A bookmark produced by (and for) the Industrial School for the Blind, and distributed at the Adelaide International Exhibition, 1887
A piece of light grey card (45 × 125 mm), printed in red and lightly sewn onto a piece of maroon silk (43 × 215 mm, pointed at one end, notched at the other); a name ('T. Gifford') is embossed in Braille on the card.
Both ends of the piece of silk are a little creased and slightly frayed; overall, in excellent condition.
We presume the card, which has 'Queen's Jubilee' and 'S.A. Jubilee' printed on it as well, would have been embossed for (a young) Thomas Gifford when he visited the Adelaide International Exhibition. 'An industrial school for the blind in South Australia opened in 1884 in the former Ebenezer chapel in Brougham Place, North Adelaide, before expanding its premises with a name change in 1903 to the Royal Institution for the Blind (later Royal Society for the Blind) in 1903. Andrew Whyte Hendry, almost blinded as a teenager from a fork accident, inspired the industrial school to create opportunities for the blind, in an age when many had to resort to begging to survive. The blind were regarded as inmates of institutions with very few Braille books to read. Hendry saw the blind needing normal-wage work opportunities, beyond education, for self esteem. Hendry's concept for an industrial school for the blind and a Braille library gained support and financial help from wealthy merchant and politician Charles Goode. A property leased at 92 Brougham Place, North Adelaide, in 1884, had an unused church on the north that became a Braille library and the old Ebenezer Chapel as the first workshop for the industrial school. Its first blind trainees started in January 1885, accepting contracts to make brooms, brushes and baskets. The school was supported by the Brighton Blind, Deaf and Dumb Institute (later Townsend House) that sent some of its students to the school to learn trades and paid their living expenses. The Destitute Asylum also sent some residents to the school. Hendry visited country towns around South Australia, recruiting candidates for training in the workshops and reading instruction as well as displaying goods produced by the blind workers and setting up local committees to help distribute its goods in their towns and raise donations. He also visited blind students in their home to teach them to read' (AdelaideAZ online, misspelling 'Hendry' as 'Hendy' throughout).
Item #142631
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