Thomas Gallaudet
Breaking the Chains of Silence
Gallaudet dedicated his life to help free the
minds and souls of America's deaf people.
By Riek Bruyns
 Suppose you, knew a secret code to send
messages to your friends just by making faces at them! For example,
a look of Awe would stand for the letter "A", a Bold
expression would stand for "B", and so forth.
You could drive your teachers up the wall and then tell them
with a straight face, - "I wasn't saying anything!" Of
course, that wouldn't be quite true; you would have been communicating,
that is--if you had the time and the skill to .get your message
across.
This code was invented by a real teacher many years ago as a
way of helping his pupils "talk" The teacher, Thomas
H. Gallaudet., is the man responsible for bringing sign language
to America.(1)
Gallaudet, who had studied to be a minister, believed that it
was vitally important for deaf people to learn sign language.
Otherwise, he knew they would never learn about God
His Search For God
Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet was born in Philadelphia in December,
1787 to Christian parents'. He grew up in Hartford, Connecticut,
as the oldest of 12 children. Physically he was weak and often
sick; mentally he was a giant.
At age 18 Gallaudet graduated with highest honors from Yale University.
According to a classmate he was popular among his friends, talented
in math and language, and certain to excel in whatever career
he chose.
His relationship with God was unsettled, however, and his weak
health kept him from finding his place in life. So, at age 22
Gallaudet promised God that he would dedicate his life to God's
service, if God would give him assurance of his salvation and
restore him to good health.
Not long after that, Gallaudet took a job as a travelling agent
and the fresh air and exercise he gut from long hours on horseback
significantly improved his health. As promised, he entered Andover
Divinity College to prepare for the ministry and wrote in his
diary on January 12,1812,"I desire to dedicate myself, souls,
body and spirit, with all my powers and capacity of action, to
Thy service."
A New Friend
While on a vacation from the seminary, Gallaudet visited in the
home of Dr. Mason Cogswell, whose nine-year-old daughter Alice
had been completely deaf since age two. Alice knew no words so
Gallaudet set out to teach her some. He wrote the word "HAT" and
pointed to his own hat. Before long, Alice understood the connection
between the scribbles on the paper and the object. Gallaudet
taught her more words every time he visited.
After a survey showed that there were 84 deaf people in Connecticut
(many young enough to go to school), Dr. Cogswell and his friends
formed a committee to send Gallaudet to Europe to learn the systems
used there for educating the deaf.
The committee could not pay him a salary, only travel expenses,
but Gallaudet did not mind. This was his way of keeping his promise
to God. To Gallaudet, deaf education was a Christian mission: ",...it
seeks to restore them (the deaf) to society with habits of practical
usefulness, with capacities ,of intellectual enjoyment, and,
.above all, in possession of the hope of immortality through
Jesus 'Christ." (2)
After a disappointing attempt .to study the deaf education system
to study the deaf education system in England, Gallaudet went
next to .the National Institute ' for Deaf-Mutes in Paris. There
he learned the manual alphabet and a system of signs developed
by Abbe 'de I'Epee, a French priest.
Gallaudet believed everyone should hear the message of God's love
On June 18, 1816, Gallaudet left for home, accompanied by 'Laurent
Clerc, who was deaf himself and a teacher at the institute ,'in
Paris. Clerc's skill in communication proved the potential of
deaf, education to the American people. This opened purse strings
not only of individuals and private institutions, but also of
legislatures. In October, 1816, the state of Connecticut gave
$5,000 to open the first school for the deaf in that state. It
was open to deaf children of all races and charged no tuition.
Using Abbe de L'Epee's principle (first ideas then words) to
the fullest, Gallaudet relied on natural signing to bring understanding
of Gallaudet kept his promise and gave his life to God's service.
Thanks in part to him, schools are now available all across the
nation where the hearing impaired can learn to share their thoughts
and feelings with other people and ultimately with God. Gallaudet
knew how important It was to break the chains of silence between
God and man for as he once said, "...nothing can satisfy
the mortal mind but God Himself." (3)
Education Was Gallaudet's Service To God
Thomas H. Gallaudet (1787-1851), the Father of Education of the
Deaf (see I & A p.7), was involved in many social issues
which still concern us today.
Faith in Christ was the motivating force of his life. He was
24 years old when he made public confession of his faith and
concluded his dairy, "Prayers, Meditations and Reflections" with
these words. "The vows of God are upon me." 91) This
complete commitment allowed him to live without financial worries
(Providence did provide according to his faith; to overcome frustration
in time of adversity (he learned more to depend on God); and
to arrange priorities (his family always ranked high over status-promising,
demanding posts.
In the single-mindedness of his faith there was no room for separation
between the religious and the secular. "Non Omnis Moriar--AU
of me will not die", (2) was a motto that, according to
his good friend Henry Barnard, meant to Gallaudet that this life
is preparation for the life to come. Hence, education without,
the gospel was unthinkable to him!. As he wrote to a friend, "How
can we expect any great moral change to take place in the world
until the education of children is conducted on the best plan
and, I would add,''oh evangelical principles?" (3)
And in the preface to his Child's Book of the Soul we read, "When
the consideration of these evidences (of the truth of revelation)
and a more faithful study of the divine oracles of truth shall
form a part, and a prominent part, of the education of our children
and youth in this land called Christian, we may hope, and not
till then, for a more general diffusion among us, not only of
a speculative knowledge of what the religion of Jesus Christ
is, but of the influence of its genuine spirit upon the hearts
and lives of men." (4)
Thus spoke the man whom the Connecticut legislature picked as
first choice for the newly created post of Secretary of the Board
Supplement.
of Commissioners of Common Schools in 1839, and who was asked
by Horace Mann of Massachusetts to be the founder of the first
Normal School (teacher training) in that state (in fact in the
whole country), so that it could be conducted as the best possible
experiment.
Gallaudet declined both positions because of his age (50) and
ill health. Gallaudet had a high regard for the family and a
deep respect for women, as mothers. Education in the sense of
preparation for this life and the life hereafter--to him the
highest calling in life--starts in the cradle. Does that mean
that Gallaudet wanted women "barefoot and pregnant in the
kitchen"? Far from it. The task requires the best possible
preparation. The following quotes are from Gallaudet's speech
at the opening of a new building for the Hartford Female Seminary,
a speech that is worthwhile reading for every teacher, even today. "The
pupil should be led to do something more than merely recollect
that
she has read such a fact, on such a page, in such an author.
She should be taught how to arrange and classify those facts
... to improve her powers of judgment." (5)
"Language is the great instrument both of education and thought ... Without
it no instruction could be communicated. Without it, the human mind:..could
arrive at very few abstract truths ... or carry on any extensive processes
of reasoning or useful trains of thought." ( 6) "...from whom does
it (the baby) first learn language, the great instrument ... of cultivating
all its intellectual and moral powers? It is the mother who does all this.
Her influence upon the child is inferior only to that of God." (7)
In his "Letters of a Father, " a series of articles
written on the need for teacher training, he expressed the hope
for a regeneration of society ... resting on the influence of
pious and educated women as mothers and teachers." (8 )
At the wedding of a missionary couple, Gallaudet spoke in honor
of the woman in her role as wife, "woman, sent by heaven
as a helpmate for man, designed to share his sorrows, to participate
in his cares; woman who may have less active courage, but more
unbending fortitude than man; woman, who ... keeps bright the
light of domestic virtue where man suffers its flame to be almost
extinguished in the tumult of this world..." (9) Gallaudet
allows us to see woman as the "other" not the weaker
sex in a God ordained plan where both male and female have an
essential role to fill.
Gallaudet's life leaves us with a question. Did this man, whose
talents are reflected in the impressive list of jobs offered
him upon his release from the post of principal of the School
for the Deaf in 1831, waste precious opportunities? (Gallaudet
resigned as principal in 1830 in order to accept speaking and
writing assignments to support his growing family. He remained
involved in the school as a lifetime board member.)
He could have been founder of the school for the blind in Boston;
he could have practiced what he preached concerning the importance
of sound language instruction in any one of the seven or eight
high schools and colleges that asked for his services. He could
have had a major influence on trends in education as chairman
of the new department of Philosophy of Education at the New York
University.
As director of the Oneida Institute of Science and Industry,
his innate respect for the working man might have carried influence
in the earliest labor management problems. In a time when a 10-hour
workday was an ideal to go on strike for, "Gallaudet's aims
were to secure for all laborers, young and old, in the factories
and in the fields, in the shop and in the kitchen, TIME, time
to attend to their spiritual and intellects improvement; in the
second place a taste of something pure and intellectual and in
the third place, a means to satisfy those tastes." (10)
As it was, his son wrote in 1887, 'Had they (his suggestions)
been generally adopted as they were not--handlabor would have
been dignified, the acquisition of trades by boys would have
been easy and the element of monopoly in trade unions, which
since has-, become so menacing, would have been practically neutralized." (11)
Instead of accepting any of these influential positions, Gallaudet
chose to work away from the limelight. He wrote books for children,
cooperated actively with Henry Barnard in the effort to establish
normal schools and worked as chaplain both in the Hartford prison
and the Retreat (mental hospital)
How did Gallaudet know which tasks accept and which to decline?
We find an answer to this question in Henry Barnard's Tribute
to Gallaudet: "When the calls of the public, or the voice
of religion itself, seems to, urge to the performance of higher
and more important duties, his doctrine was, that conscience
should weigh those claims."(12) The. scales of Gallaudet's
conscience were set when he entered Andover Seminary in 1812
and said, "...lead me, by Thy good Spirit to engage in my
intended pursuits with a single eye to the promotion of Thy glory
and the extension of the Redeemer's kingdom on earth@' ( 13)
Today, as good causes seem to overwhelm us on all sides, Gallaudet.
in his singlemindedness, gives us a good example to follow.
Footnotes
1. Edward Miner Gallaudet, Life Of Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet,
Founder of Deaf-Mute Instruction in America, New York: Henry
Holt & Co., 1898, p.39; 2. Herny Barnard, Tribute To Galluadet,
Hartford: Rocket & Hutchinson. 1852, p.46; 3. E.M. Gallaudet,
op.cit., p. 196; 4. Rev. T.H.Gallaudet, The Child's Book On The
Soul, New York: American Tract Society, Preface to Part 11, p.
73; S. Thomas H. Gallaudett. An Address On Female Education,
delivered November 21, 1827, Hartford: H & FJ Huntington,
1828, p. 10; 6. Ibid, p. II; 7. lbid,. P. 14; 8. Barnard, op.cit.,
p. 29; 9. E.M.Gallaudet, op. 6t., pp. 214-215; 10. Barnard, op.cit.,
p.55; 11. E.M.Gallaudet, op. cit., pp.240-241; 12. Barnard, op.cit.,
p. 55; 13, E.M. Gallaudet, op.cit., p. 38.
DARE To share from John
This is very sad to hear, I'm sure that if Thomas Gallaudet is
here today, he will weep over University of Gallaudet. We must
grasp his vision. Please pray for them and also pray for us as
DARE TEAM to work together with the Worldwide Deaf Ministries
at Deaf Way II to reach lost souls this Summer. Thanks!
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