Saturday, June 27, 2009

Helen Keller Day in SL



One of my favorite people to have learned about in jr High was Helen Keller, I couldn't get my hands on enough to read about her. She Was born June 27, 1880, and passed on June 1, 1968, and she was born in the small town of Tuscumbia, in Alabama. She was completely blind and deaf, and became uncontrollable at times, for her parents, it was becoming increasingly hard to control her, Helen didn't know how to communicate with others, she would often throw things, or bite probably due to much frustration, however, I am sure it had to be rough on her parents, not knowing how to help their child. Early on in Helen's young life at age 5, Ann Sullivan, came to her to teach her how to communicate, or at least try, it was quite difficult at first but in time Helen began to learn, and until her death never stopped wanting to learn. Please when you have time look up Helen Keller and Ann Sullivan, two very interesting ladies in a time that was very difficult in itself to live even without a disability.



Today and I believe this is the only day in Second life they are having Helen Keller day. Not only to reflect on this wonderful woman's courage and strength and abilities, but to come together to make the Second Life experience more interesting, fun, and exciting for those with disblities, some with partial and or total loss of sight, and hearing. Virtual Helping Hands Group, and Wheelies are key help in organizing this event, and also instrumenting in creating new aids to assist the blind and deaf in Second Life, They are having many speakers from all over that have some link to the above mentioned things. I am sure you can contact these groups if you have access to Second Life for further information, in detail, for your interest or if you know someone who could use their assistance. To speak of a couple of them; Michael Vision, is blind, and in real life worked at the Twin Towers in New York City, where on the day of 911, was on the I believe the 78th floor, when the planes hit. With is co-worker, and also his seeing eye dog he and the people he was with were able to make it out down the stair, after an hour the plane had hit. They made it down the street, only to have the one of the towers fall, and they began to breath in debris. He was calm he said because his buddy, Rossell (seeing eye dog) he said remained calm. He says since 2007 his dog has retired, and relaxing now in his back yard. He now has another seeing eye dog and continues to do well...

Enter here for Helen Keller Slurl


Keller Sight, she is a relative of Helen Keller, and she gave a wonderful talk about the town of Tuscumbia, that she lives in that Helen grow up in, was quite interesting, and she gave a lot of details of Helen you might not have had any where else! Second life was crashing repeatedly so I don't have all the information I would have like to have had at this time, however when in world you can contact some of these people and see who has the schedules and the speeches in writing, because they were recorded!
Pathfinder Linden has be instrumental in helping extremely to put this together with many others such as Pologara Paine (Wheelies Director) Simon Walsh (Creator of Wheelies) and so on...

Will show what photos I could get of the Presentations, and tonight if SL is working better will get more of the other events on the Island!


A Large Group Turn out!


Michael Vision (Survived 911 Attack)



Simon Walsh (Wheelies)

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