No doubt, there are indeed many successful people in this world. People who had encountered countless of failures and “brick walls”, in this case it refers to the obstacles faced by one, and succeeds in life. However, for now I’ll only talk about one of the famous personality whom I deem to be successful, and it’ll be none other than Helen Keller.
Biography
“When one comes to think of it, there are no such things as divine, immutable, or inalienable rights. Rights are things we get when we are strong enough to make good our claim on them.”
Helen Keller (June 27, 1880 – June 1, 1968) is born to Captain Arthur Henley Keller and Kate Adams Keller at Ivy Green in Tuscumbia, Alabama. She suffered a ‘brain fever’ (probably scarlet fever or meningitis) at age 19 months that left her blind and deaf. The disease also turned her into an out-of-control child, usually in a foul temper. Finally, in their own defense, her parents traveled to Baltimore to meet with Alexander Graham Bell. The famous inventor, who studied speech while working on his telephone, subsequently had become interested in educating deaf children.
Bell told the Kellers to contact the Perkins Institution for the Blind in Boston, which in turn recommended a former pupil, Anne Sullivan, as Helen’s teacher. The orphaned Sullivan, herself mostly blind since age five, also had had a difficult life, and desperately needed the work. In 1887 she came to Alabama and, after a stormy first month, got Helen to understand the concept of words during a famous encounter at the family’s water pump.
Keller made remarkable progress from that point and ultimately, with Sullivan’s help, graduated with honors in 1904 from Radcliffe University, the first deaf and blind person ever to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree. In an era when most women were not allowed careers, and the blind often were considered fit only to live in asylums, Keller’s impassioned writings and lectures (delivered through an interpreter) made a strong impression on audiences around the world.Keller primarily is remembered for her advocacy for the disabled, but as a member of the Socialist Party, she also strongly supported such groups as the ACLU, IWW, and NAACP, and campaigned for birth control, civil rights, women’s suffrage, and world peace.
The Miracle Worker, a play about Keller’s childhood education with Sullivan, won a Tony award in 1960, and then became a popular film, winning acting Academy Awards in 1962 for both Anne Bancroft (who played Anne) and Patty Duke (Helen). Keller was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1964 by Lyndon Johnson. She is buried in the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., where visitors over the years twice have worn the braille letters completely off the plaque by her grave. She died at the age of 87.
In Helen’s own words:
“The public must learn that the blind man is neither genius nor a freak nor an idiot. He has a mind that can be educated, a hand which can be trained, and ambitions which it is right for him to strive to realize, and it is the duty of the public to help him make the best of himself so that he can win light through work.”
I think Helen Keller is a successful person because she has shown millions of people that disability need not be the end of the world. And despite being a blind and deaf person, she managed to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree and even went on to become a world-famous speaker and author. Keller devoted much of her later life to raise funds for the American Foundation for
the Blind. She has achieved a lot in life and has a story of her own.
Keller has inspired me in a sense that she is a determined person and she never gave her life up. She must have a lot of qualities in her for her to accomplish so much in life. Being a blind-deaf person, Keller learned Braille and used it to read not only English but also French, German, Greek, and Latin. And, me as a normal person with perfect health cannot even do as much as Helen Keller. I really admire her for her perseverance, determination. She has inspired me to live life to the fullest and not give up yourself.
