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OBJECTS AND POLICIES

Current Misrepresentations Corrected by Organized Workers for the Blind

Agitation and Establishment

The original plan of the Michigan Employment Institution for the Blind, located at Saginaw West Side, was conceived by Rev. Rufus H. Crane of Saginaw. He, with the aid of two other blind men, Rev. Henry N. Couden of Port Huron and Dexter S. Pettibone of Grand Rapids, endeavored to get a bill through the Legislature of 1893 providing for the establishment of a workshop for blind men. Another vigorous but unsuccessful attempt was made by them in 1895.

When the Michigan Association of Workers for the Blind was organized in 1900, Mr. Crane went before the first convention and delivered a very animated address in which he set forth in need of a workshop or working home for the adult blind. At the second convention, in 1902, the organization took the matter up, placing it in the hands of a committee of which Mr. Crane was made chairman and Mr. Pettibone was a member; and the broader plan of the present industrial home was formulated. One of the committeemen, Ambrose M. Shotwell of Jackson County, and an eminent pioneer in organized work for the blind of America, drafted the bill. Senator Moriarty from Upper Michigan introduced this Bill into the Legislature in February of 1903. It was passed and signed by Governor Bliss in June.

The Institution was opened and dedicated in the autumn of 1904 and has served its purpose ever since.

Objects and Policies

According to the establishing Act, this institution has a two-fold major object and policy; namely, that of a polytechnic school for adult blind applicants; and, that of a working home and factory for the steady employment of qualified, adult blind of Michigan, at a reasonable scale of wages. It is also the home of the Free Lending Library for the Blind and the Employment Bureau for the Blind.

Privileges of Learners

The law generously provides that the learner may have free board, lodging and washing for not exceeding three years. But if a person completes his or her course of training in less than three years, this free maintenance automatically ceases. If his training has been in a line of work furnished by the Institution, and he wishes to remain, he then becomes a beneficiary of the employment feature. He is placed on the payroll and pays his board from his earnings.

Beneficiaries of the Institution must be of good moral character and able and willing to work.

A Happy Privilege Threatened

For nearly a quarter of a century, this industrial home has served a noble purpose by furnishing remunerative occupations and contentment many capable men and women who would otherwise have been hopelessly idle and dependent either on relatives or on public charity.

And now, according to current discussion for the past six months, there is a movement being agitated to do away with the employment feature thus making the Institution simply a vocational school.

Recommendations

We would recommend that sufficient stress be put on the vocational school to bring it to the highest standard of excellence; and that the remunerative employment feature be the subject of equally intelligent development. For, to discontinue that line of service would bring grief and hopeless idleness not only to many who are happily employed and earning wages there now, but also would deprive others in years to come of the same happy privilege.

We would urge that as far as possible and practicable the beneficiaries of the vocational school be encouraged to leave the Institution and engage in some useful and remunerative occupation outside. In creating the Employment Bureau for the Blind, the State purposes to give aid to the blind either to establish themselves in an independent business of their own; or, where it is possible, to find employment in some industry of their community, doing work that is within their capacity. But there are those whom, for various reasons, it is not possible to place thus. It was for this class that Mr. Crane and his associates saw the need of a working home.

An Appeal

We therefore, the members of the Board of Directors of the Michigan Association of Workers for the Blind, are sending out this urgent appeal to those who have in charge the future usefulness of the Institution and to other friends interested in the welfare of the blind. We beg you to use your good offices and your influence on behalf of these handicapped people, to the end that the original objects and policies of the Michigan Employment Institution for the Blind may be preserved and maintained indefinitely.

JAMES L. BOWEN, President.
B. EVA BELLISLE, Secretary.

MERGING WOULD BE DISASTROUS AND DISHONORABLE

Some have thoughtlessly suggested a merging of two vastly unlike undertakings, -- an attempt that could only prove disastrous to both and discreditable to the good people of our State.

Pupils without sight from childhood and in need of a graded school course of education, are in a very different group, and present a most diverse problem, from that of recently blinded adults from all walks of life and in need of intensive individual training for a brief period, to be followed, in most cases, by indefinite vocational opportunities where success is still possible, whether at the State workshop or in home communities. If you or your wife, a grown-up son or daughter were suddenly blinded to-morrow, what possible public service would then be chiefly needed? Most victims of such a handicap cannot know in advance just what they can still accomplish, or what degree of vocational success may still be possible in their case. To attempt to blend brine and oil -- primary school and an efficient rehabilitation service -- would contaminate both and dishonor the mixers. They were never "separated"; for they were "never" truly together in Michigan. The felt need of pecuniary relief for the doubly handicapped would promptly become urgent.