An anniversary of the birth of Louis Braille, the inventor of the system that allows people with visual disabilities to read, is remembered.

Tactile reading is, so far, one of the most effective systems to facilitate the communication of people with visual disabilities. And that system is an invention of Louis Braillean educator who became totally blind at the age of five.

Louis Braille was born on January 4, 1809, in Coupvray, France. He was three years old in 1812 when, one afternoon accompanying his father in his leather tanning shop, he picked up an iron awl and accidentally stuck it in his eye.

The infection caused by the iron spike in that eye soon spread to the other, and within two years Louis was totally blind. However, that did not dampen his desire to go to school and learn.

At the age of seven Louis went to school, but no one could teach him to read or write, so his family sent him to the Royal Institute for Blind Youth (RIJC) of Pariswhere he obtained a scholarship to enter the institute.

Despite being a school specialized in teaching blind children, the system was not developed and it was very difficult to learn.

There was a reading method created by Valentin Haüy, the founder of the institution, through books with raised letters. But it implied a significant effort for the students, who had to touch each letter to form the words.

the braille system

Louis Braille, at the age of fifteen, perfected Haüy’s system along with a system used by soldiers on the battlefield to read at night, and not be detected by the enemy.

This is how the Braille system was created, which was approved and published by the French government in 1829 for its effectiveness and help for blind people.

How does it work? The tactile literacy system invented by Louis Braille at the age of fifteen works by means of cells with six raised dots.

It is universal and can be translated into any language, so that a word that has 4 letters in a language, in braille will also have 4 symbols made with the 6 dots. They also include symbols for particular spellings, punctuation marks and mathematics, musical scores, etc.

Since then, the blind community has been able to have an efficient reading and writing system, which currently applies not only to books, but also to signs, public transportation, and electronic devices.

Louis Braille did not manage to see his entire system implemented worldwide, as he died of tuberculosis at the age of 43, on January 6, 1852.

(YO)