Louis Braille

This is the true story of Louis Braille from your book, Santoor (Chapter 6, 'Braille'). Here it is, told in short.

Long ago, in France, there lived a little boy called Louis Braille. When he was three years old, he was playing outside his home while his father, a blacksmith, worked nearby. Louis began to play with the tools lying around. Suddenly, a sharp tool went into his eye. Within a few days he could not see with that eye. Then his other eye was harmed too, and he became completely blind.

In 1819, when he was ten years old, Louis joined the Royal Institute for Young Blind Persons in Paris. There he learnt his letters using wood, cloth, or pins stuck in pincushions.

Around that time, an army man, Captain Charles Barbier, had invented something called 'Night Writing'. It was an alphabet of raised dots and dashes that soldiers could 'read' with their fingers in the dark. But it was too difficult, so it was not a success.

Louis, by now a teenager, became interested in Night Writing and made it much simpler. That is how he gave the world the Braille alphabet. As your book says, a blind person taught the world to see.