DEAF AND DUMB (ante). The organization of institutions to educate the deaf and dumb in the United States dates from the early part of this century. An essay on Teaching the Deaf to Speak, by Dr. W. Thornton, of Philadelphia, was published in 1793, and in 1811, a grandson of Braidwood tried to establish a school in New York and Vir ginia, but failed in both instances. The circumstances which led to the opening of the Connecticut asylum at Hartford, April 15, 1817, are as follows: A deaf-mute little girl in the family of Dr. Cogswell, an eminent physician in Hartford, attracting some atten tion, it was soon afterward found that there were other deaf-mutes in the country. It was decided to send some one abroad to acquire, the art of educating them; and to estab lish a school for this purpose funds were raised, and the Rev. F. F. Gallaudet, D.D., was selected for this work. He left the United States May 15, 1816, to execute this mis sion. The institution was incorporated by the Connecticut legislature in l‘lay, 1816, with an appropriation of $5,000. Dr. Gallaudet returned to America in August of the same year, accompanied by Laurent Clerc, a deaf-mute pupil of the abbe Sicard, and they munediately commenced collecting funds to start the school. Thc enterprise ex cited general interest; individuals and churches contributed liberally, and the sum of $12,000 was raised in the course of a few months. Early in 1819, the government of Massachusetts followed the example of Connecticut by providing for the education in the asylum of twenty indigent pupils from that state. The appropriation was after wards enlarged so as to meet the demands of this entire class. New Hampshire made a similar provision in 1821, and Vermont and Maine in 1825. In 1834, South Carolina and Georgia decided to send their indigent deaf-mutes to the asylum, and in 1848, Rhode Island came into the same arrangement. In 1819. congress made a grant to the institu tion of 23 acres of wild land, the proceeds of which now form a fund of $339,000. It was owing to this munificent gift that the name of the school was changed to the "Ameri can Asylum." Before the school at Hartford was in operation, efforts had been made to establish a similar institution in the city of New York; a society was formed which was incorporated April 15, 1817, as the "New York Institution for Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb." Watson's book was taken as a guide, and articulation was taught in cases where the scholar appeared to possess the necessary aptitude, but this method did not prove very successful; and in 1827, the legislature, which had provided since 1822 for the support of 32 pupils, authorized an investigation by the superintendent of common schools of the state, who recommended in his report the introduction into the New York school of the improved methods in use at Hartford and Philadelphia. In consequence of that recommendation the directors finally succeeded in engaging, in 1831, the perma nent services of Harvey P. Peet, LL.D., then one of the most efficientinstructors in the American asylum. Ile served as principal from 1831 to 1867, and has a worthy suc cessor in his son Isaac Lewis Peet, LL.D. Under the management of these two able teachers the institution has taken its place among the most successful schools for deaf-mutes in the world. Its grounds comprise about 20 acres, upon the banks of the Hudson river at Washington heights. The institution has a shoe-shop, tailor
shop, and carpenter-shop, a printing-office, garden, and seamstress rooms connected with the school, in which the pupils receive competent instruction to prepare them for self-support by manual labor, as in all our large asylums. Prof. E. Henry Currier, a leading teacher of this establishment, has secured better results than are usually met with in giving articulation to the dumb and lip-reading to the deaf. Most of his pupils have attained such distinctness of pronunciation and such quickness in recognizing the fleeting indications of words which are made in ordinary utterance, that they have given their instructor a reputation which is attracting more and more pupils of this class to the institution. The method of teaching articulation by visible speech was invented by A. Mellville Bell in England about 1848, and consists of a species of phonetic writing based ou the action of the vocal organs in producing sound. The Pennsylvania institu tion was organized at Philadelphia in 1820 by Joseph Seixas, a Jew of Portuguese descent. Among its first instructors were Laurent Clerc and Lewis Weld, the latter filling the office of principal till 1830, when he was recalled to Hartford to succeed Dr. Gallau det. The Kentucky asylum at Danville was incorporated in 1823, and the Ohio asylum at Columbus was opened in 1829. Virginia, Indiana, Tennessee, Illinois, North Caro lina, Georgia, South Carolina, Missouri, Wisconsin, and Michigan incorporated institu tions, in the course of the next 25 years, and at the present time every state has provided for the education of the (leaf and dumb who are adopted "as wards of the common wealth;" the state regarding it as a primary duty that they shall not be excluded from those educational privileges accorded to every member of the community. Most of these institutions derive their whole income from annual legislative appropriations. The usual term of attendance is 5 years, but the legal term of instruction in most states is 7 years, and may be extended in cases of good scholarship; the average annual cost for board, lodging, and tuition for each pupil supported by the state is $325. There are 51 institutions in the States, a national college at Washington organized by E. M. Gallaudet, LL.D., and 6 institutions in Canada. Religious services have been conducted since 1850 by the Rev. Thomas H. Gallaudet, D.D., eldest son of the founder of the American asylum, at St. Ann's chapel for deaf-mutes, in New York city, but he and his assistants preach frequently in other parts of the country. The American Annals of the Deaf and Dumb, a quarterly periodical, has been published since 1847; conventions of the principals and instructors have been held every few years since 1850, at which papers containing valuable information have been read. Elementary manuals for the deaf-mute have been written in this country by H. B. Peet, J. S. Hutton, Jacobs, Keep, and oth ers. An enumeration of the deaf and dumb is made in the decennial census of the United States, and the proportion is about 1 in 2,000. Of the post-natal causes it has been found that scarlet fever has since 1830 produced 20 to 25 per cent of the total cases; scrofula and spotted fever have also caused a large proportion: The following table gives statistics for the year 1879: