Louis was born in a small town called Coupvary near Paris on January 4th 1809. His father had a leather work shop. He was a cute smart little blonde boy till that tragedy happened at the age of 3. Oneday, the naughty Louis was imitating his dad in making holes on the leather with a sharp awl and the tool slid and pierced in to his left eye. Blood gushed as if from a fountain! Little Louis screamed with pain.It was in early 19th century, you can imagine what kind of treatment our Louis got! The wound got infected and the infection spread and soon Louis became blind in both eyes! Poor Louis, all the beauty of this world was denied to him. The whole world including his family neglected him as there are limitations to a blind in life. They put him in a blind's school. The condition in the school was too bad. More than a school, It was an asylum of blind beggars of different ages and abandoned blind kids.
Since the school was not funded by the government the then principal Guillie started a workshop for making slippers to find fund. The more the business improved, the worser the condition of the students. They had to work hard since the business was diversified to making fishing nets, buggy whips, weaving etc. Guille has taken majority of the income and kept students starving with stale bread and water. He was not ready to pay for the teachers and he made the senior students as tutors. The students turned teachers administered atrocious punishments for even simple mistakes. Little Louis was growing up in the middle of these atrocities. He did not want to end up his life as any other blinds as a beggar, or a street singer. He was waiting for a turning point in his life.
Dear readers, let's leave Louis awaiting his fortune. I would like to pull your attention to the Finkenstein Castle where the Neapolitan Bonaparte summoned Charles Barbier, captain of one of his regiment for an important mission. It was in 1815 just before the War of Waterloo. The British force has destroyed one of their barracks when a soldier lit a candle to read the map. Napoleon asked Captain Charles to find out a solution where the soldiers can read without light.
Charles Barbier came up with a new way of communication called night writing. It was a method of putting 12 dots on a cardboard in matrix and which has a separate decoding formula. The soldiers refused his invention as it was quite inconvenient for them to carry and use in the battlefields.
Charles was bit disappointed but found it would be useful for the people always in darkness – blinds. In 1821 he conducted a workshop for the 40 students in the Blind's school.
Let's come back to the story of Louis. He was one among the students attended Captain Charles workshop. When he touched the dots he felt an invigorating force pumping through his veins! That was the one he was waiting for! Charles system was much inconvenient as a single alphabet cannot be read without moving the fingers. He thought of having a new method. He started to write on a cardboard by piercing it with an awl. What an irony of life! He used the same tool which made him blind to develop a new code with six dots! In which a blind can feel one letter without moving his finger! He shared his invention with his friends and they were surprised to see they can write and read!
The news went to the ears of the then Principal of the school Dephu. He thought it was a humiliation as one of his student challenging the old way of teaching. He confiscated all his writing equipments and burnt his scrpts alleging it is against the school rules! But soon other students found it convenient and started learning it secretly. It became a mass learning even Daphu cannot ignore any more. He called for a public demonstration to prove it is not a trick. He challenged the 12 year old Louis if it is proven as a trick he has to undergo severe punishments and to stop cheating people with dots!
The day of public demonstration came. There were almost 400 people including the school students. Louis planned his demonstration very cleverly. One student will dictate a sentence and Louis will write it on the cardboard with his new writing method. Another student who was in out of the hall will come and read the script from Louis. After the experiment the audience started to howl. They neither saw nor expected a blind could read and write as an ordinary man. One man from the audience said, "hey boy… Don’t cheat us. We know it was a trick! You already memorized the sentence and pretending you are reading... huh! No blind can read in this world!"
Louis called that man and asked him to find some printed material from his pocket and which turned to be a theater ticket. He asked the man to read whatever in that ticket. Once he finished reading the name of the play and theater, Louis finished piercing dots on the card board! Then he called another student who was outside the hall. The student's heart throbbed in anxiety. They were confident about Louis's new language, but if there was an error in reading will end up their intense longing for reading and exploring the world.
The boy came to the stage and read the whole sentence flawlessly to the crowd. The crowd applauded wildly for a full six minutes! The amazing boy Louis Braille stood on the stage as a Colossus! There comes the light to the blinds in the world "Braille alphabets"
