15 Secrets Most People Probably Don’t Know About Helen Keller

10. Supporter of Our Troops

Helen visited disabled veterans in military hospitals around the country during and after World War II, bringing them comfort, support, and encouragement.

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11. Political Activist

Helen was a member of the Socialist Party of America and the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), and she campaigned for many leftist causes such as women’s suffrage, birth control, workers’ rights, and socialism. She helped found the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in 1920.

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12. Dignitary

Helen met every U.S. President from Grover Cleveland to Lyndon B. Johnson; here she is pictured with President Dwight D. Eisenhower. She was friends with many famous figures, including Mark Twain and Alexander Graham Bell, and met many artists of the day, including Charlie Chaplin, Martha Graham, and Enrico Caruso. In 1964, Lyndon B. Johnson awarded Helen America’s highest civilian honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

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13. Her Image (WITH BRAILLE) Is On Our Currency.

Keller’s image is on the Alabama state quarter (part of the 50 state quarters program). She appears as an old woman sitting in a rocking chair, holding a book (Keller died at age 87 in 1968). Introduced in March 2003, the words “Helen Keller” are on the quarter in the Latin alphabet and in braille.

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14. She had three failed elopements with her boyfriend

At 36 years of age, Helen fell in love with her temporary assistant, Peter Fagan, a newspaper journalist who was seven years her junior. Fagan and Keller took out a marriage license and tried to elope three separate times.

However, during an era in which eugenics beliefs still existed [the belief that reproduction should be controlled in order to reduce inheritable ‘defects’], coupled with complex relationships and concern that Helen could only be properly cared for by her family, Keller’s family stood in the way of at least one of the failed elopements.

15. Her Life Story Got The Bollywood Treatment.

Released in 2005, the Bollywood film Black is about a young deaf-blind girl named Michelle, her relationship with her teacher, and how she deals with her inability to hear and see. Inspired by Keller’s life, Black’s director, Sanjay Leela Bhansali, read her autobiography and visited The Helen Keller Institute for the Deaf and Blind before writing and directing the film. It premiered at Cannes and won both lead actors Indian Filmfare awards.

(Sources: goodhousekeeping.com and mentalfloss)

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Zack Walkter