Historical Perspective

Special Education

1700s

Jean-Marc Gaspard Itard

A French Physician of Special Education. He worked with deaf children. In 1801 he discovered a young boy roaming wild in the woods of France. Between 1801 and 1805he used a systematic techniques to teach the boy named Victor how to communicate with others and how to perform by daily living skills such as dressing himself.

Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet (1817)

It was this year that the first deaf school was created in Hartford, Connecticut. This school was inspired by Alice Cogswell, a neighbor who was deaf.

Perkins School for the Blind (1829) This is where Helen Keller and Anne Sullivan were educated.

Samuel Gridley Howe (1832)

Famous American reformer and abolitionist founded the New England Asylum for the Blind(Perkins Institute). He was the first person to successfully teach a person who was both blind and deaf. The Perkins Institution in Boston, Massachusetts was the first residential institution for people with mental retardation.

Columbia Institution for the Deaf and Dumb and Blind (1864)

It was the first college in the world established for people with disabilities.

Elizabeth Farrell (1918)

Founded the Council for exceptional children

Jacobus Broek (1940) Founded the National Federation of the Blind in WilkesBarre, Pennsylvania. They advocated for white cane laws, input by blind people for programs for blind clients and other reforms.

Paul Strachan(1940)

Founded the American Federation of the Physically Handicapped. He was the first cross-disability national political organization to urge an end to job discrimination, lobby for passage of legislation, call for a National Employ the Physically Handicapped Week and other activities.

Pres. Harry Truman (1945)

Signed PL-176 creating an annual National Employ the Handicapped Week

Pres. John F. Kennedy (1961)

Appointed a special Presidents Panel on Mental Retardation. Increased interest in employment issues affecting people with cognitive disabilities and mental illness were reflected.

American Disabled for Public Transit (ADAPT) 1978 It held a transit bus hostage in Denver, Colorado. A yearlong civil disobedience campaign followed to force the Denver Transit Authority to purchase wheelchair lift-equipped buses.

International Year of Disabled (1981) During the year, governments were encourage to sponsor programs bringing people with disabilities into the mainstream for their societies.

Mental Illness Bill of Rights Act (1985) Required states to provide protection and advocacy services for people with psychological disabilities.

Pres. George Bush (1990)

Signed the Americans with Disabilities Act

Americans with Disabilities Act (1990)

The act provided comprehensive civil rights protection for people with disabilities. Closely modelled after the Civil Rights Act Section 504, the law was the most sweeping disability rights in legislation in history.