Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind

Alabama Institute for the Deaf and Blind (AIDB) is a state-operated education, rehabilitation and service program for deaf, blind, and multi-disabled individuals. The program, headquartered in Talladega, operates the Alabama School for the Blind and Helen Keller School of Alabama boarding schools, as well as the E. H. Gentry Facility vocational training center and the Alabama Industries for the Blind. AIDB also operates regional centers in Birmingham and Tuscaloosa and 11 other cities.

The program was founded in 1858 through the efforts of Joseph Henry Johnson, who acquired property in Talladega and petitioned Governor Andrew Moore and Superintendent of Education William Perry to fund a school for the deaf. The state bought the land from Johnson in 1860 and appointed him as president of the institution. After the Civil War, Johnson's brother-in-law, Reuben Asbury, who had lost an eye in the fighting, suggested expanding the program to help the blind. The Alabama State Legislature approved the proposal in 1870. The combined program, called the Alabama Institute for the Deaf, Dumb and Blind, served about 70 students that year. It was split into separate schools in 1887 with Johnson keeping charge of deaf students and Josiah Graves hired as president for the Alabama Academy for the Blind.

In 1892 Graves was made principal of the newly-created Alabama School for Negro Deaf-Mutes

References

• Couch, Rober Hill (1983) Out of Silence and Darkness: The History of the Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind, 1858-1983. Troy State University Press