Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend Andrew Foster

Andrew Jackson Foster was born on 26 December, 1925 in Ensley, Alabama, USA and died on 3 December, 1987 in Rwanda, Africa at the age of 61 killed in an airplane accident.

Andrew Foster was a missionary to the Deaf in Africa from 1956 until his death in 1987. Andrew Foster became the first Black Deaf person to earn a bachelor's degree from Gallaudet College and the first to earn a master's degree from Eastern Michigan University. Eventually receiving a Master's Degree from Seattle Pacific Christian College, he founded Christian Mission for Deaf Africans in 1956, and set for Liberia, Africa.

Andrew Foster was the son of a coal miner, he and his younger brother became deaf through spinal meningitis in 1936. Educational opportunities for African Americans in that era prevented him from achieving more than a 6th grade education. At the age of 16, he moved to Detroit, Michigan to live with his aunt and attended Bethany Pembroke church where he later committed his life to the call of Christ. Andrew Foster completed high school at Michigan School for the Deaf.

In 1961 Andrew Foster was married to Berta, a German, and together they have 5 children. Gallaudet College awarded him an honorary doctorate in Humane Letters in 1977 for his accomplishment.

Deaf Education in Africa

There Andrew Foster encountered cultures so oppressive of deaf people that parents often hid their deaf children at home or abandoned them altogether. Hearing missionaries told him that deaf children didn't even exist in Africa but, he found deaf children and established schools for them.

The challenges for deaf ministry in central and west Africa were two-fold: not only were there no churches for the deaf in the most populous regions of Africa, but there were no schools for the deaf. Consequently, the deaf were completely illiterate. The most a deaf person could hope for was to become the family servant and use rudimentary signs invented by the family. In remote villages, some deaf children were thought to be cursed by demons and abandoned to be eaten by wild animals.

Andrew Foster began his work in 1956 by convincing school officials to let him use their classrooms after hours to teach the deaf. In Ghana he found a public school willing to allow him to teach the deaf, and within months the school had a waiting list of over 300 families wanting to send their deaf children to his school. As the deaf began to become literate, Andrew Foster would supplement their education with trade skills, and, most importantly, teach Christianity lessons. Andrew Foster convinced existing churches and missions to expand their ministry to include the deaf.

After staying on as the administrator of the school for three years, Andrew Foster moved on to Nigeria to repeat the successes he had seen in Ghana. It was in Ibadan, Nigeria, that he would eventually set up his headquarters and create a teacher-training facility as he continued to expand his work to over thirty countries in the West and Central regions of Africa. Andrew Foster's work included schools, Sunday schools, churches, youth camps and teacher-training facilities reaching tens of thousands of deaf-teaching many of them not only their own names, but additional to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

During 30 years of service Andrew Foster founded 31 schools and 2 centers, successively in Ghana, Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Togo, Chad, Senegal, Benin, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Zaire (presently Democratic Republic of Congo), Burkina Faso, Burundi and Gabon. About the same number of Sunday Schools and churches were established in those countries, and also in Kenya, Sierra Leone, Congo and Guinea. For much of his life Andrew Foster spent 6 months of the year in Africa establishing schools and the other 6 months in the United State raising money to support these schools. In 1977, the name was changed to Christian Mission for the Deaf.

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Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend Harold MacGrath

Harold MacGrath was born on 4 September, 1871 and died on 30 October, 1932. Harold MacGrath was an American author, Harold MacGrath was a bestselling American novelist, short story writer, and screenwriter. In an article in the 23 April, 1932 issue of The Saturday Evening Post written under the title "The Short Autobiography of a Deaf Man," Harold MacGrath told the public how he had struggled early in life as a result of a hearing impairment. At a time in history when deaf people were almost automatically considered as lacking intellectual acuity, he had hid this from his employer and others. Harold MacGrath's success made him a very wealthy man and although he travelled the world extensively.

Harold McGrath is also known occasionally as Harold McGrath, he was born in Syracuse, New York. As a young man, he worked as a reporter and columnist on the Syracuse Herald newspaper until the late 1890s when he published his first novel, a romance titled "Arms and the Woman." According to the New York Times, his next book, "The Puppet Crown," was the No.7 bestselling book in the United States for all of 1901. From that point on, Harold MacGrath never looked back, writing novels for the mass market about love, adventure, mystery, spies, and the like at an average rate of more than one a year. Harold McGrath would have 3 more of his books that were among the top ten bestselling books of the year. At the same time, he penned a number of short stories for major American magazines such as The Saturday Evening Post, Ladies Home Journal, and Red Book magazine. Several of Harold MacGrath's novels were serialized in these magazines and contributing to them was something he would continue to do until his death in 1932.

In 1912, Harold MacGrath became one of the first nationally-known authors to write directly for the movies when he was hired by the American Film Company to do the screenplay for a short film in the Western genre titled "The Vengeance That Failed." Harold MacGrath had 18 of his 40 novels and 3 of his short stories made into films plus he wrote the story for another 4 motion pictures. 3 of his books were also made into Broadway plays. 1 of the many films made from Harold MacGrath's writings was the 1913 serial The Adventures of Kathlyn starring Kathlyn Williams. While writing the 13 episodes he simultaneously wrote the book that was published immediately after the 29 December, 1913 premiere of the first episode of the serial so as to be in book stores during the screening of the entire 13 episodes.

Among Harold MacGrath's short stories made into film was the 1920 Douglas Fairbanks Production Company's feature-length adventure film The Mollycoddle based on Harold MacGrath's short story with the same title that appeared in The Saturday Evening Post in 1913. Directed by Victor Fleming, it starred Fairbanks, Ruth Renick, and Wallace Beery and was distributed through the newly created United Artists. It is said that during this same time, a young Boris Karloff, who previously had a few uncredited film roles, chose his stage name for his first screen credit in 1920 from the Harold MacGrath novel "The Drums of Jeopardy" which had also been published by The Saturday Evening Post in January of that year and which featured a Russian mad scientist character named "Boris Karlov." The name "Boris Karlov" was used from Harold MacGrath's book for the 1922 Broadway play, but by 1923 with actor Boris Karloff using the similar sounding variation, the film version renamed the character as "Gregor Karlov."

Harold MacGrath's success made him a very wealthy man and although he traveled the world extensively, Syracuse, New York was his home and it was there in 1912 that he built an English country-style mansion renowned for its landscaped gardens. In an article in the April 23, 1932 issue of The Saturday Evening Post written under the title "The Short Autobiography of a Deaf Man," MacGrath told the public how he had struggled early in life as a result of a hearing impairment. At a time in history when deaf people were almost automatically considered as lacking intellectual acuity, he had hid this from his employer and others. Harold MacGrath died at his home in Syracuse a few months after the article was published.

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Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend William Elsworth

William Elsworth, Dummy Hoy, was born on 23 May, 1862 and died on 15 December, 1961. William Elsworth was an American center fielder in Major League Baseball who played for several teams from 1888 to 1902, most notably the Cincinnati Reds and two Washington, D.C. franchises. William Elsworth is noted for being the most accomplished deaf player in major league history, and is credited by some sources with causing the establishment of signals for safe and out calls. William Elsworth became deaf after suffering from meningitis at age of 3, and went on to graduate from the Ohio State School for the Deaf in Columbus as class valedictorian. William Elsworth became the 3rd deaf player in the major leagues, after pitcher Ed Dundon and catcher Tom Lynch. William Elsworth also worked as an executive with Goodyear after supervising hundreds of deaf workers during World War I. In 1951 he was the first deaf athlete elected to membership in the American Athletic Association of the Deaf Hall of Fame.

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Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend Thomas Edison

Thomas Alva Edison was born on 11 February, 1847 in Milan, Ohio, and grew up in Port Huron, Michigan and died on 18 October, 1931, in his home, "Glenmont" in Llewellyn Park in West Orange, New Jersey. Thomas Edison is buried in Rosedale Cemetery in Orange, New Jersey. Thomas Edison's last breath is reportedly contained in a test tube at the Henry Ford Museum. Henry Ford reportedly convinced Charles Edison to seal a test tube of air in the inventor's room shortly after his death, as a memento. A plaster death mask was also made.

Thomas Edison was an American inventor and businessman who developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph and a long lasting light bulb. Dubbed "The Wizard of Menlo Park" by a newspaper reporter, he was one of the first inventors to apply the principles of mass production to the process of invention, and therefore is often credited with the creation of the first industrial research laboratory.

Thomas Edison is considered one of the most prolific inventors in history, holding 1,093 U.S. patents in his name, as well as many patents in the United Kingdom, France and Germany.

Thomas Edison was the 7th and last child of Samuel Ogden Edison, Jr. (1804–1896) (born in Marshalltown, Nova Scotia, Canada) and Nancy Matthews Edison née Elliott (1810–1871). Thomas Edison considered himself to be of Dutch ancestry.

Thomas Edison as a boy in school, the young Thomas Edison's mind often wandered, and his teacher, the Reverend Engle, was overheard calling him "addled." This ended Thomas Edison's 3 months of official schooling. Thomas Edison recalled later, "My mother was the making of me. She was so true, so sure of me; and I felt I had something to live for, someone I must not disappoint." Thomas Edison's mother then home schooled him. Much of his education came from reading R.G. Parker's School of Natural Philosophy and The Cooper Union.

Thomas Edison developed hearing problems at an early age. The cause of his deafness has been attributed to a bout of scarlet fever during childhood and recurring untreated middle ear infections. Around the middle of his career Thomas Edison attributed the hearing loss to being struck on the ears by a train conductor when his chemical laboratory in a boxcar caught fire and he was thrown off the train in Smiths Creek, Michigan, along with his apparatus and chemicals. In his later years he modified the story to say the injury occurred when the conductor, in helping him onto a moving train, lifted him by the ears.

Thomas Edison's family was forced to move to Port Huron, Michigan, when the railroad bypassed Milan in 1854, but his life there was bittersweet. Thomas Edison sold candy and newspapers on trains running from Port Huron to Detroit, as well as vegetables that he sold to supplement his income. This began Thomas Edison's long streak of entrepreneurial ventures as he discovered his talents as a businessman. These talents eventually led him to found General Electric, which is still a publicly traded company, and 13 other companies.

Thomas Edison became a telegraph operator after he saved 3 year old Jimmie MacKenzie from being struck by a runaway train. Jimmie's father, station agent J.U. MacKenzie of Mount Clemens, Michigan, was so grateful that he trained Edison as a telegraph operator. Thomas Edison's first telegraphy job away from Port Huron was at Stratford Junction, Ontario, on the Grand Trunk Railway. In 1866, at the age of 19, Thomas Edison moved to Louisville, Kentucky, where as an employee of Western Union he worked the Associated Press bureau news wire. Thomas Edison requested the night shift, which allowed him plenty of time to spend at his 2 favorite pastimes—reading and experimenting. Eventually, the latter pre-occupation cost him his job. One night in 1867, he was working with a battery when he spilled sulphuric acid onto the floor. It ran between the floorboards and onto his boss' desk below. The next morning he was fired.

One of his mentors during those early years was a fellow telegrapher and inventor named Franklin Leonard Pope, who allowed the impoverished youth to live and work in the basement of his Elizabeth, New Jersey, home. Some of Thomas Edison's earliest inventions were related to telegraphy, including a stock ticker. Thomas Edison's first patent was for the electric vote recorder, (U. S. Patent 90,646), which was granted on June 1, 1869.

On 25 December, 1871, Thomas Edison married 16 year old Mary Stilwell, whom he had met 2 months earlier as she was an employee at one of his shops. They had 3 children: Marion Estelle Edison (1873–1965), nicknamed "Dot" Thomas Alva Edison Jr. (1876–1935), nicknamed "Dash" and William Leslie Edison (1878–1937) Mary Edison died on 9 August, 1884.

On 24 February, 1886, at the age of 39, Thomas Edison married 20 year old Mina Miller in Akron, Ohio. Mina Miller was the daughter of inventor Lewis Miller, co-founder of the Chautauqua Institution and a benefactor of Methodist charities. They also had 3 children: Madeleine Edison (1888–1979), who married John Eyre Sloane.

Mina outlived Thomas Edison, dying on 24 August, 1947 in Seminole Lodge, Edison's winter home in Fort Myers, Florida . Thomas Edison had purchased his home in 1886 as a wedding gift for Mina.

Charles Edison (1890–1969), who took over the company upon his father's death and who later was elected Governor of New Jersey
Theodore Miller Edison (1898–1992).

Photograph of Thomas Edison with his phonograph, taken by Mathew Brady in 1877 Thomas Edison began his career as an inventor in Newark, New Jersey, with the automatic repeater and his other improved telegraphic devices, but the invention which first gained him fame was the phonograph in 1877. This accomplishment was so unexpected by the public at large as to appear almost magical. Thomas Edison became known as "The Wizard of Menlo Park," New Jersey, where he lived. Thomas Edison's first phonograph recorded on tinfoil around a grooved cylinder and had poor sound quality. The tinfoil recordings could only be replayed a few times. In the 1880s, a redesigned model using wax-coated cardboard cylinders was produced by Alexander Graham Bell, Chichester Bell, and Charles Tainter. This was one reason that Thomas Edison continued work on his own "Perfected Phonograph."

Thomas Edison's Menlo Park Laboratory, removed to Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Michigan. Thomas Edison's first successful light bulb model, used in public demonstration at Menlo Park, December 1879
U.S. Patent #223898: Electric-Lamp. Issued 27 January, 1880. Thomas Edison's major innovation was the first industrial research lab, which was built in Menlo Park, New Jersey. Built with the funds from the sale of Thomas Edison's quadruplex telegraph, it was the first institution set up with the specific purpose of producing constant technological innovation and improvement. Thomas Edison was legally attributed with most of the inventions produced there, though many employees carried out research and development work under his direction. Thomas Edison's staff was generally told to carry out his directions in conducting research, and he drove them hard to produce results. The large research group, which included engineers and other workers, based much of their research on work done by others before them.

William J. Hammer, a consulting electrical engineer, began his duties as a laboratory assistant to Thomas Edison in December 1879. Thomas Edison assisted in experiments on the telephone, phonograph, electric railway, iron ore separator, electric lighting, and other developing inventions. However, Hammer worked primarily on the incandescent electric lamp and was put in charge of tests and records on that device. In 1880, he was appointed chief engineer of the Edison Lamp Works. In his first year, the plant under General Manager Francis Robbins Upton turned out 50,000 lamps. According to Thomas Edison, Hammer was "a pioneer of incandescent electric lighting".

Nearly all of Thomas Edison's patents were utility patents, which were protected for a 17 year period and included inventions or processes that are electrical, mechanical, or chemical in nature. About a dozen were design patents, which protect an ornamental design for up to a 14 year period. Like most patents, the inventions he described were improvements over prior art. The phonograph patent, on the other hand, was unprecedented as the first device to record and reproduce sounds. Thomas Edison did not invent the first electric light bulb, but instead invented the first commercially practical incandescent light. Several designs had already been developed by earlier inventors including the patent he purchased from Henry Woodward and Mathew Evans, Moses G. Farmer, Joseph Swan, James Bowman Lindsay, William E. Sawyer, Sir Humphry Davy, and Heinrich Göbel. Some of these early bulbs had such flaws as extremely short life, high expense to produce, and high current draw, making them difficult to apply on a large scale commercially. In 1878, Thomas Edison applied the term filament to the element of glowing wire carrying the current, although English inventor Joseph Swan had used the term prior to this. Thomas Edison took the features of these earlier designs and set his workers to the task of creating longer-lasting bulbs. By 1879, he had produced a new concept: a high resistance lamp in a very high vacuum, which would burn for hundreds of hours. While the earlier inventors had produced electric lighting in laboratory conditions, dating back to a demonstration of a glowing wire by Alessandro Volta in 1800, Thomas Edison concentrated on commercial application, and was able to sell the concept to homes and businesses by mass-producing relatively long-lasting light bulbs and creating a complete system for the generation and distribution of electricity.

The Menlo Park research lab was made possible by the sale of the quadruplex telegraph that Thomas Edison invented in 1874. It could send 4 simultaneous telegraph signals over the same wire. After his demonstration of the telegraph, Thomas Edison was not sure that his original plan on selling it for $4,000 to $5,000 was right, so he asked Western Union to make an bid. Thomas Edison was surprised to hear them offer $40,000, which he graciously accepted. The quadruplex telegraph was Thomas Edison's first big financial success and allowed him to build Menlo Park.

In just over a decade Thomas Edison's Menlo Park laboratory had expanded to occupy 2 city blocks. Thomas Edison said he wanted the lab to have "a stock of almost every conceivable material". A newspaper article printed in 1887 reveals the seriousness of his claim, stating the lab contained "eight thousand kinds of chemicals, every kind of screw made, every size of needle, every kind of cord or wire, hair of humans, horses, hogs, cows, rabbits, goats, minx, camels ...silk in every texture, cocoons, various kinds of hoofs, shark's teeth, deer horns, tortoise shell ...cork, resin, varnish and oil, ostrich feathers, a peacock's tail, jet, amber, rubber, all ores ..." and the list goes on.

Over his desk, Thomas Edison displayed a placard with Sir Joshua Reynolds' famous quote: "There is no expedient to which a man will not resort to avoid the real labor of thinking." This slogan was reputedly posted at several other locations throughout the facility.

With Menlo Park, Edison had created the first industrial laboratory concerned with creating knowledge and then controlling its application.

In 1877–1878, Thomas Edison invented and developed the carbon microphone used in all telephones along with the Bell receiver until the 1980s. After protracted patent litigation, in 1892 a federal court ruled that Thomas Edison—and not Emile Berliner—was the inventor of the carbon microphone. The carbon microphone was also used in radio broadcasting and public address work through the 1920s.

History of the light bulb

After many experiments with platinum and other metal filaments, Thomas Edison returned to a carbon filament. The first successful test was on October 22, 1879, and lasted 40 hours. Thomas Edison continued to improve this design and by 4 November, 1879, filed for U.S. patent 223,898 (granted on January 27, 1880) for an electric lamp using "a carbon filament or strip coiled and connected to platina contact wires". Although the patent described several ways of creating the carbon filament including "cotton and linen thread, wood splints, papers coiled in various ways", it was not until several months after the patent was granted that Thomas Edison and his team discovered a carbonized bamboo filament could last over 1,200 hours.

Thomas Edison bought light bulb U.S. patent 181,613 of Henry Woodward that was issued 29 August, 1876 and obtained an exclusive license to Woodward's Canadian patent. These patents covered a carbon filament in a rarefied gas bulb.

In 1878, Thomas Edison formed the Edison Electric Light Company in New York City with several financiers, including J. P. Morgan and the members of the Vanderbilt family. Thomas Edison made the first public demonstration of his incandescent light bulb on 31 December, 1879, in Menlo Park. It was during this time that he said: "We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles."

George Westinghouse's company bought Philip Diehl's competing induction lamp patent rights (1882) for $25,000, forcing the holders of the Edison patent to charge a more reasonable rate for the use of the Edison patent rights and lowering the price of the electric lamp.

On 8 October, 1883, the U.S. patent office ruled that Edison's patent was based on the work of William Sawyer and was therefore invalid. Litigation continued for nearly 6 years, until 6 October, 1889, when a judge ruled that Thomas Edison's electric light improvement claim for "a filament of carbon of high resistance" was valid. To avoid a possible court battle with Joseph Swan, whose British patent had been awarded a year before Thomas Edison's, he and Swan formed a joint company called Thomas Edison to manufacture and market the invention in Britain.

Mahen Theatre in Brno in what is now the Czech Republic, was the first public building in the world to use Thomas Edison's electric lamps, with the installation supervised by Thomas Edison's assistant in the invention of the lamp, Francis Jehl.

Thomas Edison patented an electric distribution system in 1880, which was essential to capitalize on the invention of the electric lamp. On 17 December, 1880, Thomas Edison founded the Edison Electric Illuminating Company. The company established the first investor-owned electric utility in 1882 on Pearl Street Station, New York City. It was on 4 September, 1882, that Thomas Edison switched on his Pearl Street generating station's electrical power distribution system, which provided 110 volts direct current (DC) to 59 customers in lower Manhattan.

Earlier in the year, in January 1882 he had switched on the first steam generating power station at Holborn Viaduct in London. The DC supply system provided electricity supplies to street lamps and several private dwellings within a short distance of the station. On 19 January, 1883, the first standardised incandescent electric lighting system employing overhead wires began service in Roselle, New Jersey.

Extravagant displays of electric lights quickly became a feature of public events, as this picture from the 1897 Tennessee Centennial Exposition shows. Thomas Edison's true success, like that of his friend Henry Ford, was in his ability to maximize profits through establishment of mass-production systems and intellectual property rights. This dampened the success of less profitable work by others who were focused on inventing longer-lasting high-efficiency technology. George Westinghouse and Thomas Edison became adversaries because of Thomas Edison's promotion of direct current for electric power distribution instead of the more easily transmitted alternating current (AC) system invented by Nikola Tesla and promoted by Westinghouse. Unlike DC, AC could be stepped up to very high voltages with transformers, sent over thinner and cheaper wires, and stepped down again at the destination for distribution to users.

In 1887 there were 121 Edison power stations in the United States delivering DC electricity to customers. When the limitations of Direct Current (DC) were discussed by the public, Thomas Edison launched a propaganda campaign to convince people that Alternating Current (AC) was far too dangerous to use. The problem with DC was that the power plants could only economically deliver DC electricity to customers about one and a half miles from the generating station, so it was only suitable for central business districts. When George Westinghouse suggested using high-voltage AC instead, as it could carry electricity hundreds of miles with marginal loss of power, Thomas Edison waged a "War of Currents" to prevent AC from being adopted.

Despite Thomas Edison's contempt for capital punishment, the war against AC led him to become involved in the development and promotion of the electric chair as a demonstration of AC's greater lethal potential versus the "safer" DC. Thomas Edison went on to carry out a brief but intense campaign to ban the use of AC or to limit the allowable voltage for safety purposes. As part of this campaign, Thomas Edison's employees publicly electrocuted animals to demonstrate the dangers of AC, even though protection from electrocution by AC or DC is essentially the same. On one of the more notable occasions, in 1903, Thomas Edison's workers electrocuted Topsy the elephant at Luna Park, near Coney Island, after she had killed several men and her owners wanted her put to death. Thomas Edison's company filmed the electrocution.

AC replaced DC in most instances of generation and power distribution, enormously extending the range and improving the efficiency of power distribution. Though widespread use of DC ultimately lost favor for distribution, it exists today primarily in long-distance high-voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission systems. Low voltage DC distribution continued to be used in high density downtown areas for many years but was replaced by AC low voltage network distribution in many central business districts. DC had the advantage that large battery banks could maintain continuous power through brief interruptions of the electric supply from generators and the transmission system. Utilities such as Commonwealth Edison in Chicago had rotary converters, also known as motor-generator sets , which could change DC to AC and AC to various frequencies in the early to mid-20th century. Utilities supplied rectifiers to convert the low voltage AC to DC for such DC loads as elevators, fans and pumps. There were still 1,600 DC customers in downtown New York City as of 2005, and service was only finally discontinued on 14 November, 2007. The New York City Subway system is still run by DC power to this day.

Thomas Edison is credited with designing and producing the first commercially available fluoroscope, the machine that takes radiographs (colloquially known as "X-rays"). Until Thomas Edison discovered that calcium tungstate fluoroscopy screens produced brighter images than the barium platinocyanide screens originally used by Wilhelm Röntgen, the technology was only capable of producing very faint images. The fundamental design of Thomas Edison's fluoroscope is still in use today, despite the fact that Thomas Edison himself abandoned the project after nearly losing his own eyesight and seriously maiming his assistant, Clarence Dally. Clarence Dally had made himself an enthusiastic human guinea pig for the fluoroscopy project and in the process been exposed to a poisonous dose of radiation. Clarence Dally later died of injuries related to the exposure. In 1903, a shaken Thomas Edison said "Don't talk to me about X-rays, I am afraid of them."

Frank J. Sprague, a competent mathematician and former naval officer, was recruited by Edward H. Johnson and joined the Edison organization in 1883. One of Sprague's significant contributions to the Edison Laboratory at Menlo Park was to expand Edison's mathematical methods. Despite the common belief that Thomas Edison did not use mathematics, analysis of his notebooks reveal that he was an astute user of mathematical analysis, for example, determining the critical parameters of his electric lighting system including lamp resistance by a sophisticated analysis of Ohm's Law, Joule's Law and economics. A key to Thomas Edison's success was an holistic rather than reductionist approach to invention, making extensive use of trial and error. Since Sprague joined Thomas Edison in 1883 and Thomas Edison's output of patents peaked in 1880, it could be interpreted that the shift towards a reductionist analytical approach may not have been a positive move for Thomas Edison. Sprague's important analytical contributions, including correcting Thomas Edison's system of mains and feeders for central station distribution, form a counter argument to this. In 1884, Sprague decided his interests in the exploitation of electricity lay elsewhere, and he left Thomas Edison to found the Sprague Electric Railway & amp; amp; Motor Company. However, Sprague, who later developed many electrical innovations, always credited Thomas Edison for their work together.

Another of Thomas Edison's assistants was Nikola Tesla, who claimed that Thomas Edison promised him $50,000 if he succeeded in making improvements to his DC generation plants. Nikola Tesla claimed that several months later, when he had finished the work and asked to be paid, Thomas Edison said, "When you become a full-fledged American you will appreciate an American joke." Nikola Tesla immediately resigned. With Nikola Tesla's salary of $18 per week, the payment would have amounted to over 53 years pay and the amount was equal to the initial capital of the company. Nikola Tesla resigned when he was refused a raise to $25 per week. Although Nikola Tesla accepted an Edison Medal later in life and professed a high opinion of Thomas Edison as an inventor and engineer, this and other negative series of events concerning Thomas Edison remained with Nikola Tesla. The day after Thomas Edison died, the New York Times contained extensive coverage of Thomas Edison's life, with the only negative opinion coming from Nikola Tesla who was quoted as saying, "He had no hobby, cared for no sort of amusement of any kind and lived in utter disregard of the most elementary rules of hygiene" and that, "His method was inefficient in the extreme, for an immense ground had to be covered to get anything at all unless blind chance intervened and, at first, I was almost a sorry witness of his doings, knowing that just a little theory and calculation would have saved him 90 percent of the labour. But he had a veritable contempt for book learning and mathematical knowledge, trusting himself entirely to his inventor's instinct and practical American sense." When Thomas Edison was a very old man and close to death, he said, in looking back, that the biggest mistake he had made was that he never respected Nikola Tesla or his work.

There were 28 men recognized as Edison Pioneers.

The key to Thomas Edison's fortunes was telegraphy. With knowledge gained from years of working as a telegraph operator, he learned the basics of electricity. This allowed him to make his early fortune with the stock ticker, the first electricity-based broadcast system. Thomas Edison patented the sound recording and reproducing phonograph in 1878. Thomas Edison was also granted a patent for the motion picture camera or "Kinetograph". Thomas Edison did the electromechanical design, while his employee W.K.L. Dickson, a photographer, worked on the photographic and optical development. Much of the credit for the invention belongs to Dickson. In 1891, Thomas Edison built a Kinetoscope, or peep-hole viewer. This device was installed in penny arcades, where people could watch short, simple films. The kinetograph and kinetoscope were both first publicly exhibited 20 May, 1891.

On 9 August, 1892, Thomas Edison received a patent for a two-way telegraph. In April 1896, Thomas Armat's Vitascope, manufactured by the Edison factory and marketed in Edison's name, was used to project motion pictures in public screenings in New York City. Later he exhibited motion pictures with voice soundtrack on cylinder recordings, mechanically synchronized with the film.

Officially the kinetoscope entered in Europe when the rich American Businessman Irving T. Bush (1869–1948) bought from the Continental Commerce Company of Franck Z. Maguire and Joseph D. Bachus a dozen machines. Bush placed from 17 October, 1894 on the first kinetoscopes in London. At the same time the French company Kinétoscope Edison Michel et Alexis Werner bought these machines for the market in France. In the last 3 months of 1894 The Continental Commerce Company sold hundreds of kinetoscopes in Europe (i.e. the Netherlands and Italy). In Germany and in Austria-Hungary the kinetoscope was introduced by the Deutsche-österreichische-Edison-Kinetoscop Gesellschaft, founded by the Ludwig Stollwerck of the Schokoladen-Süsswarenfabrik Stollwerck & amp; Co of Cologne. The first kinetoscopes arrived in Belgium at the Fairs in early 1895. The Edison's Kinétoscope Français, a Belgian company, was founded in Brussels on January 15, 1895 with the rights to sell the kinetoscopes in Monaco, France and the French colonies. The main investors in this company were Belgian industrialists. On 14 May, 1895 the Edison's Kinétoscope Belge was founded in Brussels. The businessman Ladislas-Victor Lewitzki, living in London but active in Belgium and France, took the initiative in starting this business. Thomas Edison had contacts with Leon Gaumont and the American Mutoscope and Biograph Co. In 1898 he also became shareholder of the Biograph and Mutoscope Company for France.

In 1908, Thomas Edison started the Motion Picture Patents Company, which was a conglomerate of 9 major film studios (commonly known as the Edison Trust). Thomas Edison was the first honorary fellow of the Acoustical Society of America, which was founded in 1929.

Thomas Edison moved from Menlo Park after the death of Mary Stilwell and purchased a home known as "Glenmont" in 1886 as a wedding gift for Mina in Llewellyn Park in West Orange, New Jersey. In the 1880s, Thomas Edison bought property in Fort Myers, Florida, and built Seminole Lodge as a winter retreat. Thomas Edison shared these 2 residences until early in 1931 when his medical needs were better met in West Orange.

Henry Ford, the automobile magnate, later lived a few hundred feet away from Thomas Edison at his winter retreat in Fort Myers, Florida. Thomas Edison even contributed technology to the automobile. They were friends until Thomas Edison's death.

Officially the kinetoscope entered in Europe when the rich American Businessman Irving T. Bush (1869–1948) bought from the Continental Commerce Company of Franck Z. Maguire and Joseph D. Bachus a dozen machines. Bush placed from October 17, 1894 on the first kinetoscopes in London. At the same time the French company Kinétoscope Edison Michel et Alexis Werner bought these machines for the market in France. In the last three months of 1894 The Continental Commerce Company sold hundreds of kinetoscopes in Europe (i.e. the Netherlands and Italy). In Germany and in Austria-Hungary the kinetoscope was introduced by the Deutsche-österreichische-Edison-Kinetoscop Gesellschaft, founded by the Ludwig Stollwerck of the Schokoladen-Süsswarenfabrik Stollwerck & Co of Cologne. The first kinetoscopes arrived in Belgium at the Fairs in early 1895. The Edison's Kinétoscope Français, a Belgian company, was founded in Brussels on January 15, 1895 with the rights to sell the kinetoscopes in Monaco, France and the French colonies. The main investors in this company were Belgian industrialists. On May 14, 1895 the Edison's Kinétoscope Belge was founded in Brussels. The businessman Ladislas-Victor Lewitzki, living in London but active in Belgium and France, took the initiative in starting this business. Thomas Edison had contacts with Leon Gaumont and the American Mutoscope and Biograph Co. In 1898 he also became shareholder of the Biograph and Mutoscope Company for France.

In 1901, he visited the Sudbury area as a mining prospector, and is credited with the original discovery of the Falconbridge ore body. Thomas Edison attempts to actually mine the ore body were not successful, however, and he abandoned his mining claim in 1903. A street in Falconbridge, as well as the Edison Building, which served as the head office of Falconbridge Mines, are named for him.

In 1902, agents of Thomas Edison bribed a theater owner in London for a copy of A Trip to the Moon by Georges Méliès. Thomas Edison then made hundreds of copies and showed them in New York City. Méliès received no compensation. He was counting on taking the film to US and recapture the huge cost of it by showing it throughout the US when he realized it has already been showing in the US by Edison. This bankrupted Méliès. Other exhibitors similarly routinely copied and exhibited each others films. To better protect the copyrights on his films, Edison deposited prints of them on long strips of photographic paper with the U.S. copyright office. Many of these paper prints survived longer and in better condition than the actual films of that era.

Thomas Edison's favourite movie was The Birth of a Nation. Thomas Edison thought that talkies had "spoiled everything" for him. "There isn't any good acting on the screen. They concentrate on the voice now and have forgotten how to act. I can sense it more than you because I am deaf."

Thomas Edison became the owner of his Milan, Ohio, birthplace in 1906. On his last visit, in 1923, he was shocked to find his old home still lit by lamps and candles.

In 1908, Thomas Edison started the Motion Picture Patents Company, which was a conglomerate of 9 major film studios (commonly known as the Edison Trust). Thomas Edison was the first honorary fellow of the Acoustical Society of America, which was founded in 1929.

In 1928, Thomas Edison joined the Fort Myers Civitan Club. Thomas Edison believed strongly in the organization, writing that "The Civitan Club is doing things--big things--for the community, state, and nation, and I certainly consider it an honor to be numbered in its ranks." Thomas Edison was an active member in the club until his death, sometimes bringing Henry Ford to the club's meetings.

Thomas Edison was said to have been influenced by a fad diet that was popular in the day to that in his last few years "the only liquid he consumed was a pint of milk every 3 hours". Thomas Edison is reported to have believed this diet would restore his health. However, this tale is doubtful. In 1930, the year before Thomas Edison died, Mina said in an interview about him that "Correct eating is one of his greatest hobbies." Mina also said that during one of his periodic "great scientific adventures", Thomas Edison would be up at 7:00, have breakfast at 8:00, and be rarely home for lunch or dinner, implying that he continued to have all 3.

Thomas Edison was active in business right up to the end. Just months before his death in 1931, the Lackawanna Railroad implemented electric trains in suburban service from Hoboken to Gladstone, Montclair and Dover in New Jersey. Transmission was by means of an overhead catenary system, with the entire project under Thomas Edison's guidance. To the surprise of many, he was at the throttle of the very first MU (Multiple-Unit) train to depart Lackawanna Terminal in Hoboken, driving the train all the way to Dover. As another tribute to his lasting legacy, the same fleet of cars Thomas Edison deployed on the Lackawanna in 1931 served commuters until their retirement in 1984, when some of them were purchased by the Berkshire Scenic Railway Museum in Lenox, MA. A special plaque commemorating the joint achievement of both the railway and Thomas Edison, can be seen today in the waiting room of Lackawanna Terminal in Hoboken, presently operated by New Jersey Transit.

Historian Paul Israel has characterized Thomas Edison as a "freethinker". Thomas Edison was heavily influenced by Thomas Paine's Age of Reason. Thomas Edison defended Paine's "scientific deism," saying, "He has been called an atheist, but atheist he was not. Paine believed in a supreme intelligence, as representing the idea which other men often express by the name of deity." In an 2 October, 1910 interview in the New York Times Magazine, Thomas Edison stated:

Nature is what we know. We do not know the gods of religions. And nature is not kind, or merciful, or loving. If God made me—the fabled God of the three qualities of which I spoke: mercy, kindness, love—He also made the fish I catch and eat. And where do His mercy, kindness, and love for that fish come in? No; nature made us—nature did it all—not the gods of the religions.

Thomas Edison was accused of atheism for those remarks, and although he did not allow himself to be drawn into the controversy publicly, he defended himself in a private letter: "You have misunderstood the whole article, because you jumped to the conclusion that it denies the existence of God. There is no such denial, what you call God I call Nature, the Supreme intelligence that rules matter. All the article states is that it is doubtful in my opinion if our intelligence or soul or whatever one may call it lives hereafter as an entity or disperses back again from whence it came, scattered amongst the cells of which we are made."

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Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend Linda Bove

Linda Bove was born on 30 November, 1945 in Garfield, New Jersey, USA. Linda Bove attended Gallaudet University. Linda is a deaf American actress who played the part of Linda the Librarian on the children's television programme Sesame Street from 1971 to 2003. Linda Bove has introduced thousands of children to sign language and issues surrounding the Deaf Community. Linda Bove's role as Linda on Sesame Street is currently the longest recurring role in television history for a deaf person. Linda Bove has been married to Ed Waterstreet since 1970. Like Linda Bove, Ed Waterstreet is also deaf. Ed Waterstreet also performed with the National Theater of the Deaf.

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Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend Johnnie Ray

John Alvin Ray was born on 10 January, 1927 in Hopewell, Oregon, USA and died on 24 February, 1990 in Los Angeles, California, USA of liver failure at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles. Johnnie Ray was interred at Hopewell Cemetery near Hopewell, Oregon.

Johnnie Ray was an American singer, songwriter, and pianist. Johnnie Ray developed a unique rhythm based style, described as alternating between pre-rock R&B and a more conventional classic pop approach. Johnnie Ray was partially deaf because of an injury sustained at the age of 13. Johnnie Ray became deaf in his right ear at age 13 after an accident during a Boy Scout event. Johnnie Ray later performed his music wearing a hearing aid. Surgery performed in New York in 1958, left him almost completely deaf in both ears, although hearing aids helped his condition.

Johnnie Ray spent part of his childhood on a farm, eventually moving to Portland, Oregon. Johnnie Ray was of Native American origin; his great-grandmother was a full-blooded Indian and his great-grandfather was Oregon pioneer George Kirby Gay of Berkeley, Gloucestershire, England.

Johnnie Ray first attracted attention while performing at the Flame Showbar in Detroit, Michigan, an R&B nightclub. Inspired by rhythm singers like Kay Starr, LaVern Baker and Ivory Joe Hunter, Johnnie Ray developed a unique rhythm based style, described as alternating between pre-rock R&B and a more conventional classic pop approach.

Johnnie Ray's first record, the self-penned R&B number for OKeh Records, Whiskey and Gin, was a minor hit in 1951. The following year he dominated the charts with the double-sided hit single of "Cry" and "The Little White Cloud That Cried". Selling over 2, 000,000 copies of the 45 single, Johnnie Ray's delivery struck a chord with teenagers and he quickly became a teen idol.

Johnnie Ray's performing style included theatrics later associated with rock 'n roll, including beating up his piano, writhing on the floor and crying. Johnnie Ray quickly earned the nicknames, "Mr. Emotion", "The Nabob of Sob", and "The Prince of Wails", and several others.

More hits followed, including "Please Mr. Sun", "Such a Night", "Walkin' My Baby Back Home", "A Sinner Am I", and "Yes Tonight Josephine". His last hit was "Just Walkin' in the Rain", in 1956. Johnnie Ray was popular in the United Kingdom, breaking the record at the London Palladium formerly set by Frankie Laine. In later years, he retained a loyal fan base overseas, particularly in Australia.

Johnnie Ray had a close relationship with journalist and television game show panelist Dorothy Kilgallen who gave a boost to his sagging career during his engagement at the Tropicana Resort & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada in 1965.

In early 1969, Johnnie Ray befriended Judy Garland, performing as her opening act during her last concerts in Copenhagen, Denmark and Malmo, Sweden. Johnnie Ray was also the best man during Garland's wedding to nightclub manager Mickey Deans in London.

Johnnie Ray's American career revived in the early 1970s, with appearances on The Andy Williams Show in 1970 and The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson 3 times during 1972 and 1973. Johnnie Ray's personal manager Bill Franklin resigned in 1976 and cut off contact with the singer a few years later. Johnnie Ray's American revival turned out to be shortlived. Johnnie Ray performed in small American venues such as El Camino College in 1987. Australian, English and Scottish promoters booked him for their large venues as late as 1989, his last year of performing.

Some writers suggested that the reason American entertainment bookers and songwriters ignored him in the 1980s was because they simply did not know who he was or what his sound was like. Johnnie Ray's exposure during the new era of cable television was limited to a few seconds in Dexys Midnight Runners' 1982 music video for Come On Eileen, using archival footage of Johnnie Ray from 1954. Johnnie Ray's other video appearance was in Billy Idol's 1986 "Don't Need a Gun", in which Johnnie Ray appeared on-camera.

Johnnie Ray had issues regarding his sexuality surface several times in his career, including 2 arrests for solicitation. Johnnie Ray quietly pleaded guilty and paid a fine after the first arrest, in the restroom of the Stone Theatre burlesque house in Detroit, which was just prior to the release of his first record in 1951. Johnnie Ray went to trial following the second arrest in 1959, also in Detroit, for soliciting an undercover officer in one of the city's gay bars. Johnnie Ray was found not guilty.

Despite these issues, Johnnie Ray married Marilyn Morrison a short time after he gave his first New York concert, which was at the Copacabana in 1952. The wedding ceremony, attended by New York mayor Vincent R. Impellitteri, made the cover of the New York Daily News. Morrison, the daughter of a Los Angeles nightclub owner, was aware of the singer's sexuality from the start, telling a friend she would "straighten it out." The couple separated in 1953 and divorced in 1954.

In the years hence, writers have noted that the marriage occurred under false pretenses, and that Johnnie Ray had a long-term relationship with his manager, Bill Franklin. Johnnie Ray also had a relationship with columnist Dorothy Kilgallen, whom he met following an appearance on What's My Line? in 1956. Dorothy Kilgallen was a strong support for Johnnie Ray during the 1959 solicitation trial.

Johnnie Ray drank regularly and his alcoholism caught up with him in 1960, when he was hospitalised for tuberculosis. Johnnie Ray recovered but continued drinking, and was diagnosed with cirrhosis at age 50.

For his contribution to the recording industry, Johnnie Ray has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6201 Hollywood Boulevard.

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Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend Foxy Brown

Foxy Brown - Inga Marchand, born on 6 September, 1978, in Brooklyn, New York City, better known as Foxy Brown, is an American rapper of Afro-Trinidadian and Asian descent. Foxy Brown is known for her solo work and her brief stint as part of hip-hop music group The Firm. Foxy Brown has revealed that she is slowly losing her hearing after being diagnosed with a rare condition that only affects 1 in 10,000. On 5 December, 2005, outside of Manhattan criminal court, Foxy Brown's attorney Joseph Tacopina stated he wanted to confirm rumors that Foxy Brown was almost totally deaf and claimed that he could no longer communicate with her verbally. Foxy Brown told reporters on 15 December that she was diagnosed with sudden hearing loss in May while she was recording her upcoming album. Shortly after Tacopina spoke to the public about her hearing condition, news spread that Foxy Brown had fired him. According to reports, Tacopina was never given permission by Foxy Brown or her agent to discuss her medical condition to reporters.

While still a teenager, Foxy Brown won a talent contest in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. At the time, production team Trackmasters were working on LL Cool J's Mr. Smith album, the pair were in attendance that night and being impressed, they decided to let her rap over "I Shot Ya." Foxy Brown followed her debut with appearances on several RIAA platinum and gold singles from other artists, including remixes of songs "You're Makin' Me High" by Toni Braxton. Foxy Brown was also featured on the soundtrack to the 1996 film The Nutty Professor, on the songs "Touch Me Tease Me" by Case and "Ain't No Nigga" by Jay-Z. The immediate success led to a label bidding war at the beginning of 1996, and in March, Def Jam Records won as they added the then 16 year old talent to their roster.

In 1996 Foxy Brown released her debut album Ill Na Na to mixed reviews but strong sales. The album sold over 109,000 copies in the first week, and debuted at No. 7 on the Billboard 200 album charts. The album was heavily produced by Trackmasters, and featured guest appearances from Jay-Z, Blackstreet, Method Man, and Kid Capri. The album went on to go platinum selling over 3 million records in the US, 6 million worldwide and launched 2 hit singles: "Get Me Home" (featuring Blackstreet) and "I'll Be" (featuring Jay-Z).

Following the release of Ill Na Na, Foxy Brown joined fellow New York based hip hop artists, Nas, AZ and Nature to form the supergroup known as The Firm. The album was released via Aftermath Records and was produced and recorded by the collective team of Dr. Dre, The Trackmasters, and Steve "Comissioner" Stout of Violator Entertainment. An early form of The Firm appeared on "Affirmative Action," from Nas' second album, It Was Written. A remix of the song, and several group freestyles were in the album, Nas, Foxy Brown, AZ, and Nature Present The Firm: The Album. The album entered the Billboard 200 album chart at No. 1 and sold over 1 000,000 records and is RIAA certified platinum.

On 25 January, 1997 Foxy Brown spat on 2 hotel workers in Raleigh, North Carolina when they told her they didn't have an iron available. When she missed a court appearance, an arrest warrant was issued and she finally turned herself in on 30 April, 1997. Foxy Brown eventually received a 30 day suspended sentence and was ordered to perform 80 hours of community service.

In March 1997, she joined the spring break festivities hosted by the MTV cable television network in Panama City, Florida, among other performers including rapper Snoop Dogg, pop group The Spice Girls, and rock band Stone Temple Pilots. Later, she joined the Smokin' Grooves tour hosted by the House of Blues with the headlining rap group Cypress Hill, along with other performers like Erykah Badu, The Roots, OutKast, and The Pharcyde, the tour set to begin in Boston, Massachusetts in the summer of 1997. However, after missing several dates in the tour, she left it.

Foxy Brown made an appearance on Ricky Lake in 1998 and mentioned that she had been cast alongside Drew Barrymore and Cameron Diaz in the 2000 film Charlie's Angels. However, due to her legal troubles around that time she was replaced, at first by Thandie Newton, and ultimately by Lucy Liu.

On 20 January, 1999 Foxy Brown released her second album Chyna Doll, delayed from its original November 1998 release date. It entered the Billboard 200 charts at number 1, selling 173,000 copies in its opening week. However, its sales quickly declined in later weeks. The album's lead single "Hot Spot" failed to enter the top 50 of the Billboard pop charts, as did the follow-up single, "I Can't" (featuring Total). Chyna Doll has been certified platinum after surpassing 1 000,000 copies in sales.

On 3 July, 1999 Foxy Brown was escorted off the stage by police at a concert in Trinidad and Tobago for using obscene language but was neither charged nor arrested. In 2000, she announced she was suffering from depression and entered rehab at Cornell University Medical College for an addiction to prescription painkillers, in particular, morphine, even stating that she couldn't perform or make records unless she was on the illegal drug. On 6 March, 2000 Foxy Brown crashed her Range Rover in Flatbush, Brooklyn. That year she was also arrested for driving without a license.

In 2001, Foxy Brown released Broken Silence. Its first single was "BK Anthem" showcased Foxy Brown changing to a "street" image and giving a tribute to her hometown Brooklyn and famous rappers such as The Notorious B.I.G. and Jay-Z. The second single from the album was "Oh Yeah", which featured her then-boyfriend, Jamaican dancehall artist Spragga Benz. The album debuted on the Billboard Charts at No. 5, selling 131,000 units its first week. Like previous albums, Broken Silence also sold over 1 000,000 records and is certified platinum by the RIAA.

In 2002, Foxy Brown returned to the music scene briefly with her single "Stylin'", whose remix featured rappers Birdman, her brother Gavin, Loon, and N.O.R.E. was to be the first single off of her upcoming album Ill Na Na 2: The Fever. Threat of arrest faced her following an altercation at the Norman Manley International Airport in Kingston, Jamaica from July she would be arrested if she ever would return to the country. The next year, she was featured on DJ Kayslay's single "Too Much for Me" from his Street Sweeper's Volume One Mixtape. Foxy Brown also appeared on Luther Vandross' final studio album Dance with My Father. That April, Foxy Brown appeared on popular New York radio jock Wendy Williams' radio show, and revealed the details of her relationships with Lyor Cohen, president of Def Jam Recordings at the time, and Sean "P. Diddy" Combs. Foxy Brown accused both of illegally trading her recording masters. Foxy Brown also announced that Cohen shelved her long awaited fourth album Ill Na Na 2: The Fever over personal disagreements. Therefore, "Stylin'" was released on the compilation album The Source Presents: Hip Hop Hits Vol. 6 in December 2002.

In 2004, Foxy Brown reunited with her old friend and mentor Jay-Z, when he became the president of Def Jam and signed her to its subsidiary, Roc-A-Fella Records. Later that year, Foxy Brown joined Jay-Z and several other hip-hop acts on his Jay-Z and Friends tour. Foxy Brown began recording her fourth solo album, Black Roses. Its first single was "Come Fly With Me" featuring Sizzla. Other tracks Foxy Brown recorded included a remix of the song "You Already Know" by the R&B group 112.

On 29 August, 2004 Foxy Brown attacked 2 manicurists in Chelsea, Manhattan during a dispute over a $20 bill that she refused to pay, and she in April 2005 pled not guilty to assault charges and entered 3 years of probation effective October 2006. For that incident, she would also take anger management classes. Female rapper Jacki-O, in April 2005, alleged that she and Foxy Brown got into a physical altercation at a recording studio in Miami, Florida, saying that Foxy Brown came into the studio during her session and expected her to "bow down" to her. The next month, Foxy Brown denied any such altercation in an interview with the Miami, Florida hip-hop radio station WEDR.

Joseph Tacopina, Foxy Brown's attorney, stated on 5 December, 2005 that he wanted to confirm rumors that Foxy Brown was almost totally deaf and claimed that he could no longer communicate with her verbally. Foxy Brown told reporters on 15 December that she was diagnosed with sudden hearing loss in May while she was recording her upcoming album. Shortly after Tacopina spoke to the public about her hearing condition, news spread that Foxy Brown had fired him. According to reports, Tacopina was never given permission by Foxy Brown or her agent to discuss her medical condition to reporters.

As a result of her legal troubles, Foxy Brown entered a confrontation with radio host Egypt on New York City radio station WWPR-FM ("Power 105.1"). Foxy Brown pled not guilty in March 2007 to assaulting a beauty supply store employee. Foxy Brown's other arrests during 2007 included leaving New York state without permission during probation, hitting a neighbor with a BlackBerry, and almost running over a stroller with a baby inside.

On 24 July, 2008 publisher Simon & Schuster Inc. sued Foxy Brown in state court in New York claiming that it paid Foxy Brown $75,000 under a 2006 contract for an autobiography tentatively titled "Broken Silence" and Foxy Brown never delivered on the contract. The case is Simon & Schuster v. Inga Marchand, 110125/2008, New York State Supreme Court (Manhattan).

On 7 September, 2007, New York Criminal Court Judge Melissa Jackson sentenced Foxy Brown to 1 year in jail for violating her probation that stemmed from the 2004 fight with 2 manicurists in a New York City nail salon. Foxy Brown was eventually released from prison on 18 April, 2008. No mention was made during the trial by anyone about Foxy Brown expecting a baby. On 12 September, 2007 her representatives stated the rapper was not pregnant in response to claims by her lawyer that she was.

On 23 October, 2007, Foxy Brown was given 76 days in solitary confinement due to a physical altercation that took place on 3 October, 2007 with another prisoner. According to the prison authorities, Foxy Brown, the next day after the incident, was also verbally abusive toward correction officers and refused to take a random drug test. Prison authorities reported on 27 November that she was released "from solitary confinement...for good behavior", and Foxy Brown was finally released from prison on 18 April, 2008.

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Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend Helen Keller

Helen Adams Keller was born on 27 June, 1880 at an estate called Ivy Green in Tuscumbia, Alabama and died on 1 June, 1968 in her sleep, passing away 26 days before her 88th birthday, at her home in Arcan Ridge near Westport, Connecticut. A service was held in her honor at the National Cathedral in Washington, DC and her ashes were placed there next to her constant companions, Anne Sullivan and Polly Thompson.

Helen Keller was an American author, activist and lecturer. Helen Keller was the first deafblind person to graduate from college.

The story of how Helen Keller's teacher, Annie Sullivan, broke through the isolation imposed by a near complete lack of language, allowing the girl to blossom as she learned to communicate, has become known worldwide through the dramatic depictions of the play The Miracle Worker.

What is less well known is how Helen Keller's life developed after she completed her education. A prolific author, she was well traveled, and was outspoken in her opposition to war. Helen Keller campaigned for women's suffrage, workers' rights and socialism, as well as many other progressive causes.

Helen Keller was born to Captain Arthur H. Keller, a former officer of the Confederate Army, and Kate Adams Keller, a cousin of Robert E. Lee and daughter of Charles W. Adams, a former Confederate general. The Keller family originates from Germany, and at least one source claims her father was of Swiss descent. Helen Keller was not born blind and deaf; it was not until 19 months of age that she came down with an illness described by doctors as "an acute congestion of the stomach and the brain", which could have possibly been scarlet fever or meningitis. The illness did not last for a particularly long time, but it left her deaf and blind. At that time her only communication partner was Martha Washington, the 6 year old daughter of the family cook, who was able to create a sign language with her; by the age of 7, she had over 60 home signs to communicate with her family.

In his doctoral dissertation, "Deaf-blind Children (psychological development in a process of education)" (1971, Moscow Defectology Institute), Soviet blind-deaf psychologist Meshcheryakov asserted that Washington's friendship and teaching was crucial for Helen Keller's later developments.

Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan in 1898 In 1886, her mother, inspired by an account in Charles Dickens' American Notes of the successful education of another deafblind child, Laura Bridgman, dispatched young Helen Keller, accompanied by her father, to seek out Dr. J. Julian Chisolm, an eye, ear, nose and throat specialist in Baltimore, for advice. Dr J. Julian Chisolm, subsequently, put them in touch with Alexander Graham Bell, who was working with deaf children at the time. Alexander Graham Belll advised the couple to contact the Perkins Institute for the Blind, the school where Bridgman had been educated, which was then located in South Boston. The school delegated teacher and former student Anne Sullivan, herself visually impaired and then only 20 years old, to become Helen Keller's instructor.
It was the beginning of a 49-year-long relationship, eventually evolving into governess and then eventual companion.

Anne Sullivan got permission from Helen Keller's father to isolate the girl from the rest of the family in a little house in their garden. Anne Sullivan loved Helen Keller dearly and loved her like she was her child. Anne Sullivan's first task was to instill discipline in the spoiled girl. Helen Keller's big breakthrough in communication came one day when she realized that the motions her teacher was making on her palm, while running cool water over her hand, symbolized the idea of "water"; she then nearly exhausted Anne Sullivan demanding the names of all the other familiar objects in her world (including her prized doll).

In 1890, 10 year old Helen Keller was introduced to the story of Ragnhild Kåta, a deafblind Norwegian girl who had learned to speak. Ragnhild Kåta's success inspired Helen Keller to want to learn to speak as well. Anne Sullivan taught her charge to speak using the Tadoma method of touching the lips and throat of others as they speak, combined with fingerspelling letters on the palm of the child's hand. Later Helen Keller learned Braille, and used it to read not only English but also French, German, Greek, and Latin. Later she wrote 2 books and acted in a movie.

In 1888, Helen Keller attended the Royal Institute For the Blind. In 1894, Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan moved to New York City to attend the Wright-Humason School for the Deaf and Horace Mann School for the Deaf. In 1896, they returned to Massachusetts and Helen Keller entered The Cambridge School for Young Ladies before gaining admittance, in 1900, to Radcliffe College. Helen Keller's admirer Mark Twain had introduced her to Standard Oil magnate Henry Huttleton Rogers, who, with his wife, paid for her education. In 1904, at the age of 24, Helen Keller graduated from Radcliffe magna cum laude, becoming the first deafblind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.

Anne Sullivan stayed as a companion to Helen Keller long after she taught her. Anne Sullivan married John Macy in 1905, and her health started failing around 1914. Polly Thompson was hired to keep house. Polly Thompson was a young woman from Scotland who didn't have experience with deaf or blind people. Polly Thompson progressed to working as a secretary as well, and eventually became a constant companion to Helen Keller.

After Anne Sullivan died in 1936, Helen Keller and Polly Thompson moved to Connecticut. They travelled worldwide raising funding for the blind. Polly Thompson had a stroke in 1957 from which she never fully recovered, and died in 1960.

Winnie Corbally, a nurse who was originally brought in to care for Polly Thompson in 1957, stayed on after Polly Thompson's death and was Helen Keller's companion for the rest of her life.

Helen Keller went on to become a world-famous speaker and author. Helen Keller is remembered as an advocate for people with disabilities amid numerous other causes. Helen Keller was a suffragist, a pacifist, a Wilson opposer, a radical socialist, and a birth control supporter. In 1915, Helen Keller and George Kessler founded the Helen Keller International (HKI) organization. This organization is devoted to research in vision, health and nutrition. In 1920, she helped to found the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan traveled to over 39 countries, making several trips to Japan and becoming a favorite of the Japanese people. Helen Keller met every US President from Grover Cleveland to Lyndon B. Johnson and was friends with many famous figures, including Alexander Graham Bell, Charlie Chaplin, and Mark Twain.

Helen Keller was a member of the Socialist Party and actively campaigned and wrote in support of the working classes from 1909 to 1921. Helen Keller supported Socialist Party candidate Eugene V. Debs in each of his campaigns for the presidency. Newspaper columnists who had praised her courage and intelligence before she expressed her socialist views now called attention to her disabilities. The editor of the Brooklyn Eagle wrote that her "mistakes sprung out of the manifest limitations of her development." Helen Keller responded to that editor, referring to having met him before he knew of her political views:

“ At that time the compliments he paid me were so generous that I blush to remember them. But now that I have come out for socialism he reminds me and the public that I am blind and deaf and especially liable to error. I must have shrunk in intelligence during the years since I met him...Oh, ridiculous Brooklyn Eagle! Socially blind and deaf, it defends an intolerable system, a system that is the cause of much of the physical blindness and deafness which we are trying to prevent.”

Helen Keller joined the Industrial Workers of the World (known as the IWW or the Wobblies) in 1912, saying that parliamentary socialism was "sinking in the political bog." Helen Keller wrote for the IWW between 1916 and 1918. In Why I Became an IWW, Helen Keller explained that her motivation for activism came in part from her concern about blindness and other disabilities:

“ I was appointed on a commission to investigate the conditions of the blind. For the first time I, who had thought blindness a misfortune beyond human control, found that too much of it was traceable to wrong industrial conditions, often caused by the selfishness and greed of employers, and the social evil contributed its share. I found that poverty drove women to a life of shame that ended in blindness. ”

The last sentence refers to prostitution and syphilis, the latter a leading cause of blindness.

Helen Keller and her friend Mark Twain were both considered radicals in the socio-political context present in the United States at the beginning of the 20th century, and as a consequence, their political views have been forgotten or glossed over in popular perception.

One of Helen Keller's earliest pieces of writing, at the age of 11, was The Frost King (1891). There were allegations that this story had been plagiarized from The Frost Fairies by Margaret Canby. An investigation into the matter revealed that Helen Keller may have experienced a case of cryptomnesia, which was that she had Canby's story read to her but forgot about it, while the memory remained in her subconscious.

At the age of 23, Helen Keller published her autobiography, The Story of My Life (1903), with help from Anne Sullivan and Anne Sullivan's husband, John Macy. It includes letters that Helen Keller wrote and the story of her life up to age 21, and was written during her time in college.

Helen Keller wrote "The World I Live In" in 1908 giving readers an insight into how she felt about the world. "Out of the Dark", a series of essays on Socialism, was published in 1913.

Helen Keller's spiritual autobiography, My Religion, was published in 1927 and re-issued as Light in my Darkness. It advocates the teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg, the controversial mystic who gives a spiritual interpretation of the Last Judgment and second coming of Jesus Christ, and the movement named after him, Swedenborgianism.

In total Helen Keller wrote 12 books and numerous articles.

When Helen Keller visited Akita Prefecture in Japan in July 1937, she inquired about Hachikō, the famed Akita dog that had died in 1935. Helen Keller told a Japanese person that she would like to have an Akita dog; one was given to her within a month, with the name of Kamikaze-go. When he died of canine distemper, his older brother, Kenzan-go, was presented to her as an official gift from the Japanese government in July 1939. Helen Keller is credited with having introduced the Akita to the United States through these 2 dogs. By 1938 a breed standard had been established and dog shows had been held, but such activities stopped after World War II began. Helen Keller wrote in the Akita
Journal:

“ If ever there was an angel in fur, it was Kamikaze. I know I shall never feel quite the same tenderness for any other pet. The Akita dog has all the qualities that appeal to me — he is gentle, companionable and trusty. ”

Helen Keller suffered a series of strokes in 1961 and spent the last years of her life at her home.

On 14 September, 1964, President Lyndon B. Johnson awarded Helen Keller the Presidential Medal of Freedom, one of the United States' highest 2 civilian honors. In 1965 she was elected to the Women's Hall of Fame at the New York World's Fair.

Helen Keller devoted much of her later life to raise funds for the American Foundation for the Blind.

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Hearing Impairment Series-Disabled Legend Pete Townshend

Peter Dennis Blandford Townshend was born on 19 May 1945 in Chiswick, London. Pete Townshend is an award-winning English rock guitarist, singer, songwriter, composer, and writer, known principally as the guitarist and songwriter for The Who, as well as for his own solo career. Pete Townshend's career with The Who spans more than 40 years, during which time the band grew to be considered one of the most influential bands of the rock era, in addition to being "possibly the greatest live band ever.

Pete Townshend is the primary songwriter for the Who, writing well over 100 songs for the band's 11 studio albums, including the rock operas Tommy and Quadrophenia, plus dozens more that appeared as non-album singles, bonus tracks on reissues, and tracks on rarities compilations such as Odds and Sods. Pete has also written over 100 songs for his solo albums and rarities compilations. Although known mainly for being a guitarist, he is also an accomplished singer and keyboard player, and has played many other instruments on his solo albums, and on some Who albums (such as banjo, accordion, synthesizer, piano, bass guitar, drums).

Pete has also written newspaper and magazine articles, book reviews, essays, books, and scripts.

Born into a musical family (his father Cliff Townshend was a professional saxophonist in The Squadronaires and his mother Betty a singer), Pete Townshend exhibited a fascination with music at an early age. Pete Townshend had early exposure to American Rock and Roll (his mother recounts that he repeatedly saw the 1956 film Rock Around the Clock and obtained his first guitar from his grandmother at the age of 12, which he described as a "Cheap Spanish thing". Townshend's biggest guitar influences include Link Wray, John Lee Hooker, Bo Diddley and Hank Marvin of The Shadows.

In 1961Pete Townshend enrolled at Ealing Art College, and a year later he and his school friend from Acton County Grammar School John Entwistle founded their first band, The Confederates, a Dixieland duet featuring Pete Townshend on banjo and Entwistle on horn. From this beginning they moved on to The Detours, a skiffle/rock and roll band fronted by then sheet-metal welder Roger Daltrey. In early 1964, due to another band having the same name, The Detours renamed themselves The Who. Drummer Doug Sandom was replaced by Keith Moon not long afterwards. The band (now comprising Daltrey on vocals and harmonica, Pete Townshend on guitar, Entwistle on bass, and Moon on drums) were soon taken on by a mod publicist (named Peter Meaden) who convinced them to change their name to The High Numbers to give the band more of a mod feel. After bringing out one single ("Zoot Suit"), they dropped Meaden and were signed on by two new managers, Chris Stamp and Kit Lambert. They dropped The High Numbers name and reverted to The Who.

Pete Townshend met Karen Astley (daughter of composer Ted Astley) while in art school and married her in 1968. The couple separated in 1994 and Pete Townshend announced they would divorce in 2000. They have 3 children Emma born in 1969, who is a singer/songwriter, Aminta born in 1971 and Joseph born in 1989. For many years Pete Townshend refused to confirm or deny rumors that he was bisexual. In a 2002 interview with Rolling Stone magazine, however, he explained that, although he engaged in some brief same-sex experimentation in the 1960s, he is hetrosexual. Pete Townshend currently lives with his long-time partner, musician Rachel Fuller, in Richmond, England. Pete Townshend also owns a house in Churt, Surrey, England.

Pete Townshend has woven a long history of involvement with various charities and other philanthropic efforts throughout his career, both as a solo artist and with The Who. Pete's first solo concert, for example, was a 1974 benefit show which was organized to raise funds for the Camden Square Community Play Center.

The earliest public example of Pete Townshend’s involvement with charitable causes is the relationship he established with the Richmond-based Meher Baba Association. In 1968, Pete Townshend donated the use of his former Wardour Street apartment to the Meher Baba Association. The following year, the association was moved to another Townshend-owned apartment, the Eccleston Square former residence of wife Karen.

Pete Townshend sat on a committee which oversaw the operation and finances of the center. "The committee sees to it that it is open a couple of days a week, and keeps the bills paid and the library full," he wrote in a 1970 Rolling Stone article.

In 1969 and 1972 Pete Townshend produced 2 limited-release albums, Happy Birthday and I Am, for the London-based Baba association. This led to 1972’s Who Came First, a more widespread release, 15 percent of the revenue of which went to the Baba association. A further limited release, With Love, was released in 1976. A limited-edition boxed set of all 3 limited releases on CD, Avatar, was released in 2000, with all profits going to the Avatar Meher Baba Trust in India, which provided funds to a dispensary, school, hospital and pilgrimage center.

In July 1976, Pete Townshend opened Meher Baba Oceanic, a London activity centre for Baba followers which featured film dubbing and editing facilities, a cinema and a recording studio. In addition, the centre served as a regular meeting place for Baba followers. Pete Townshend offered very economical (reportedly £1 per night) lodging for American Baba followers who needed an overnight stay on their pilgrimages to India. "For a few years, I had toyed with the idea of opening a London house dedicated to Meher Baba," he wrote in a 1977 Rolling Stone article. "In the 8 years I had followed him, I had donated only coppers to foundations set up around the world to carry out the Master’s wishes and decided it was about time I put myself on the line. The Who had set up a strong charitable trust of its own which appeased, to an extent, the feeling I had that Meher Baba would rather have seen me give to the poor than to the establishment of yet another so-called 'spiritual center'."

Pete Townshend also embarked on a project dedicated to the collection, restoration and maintenance of Meher Baba-related films. The project was known as MEFA, or Meher Baba European Film Archive.

Pete Townshend has been an active champion of children’s charities. The debut of Pete Townshend’s stage version of Tommy took place at San Diego’s La Jolla Playhouse in July 1992. The show was earmarked as a benefit for the London-based Nordoff-Robbins Music Therapy Foundation, an organization which helps autistic and retarded children.

Pete Townshend performed at a 1995 benefit organized by Paul Simon at Madison Square Garden's Paramount Theatre, for The Children’s Health Fund. The following year, Pete Townshend performed at a benefit for the Bridge School, a California facility for children with severe speech and physical impairments. In 1997, Pete Townshend established a relationship with Maryville Academy, a Chicago area children’s charity. Between 1997 and 2002, Pete Townshend played 5 benefit shows for Maryville Academy, raising at least $1,600,000. In addition, proceeds from the sales of his 1999 release Pete Townshend Live were also donated to Maryville Academy.

As a member of The Who, Pete Townshend has also performed a series of concerts, beginning in 2000, benefitting the Teenage Cancer Trust in the UK, raising several million pounds. In 2005, Pete Townshend performed at New York’s Gotham Hall for Samsung’s Four Seasons of Hope, an annual children's charity fundraiser.

The Who rocker Pete Townshend is losing his hearing, and fears the disability will end his songwriting career. Pete Townshend blames his hearing loss on a lifetime spent using headphones, experts say today's iPod Generation is storing up trouble for the future by listening to music at high volumes.

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What is Hearing Impairment?

A hearing impairment or hearing loss is a full or partial decrease in the ability to detect or understand sounds.

A hearing impairment exists when an individual is not sensitive to the sounds normally heard by its kind. In human beings, the term hearing impairment is usually reserved for people who have relative insensitivity to sound in the speech frequencies.

Hearing loss can be inherited. Both dominant and recessive genes exist which can cause mild to profound impairment. If a family has a dominant gene for deafness it will persist across generations because it will manifest itself in the offspring even if it is inherited from only one parent.

People who are hard of hearing have varying amounts of hearing loss but usually not enough to be considered deaf. Many people who are deaf consider spoken language their primary language and consider themselves "hard of hearing".

People with unilateral hearing loss (single sided deafness/SSD) can hear normally in one ear, but have trouble hearing out of the other ear. Problems with this type of deficit is inability to localize sounds.

Those who lose their hearing later in life, such as in late adolescence or adulthood, face their own challenges. For example, they must adjust to living with the adaptations that make it possible for them to live independently. They may have to adapt to using hearing aids or a cochlear implant, develop speech-reading skills, and/or learn sign language.

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The End of Dyslexia Series

I hope you have enjoyed reading about "What is Dyslexia?" and of the Famous People that have or had suffered from Dyslexia. Sadly, we have come to the end of our "Dyslexia Series". We now begin our "Hearing Impairment Series" so please enjoy reading.

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The End of Dementia Series

I hope you have enjoyed reading about "What is Dementia?" and of the Famous People that have or had suffered from Dementia. Sadly, we have come to the end of our "Dementia Series".

We now begin our "Hearing Impairments Series" so please enjoy reading.

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Epilepsy Series-Disabled Legend James Madison

During his teens and early twenties, James Madison complained of a voice impairment. This was a functional disability that prevented his public speaking until age 30. Madison believed he would “ have a short life due to the illness he believed was epilepsy.

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