Carolina affords an unprecedented opportunity for the expression of their views and sentiments upon matters of much concern to them, therefore, be it resolved:
1. That we, the deaf of North Carolina, do hereby declare our hearty appreciation of the liberality with which the good people of our State, through the Legislature, annually provide for the education of the deaf and dumb children of the State: that we look with pride upon the splendid school plant at Morganton, and shall ever regard it as a noble evidence of North Carolina's high sense of justice and her determination that no class, however small in number, shall ever be neglected in the provision made for its education.
2. That while we entertain a deep and abiding sense of gratitude for these great benefits so generously and cheerfully vouchsafed to us, we are constrained to call upon the thinking men and women of the State to give greater and more critical attention to the manner in which the funds provided for the education of the deaf are expended: having in view the methods of instruction adopted, and the educational policies advocated, by those to whom the training of the deaf has been entrusted.
3. That inasmuch as it has been declared by the Board of Internal Improvements that it has no power or inclination to inquire into matters touching methods of instruction pursued, we deem it our duty to call upon the public to make such inquiry, to give due weight to the convictions and sentiments of this Association, and to see to it that the views of the deaf of North Carolina, and of the world at large, are not ruthlessly ignored by those placed in authority.
4. That we hereby affirm our unalterable belief that the combined system of instructing the deaf if the best fitted to secure the greatest happiness and usefulness in life to the greatest number; that, while we believe that every deaf child should be given a fair opportunity to learn to speak and to tread the lips, yet this should not be accorded undue importance:; that moral stamina and intellectual power are of far more importance to the deaf than the ability to speak and to read speech (in which only the very few can ever hope, hope to become reasonably efficient), and inasmuch as it is only through the means of signs and fingerspelling that a true understanding of things -- true ideas -- can be given to a deaf child, it follows that by this means only can the best moral and mental training be accomplished: that all instructors of the deaf should have a working knowledge of signs and the manual alphabet, and should be freely permitted to use either, as the needs of the pupil may require; that as these are practically the unanimous views of the adult deaf of the world, as expressed in resolutions of associations of the deaf in Great Britain, Germany, France, The national Association of the Deaf of the United States, and of all the various State associations, and of the World's Congress of the Deaf, we do most earnestly call the attention of the State authorities and the public generally to this matter.
5. That, whereas, it is the avowed policy of self-styled 'advanced' teachers to adopt everywhere the oral method of instructing the deaf to the total exclusion of the manual method and thereby eliminating the deaf from the ranks of teachers of the deaf and whereas, it is an open secret that the present administration of the North Carolina School for the Deaf and Dumb is enamored of this method - more spectacular than useful - we call again to the common sense and the great heart of the people of the State to say whether or not the door of the schoolroom shall be closed against the deaf men and women whom the State has educated, and whom God has endowed with anxiety and capacity to impart knowledge.
6. That it is the sense of this body that the rapid elimination of deaf teachers is the result, not of a contest of progress against fogyism, but rather of a battle of the strong against the weak, -a battle which, at least, ought not to be waged at the expense of a generous public.
7. That we hereby publicly acknowledge our great and lasting obligation to that devoted teacher, unfailing friend and trusted advisor, David R. Tillinghast, who, being himself handicapped by deafness even as we are, has for forty years labored with unselfish and disinterested loyalty to our welfare; that is it the sense of this Association that he is still blessed with such abundant physical and mental vigor as to render his discharge from the teaching force of the North Carolina School for the Deaf and Dumb a distinct loss to that institution.
8. That the importance of prompt and serious consideration of these matters and things by the people of the State is emphasized by the fact that, by recent legislative enactment, it is made a criminal offense for the parent of guardian or other custodian of a deaf child, to fail to send such deaf child to some school 'at least five terms of nine months each, between the ages of eight years and fifteen years,' provided, the 'superintendent of any school for the instruction of the deaf, by and with the approval of the executive committee of such institution, shall, in his or their discretion, serve written notice on such parent, guardian or custodian directing that such child be sent to the institution whereof they have charge'."
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Goldsboro Weekly Argus. September 10, 1908 |
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Goldsboro Weekly Argus. September 10, 1908.
A QUESTION OF HUMANITY: Attempt to Usurp a Realm That Should be Exclusive.
In the Charlotte News of a recent issue - August 24 - appears the following under the paper's Raleigh correspondence that should be taken note of by every fair-minded citizen of North Carolina:
It develops that in the course of lengthy resolutions adopted by the North Carolina Association of the Deaf, just adjourned here, rancor, engendered by the feud that has disturbed the administration of the affairs of the State School for the Deaf and Dumb, at Morganton, cropped out forcibly in that an investigation is called for to determine whether the elimination of deaf teachers is the result of progress against fogyism or the battle of the strong against the weak, a battle which it is declared should not be waged at the expense of a generous public. The adoption of the oral method of instructing the deaf by teaching them to actually speak and to read speech for the movement of the lips has created no end of trouble in the Morganton institution for some time, especially when it came to dropping from the faculty certain of the old deaf and dumb members of the faculty to give place to experts in the new method of instruction.
The resolutions adopted declare that since the State board of internal improvements holds that it has no authority to investigate methods of instruction at Morganton, there should be provision made for such investigation by the legislature or other proper authority and that it is the unalterable belief of the members of the association, representing educated deaf mutes from all parts of the State, that the combined system should be used if the greatest happiness and usefulness of the students of the institution are to be considered. The reading of signs and fingerspelling should by all means be continued, says the association, through the resolutions adopted, which will be presented to the next session of the legislature, and may come up for investigation by that body.
Commenting on the above movement the Morganton News-Herald, which is on the scene, has the following, which the Argus endorses in full:
We don't pretend to know much about it, but from our view - "up a tree" - the educated deaf teacher is better suited to teach the deaf than anyone else. It stands to reason - it is natural - that there is more sympathy and a better understanding between student and teacher, hence more rapid progress of the deaf student under the deaf teacher. We don't know that there has been any feud over the administration of affairs at the State School for the Deaf and Dumb here, but it does look like there is an undercurrent at work somewhere to "root out" the deaf and dumb teachers to give places to the "more progressive," as some are pleased to term them. As for us we shall espouse the cause of the deaf teacher, for we honestly believe he is the best suited for teaching the deaf, and we are glad to see them organizing for self-protection.
Let's be progressive but progress in the right way. It is all right in many cases to have hearing teachers to teach the deaf and dumb, but let's not eliminate the deaf and dumb teachers. The oral department of the deaf and dumb school is all right - no one is kicking against that - but let us not do away with or look lightly upon manual training by the deaf and dumb.
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Tillinghast at age 90 wrote: |
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E-News creatively designed by: Theresa Moss,
NCAD Social Media Coordinator
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Literary production of E-News by:
Jaime Marshall,
NCAD Secretary
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NC Association of the Deaf |
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