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SFO celebrates Louis Braille bicentenary anniversary
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PARIS — France is honoring Louis Braille throughout 2009.
It was two centuries ago that Louis Braille was born in Coupvray, near Paris. His father was a saddle maker, and at the age of 3, Braille injured his left eye with one of the pointed instruments in his father's laboratory. The infection that followed extended to the right eye, making him blind.
At the age of 10, Braille obtained a grant to study at the Royal Institute for the Blind in Paris. He was only 13 when he invented the Braille alphabet, the universal system of points in relief, inspired by the visit of the retired captain Charles Barbier de la Serre, who had been imagining for years a "night writing" system that would allow the silent exchange of orders between soldiers in the dark.
Through the International Committee for the Commemoration of the Bicentenary Anniversary of Louis Braille's Birth, France has celebrated this illustrious citizen with many events this year. An international meeting on visual impairment will be held in June on the topics of access to education, culture and professional life for the blind.
During the SFO meeting, the committee is proposing a series of initiatives, and in the General Assembly of SFO members on Tuesday, a biography of Louis Braille will be presented by Prof. Yves Pouliquen, of the Académie Française.