Themes of Blindness in Antebellum Literature for Children

Meredith Eliassen, San Francisco State University

Blindness -- loss of sight caused congenitally or by injury or infectious disease -- was explored by authors of antebellum children’s literature to delineate and develop instructive characters.  Blindness was historically the most recognizable form of disability, and parents feared its economic, emotional, and social repercussions.  Blind characters were developed to illustrate themes of dependency, poverty, and gender, and to inculcate being autonomous within family units and community life despite adversity.  Prior to the American Revolution, while America was still a British colony, models of moral correctness were imported from England.  Sarah Fielding’s The Governess, or, The Little Female Academy http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1905 was published in 1749.  Considered the first work of juvenile fiction, this novel was used to instruct adolescent girls and their brothers for over one hundred years.  In The Governess, Fielding urged her readers to practice caution in charity.  Her resourceful character of the dwarf in “The Story of the cruel Giant Barbarico, the good Giant Benefico, and the pretty little Dwarf Mignon,” was the first disabled character developed to teach lessons about appropriate use of power.   Researchers can track the semantics of what constituted “worthy poor” by studying disabilities literature for children.

During the Early Republic, writers shaped a rhetoric utilizing real and fictitious blind characters that demonstrated fortitude in their affliction so that communities had guidelines to provide assistance to the poor.  In the United States, blind individuals were dependent upon family, neighbors, or almshouses -- early hospitals provided hospitality and shelter to the poor and needy.  Blind individuals lived independently, and received supplemental income, food, and clothing from local parishes.  Blind characters, including war veterans, were commonly characterized as individuals readjusting to new living conditions.  The Handelian Charitable Society in Baltimore was established in 1808 to aid persons in distress, and later the Hartford Evangelical Tract Society emerged after the Battle for Baltimore in 1815.  Happy Poverty, or, The Story of Poor Ellen (1817) http://www.disabilitymuseum.org/lib/docs/793card.htm was written as a fundraiser to support the operation of the Baltimore General Dispensary.  In this small tract, Ellen, a young woman blinded at the age of six years, exemplified a modest Christian life and received a small stipend from her local parish in addition to earnings from spinning and caring for another disabled woman in a “group home” situation.

 The American Sunday-School Union (ASSU) and the American Tract Society (ATS) published books with disabled characters.  ASSU started in Philadelphia as a coalition of local Protestant Sunday-school groups in 1817.  ASSU established Sunday-schools where children learned to read and provided communities with libraries.  This non-sectarian organization also developed a distribution network for children’s book on the frontier.  Writers from many denominations -- within a single generation -- produced widely-read quality juvenile literature that caused a revolution in American reading habits and tastes.  These books remained influential until the 1860s when public libraries provided easy access to attractive literature.  ASSU published “Blind Alick” http://www.disabilitymuseum.org/lib/docs/793card.htm in The Boy’s Scrap Book in 1839.  This story chronicled the life of Alexander McDonald (1771-1830), also known as Blind Alick and the Blind Fiddler.   Born in Perth, Scotland, McDonald was blinded by smallpox as a child.  He became a well-known strolling fiddler, who earned his living as a popular performer at social gatherings.  McDonald attended a school for the blind in Glasgow and learned the Bible well enough to get other children interested in learning the Gospels.

Poverty became a visible threat to communities in the United States after a financial panic in 1819, when Americans noticed that most jobs had become seasonable and precarious, and wages were low.  Employment options for disabled people could not sustain survival.  Children experienced the impact of the tumultuous economy, and were taught to be adaptable; and families having trouble making ends meet, turned to charitable organizations for assistance.  Cobb’s Reader (1834) contained an account of Julia Bruce entitled “The Deaf, Dumb and Blind Girl” http://www.disabilitymuseum.org/lib/docs/792card.htm.  Julia was the daughter in a poor family living in Connecticut.  When her maintenance became a burden, she was placed in an asylum.  This story provided a seminal model by showing how Julia adapted to her new environment and learned new tasks.  Young readers were cautioned, “Never, therefore, forget to be grateful for the talents which you are endowed.”        

While a child’s outlook in the face of adversity might make family life easier, dealing with the illness leading to a child’s blindness might be catastrophic for a family’s economic survival.  Scarlet fever epidemics had global impact on large segments of the population, and were utilized in children’s stories throughout the nineteenth century.  The first documented epidemic of scarlet fever occurred between 1735 and 1740.  Before the nineteenth century, scarlet fever was considered to be a benign childhood illness, but between 1824 and 1885 America and England experienced cycles of pandemic scarlet fever, and the United States suffered numerous waves of scarlet fever from 1820 to 1880.  First published in Juvenile Miscellany in 1829, “Blind Susan, or, The Affectionate Family” told the story of Susan Mordant who bravely underwent corrective surgery after an illness.  Susan appeared to be on the mend, but then died in the story’s conclusion.

In The Blind Beggar, (New York:  ATS, circa 1840), a mother tells her children a cautionary tale of how blindness can be related to the heart and not to sight.  The beggar in this story was blinded by cataracts, and refused an offer from a surgeon to remove the cataracts at no charge.  The beggar refused the offer and chose to remain blind and poor, because he would have to make lifestyle changes, he would have to earn a living instead begging and living off of charity.  This story, reminiscent to The Governess, asserted the importance of knowing the circumstances of people who appeal to our sympathy.  It suggested that quick charity could exasperate problems that might be alleviated by exploring alternatives.  While some people might be down on their luck and just need a little help, others pretend to need help, but remain unwilling to change their habits in order to change their lives.  

Literature associated with institutional reform written during the 1830s often described excruciating treatments for curing blindness.  These texts strongly encouraged families to research and support institutions providing services for the blind.  In Blind Alice (New York:  D. Appleton, and Company, 1855, p. 64-65), M.J. McIntosh explained to readers, “these institutions for the blind... [where] those who are perfectly blind are taught to read, write, sew and do many fancy works, which it would seem to us quite impossible to do without sight.”

 

Even before the women’s reform movement of the 1840s, blind women strove to become as autonomous.  Incidents in the Life of a Blind Girl (Baltimore:  James Young, 1859), was a famous autobiographical account of a blind woman named Mary L. Day who was the daughter of an itinerant tinsmith.  The story revealed how Mary’s family traveled extensively and suffered many hardships prior to her blindness at the age of twelve, and provided an insightful account of a female-headed family coping with poverty and illness.  Mary underwent a series of unsuccessful treatments to cure her blindness.  Orphaned, bounded out to work, she was fired when the family tired of her.  Cast out, Mary fended for herself, wandering until she collapsed on the roadside.  Finally a family took her in and cared for her. 

To conclude, families had no safety nets -- they could only hope for the charity and good will within their own community.  Blind characters illustrated resourcefulness to encourage children to grow up to have independent lives or to endure with affliction with grace.  As doctors developed treatments for specific forms of blindness, and institutions provided education and services for the blind, the emphasis of blind characters departed from pragmatic instruction to become sentimental depictions of the blind.  The Civil War changed the tone of all children’s literature to depict changing patriarchal gender roles as soldiers left wives and widows to head households. 

Post-bellum juvenile literature reflected new sensibilities as characteristics of “childhood” and attitudes towards what constituted “worthy poor” changed.  Sentimental stories with absent father figures always featured a male figure who appeared to rescue a disabled girl.

“Faith Douglas,” (1863) http://www.disabilitymuseum.org/lib/docs/798card.htm was published in The Little Pilgrim, a northern children’s magazine for Christian children.  In this story, the cause of Faith’s blindness was allegorical and vague – however, her sunny disposition brought joy to those around her, and eventually drew in a wealthy male benefactor who alleviated her tribulation.  The semantics of disability shifted so that male-war heroes would not appear to be needy or pathetic.  Men returning from the battlefields blinded by injuries could not be depicted as being dependent, and therefore juvenile blind characters were developed to reflect the notion that children should appear to be more innocent or needy than their elders.