Helen Keller - the Story of My Life

Helen Adams Keller was an American author and lecturer. She was born in Tuscumbia, Alabama on June 27, 1880 and died on June 1, 1968. When Helen was nineteen months old, she was stricken with a damaging brain fever that left her blind and deaf. There was no way she could be educated until she was seven years old, when a teacher named Annie Mansfield Sullivan came to teach her to read the Braille system and to write with a specially constructed typewriter. Annie was almost blind herself from a fever, except her fever was different.

When Helen was older, she helped blind and deaf students by raising enough money to educate them. Helen's last year of college was the hardest not only because of the long study hours, but she was also very worried about Annie. Annie's eyes were sore and tired, just like what it was when she was almost blind. Annie soon became very ill, so a Scottish girl named Polly Thompson came to help. One day Annie went completely blind. She tried to be cheerful but smiling was a hard thing for Annie to do. On October 19, 1936, Annie Sullivan died. Helen felt like she was all alone, again, just like when she was little. Helen forced herself not to give up and so she and Polly carried on.

In 1940, Helen graduated from Radcliff College with honors. She then became a lecturer. After World War II (1939-1945), she visited wounded