Deaf American Prose 1830-1930

The Three Doors to Knowledge

The Three Doors to Knowledge 193 Vera Gammon (1896–unknown) Born in 1896, Mabel Vera Gammon was called the “Helen Keller of Minnesota.” Gammon became deaf and blind between the ages of four and five and entered the Minnesota School for the Deaf at the age of ten. “The Three Doors to Knowledge” is an essay that Gammon wrote for her commencement exercises at the Minnesota School for the Deaf; she was said also to have “delivered it in signs” at her graduation. Originally published in 1919 in Minnesota, and reprinted in the American Annals of the Deaf in the same year, “The Three Doors to Knowledge” addresses the detailed sensory world of Deaf-blind Americans. When admonished by a classmate for not using the term “feel” instead of “hear” and “see” in her writing, Gammon responded by writing: “It should be understood that I ‘see, hear, and read’ with my hands, but not in the sense that you do with your eyes and ears;” she goes on to point out the ways in which the senses are used in figurative speech in different ways that don’t always follow their literal meanings. The date of her death is unverifiable.25 c The Three Doors to Knowledge [WE PRESENT BELOW the graduating essay of Vera Gammon, delivered by her signs at our Commencement Exercises last May. And we can assure our readers that it is Vera’s own work, her own thoughts expressed in her own words. Her teacher made no important changes as to subject matter or phraseology, merely making a few minor suggestions and corrections. We think it is a most impressive showing of what Vera’s education in our school has done for her. The reader will bear in mind 25. “Mabel Vera Gammon,” Our Young People: The Deaf-Mutes’ Friend (1911): 26; William Wade, The Blind-Deaf: A Supplement (Indianapolis, IN: Hecker Brothers, 1908), 18; American Annals of the Deaf 64, no. 5 (1919): 431–39. “The Three Doors to Knowledge” is from American Annals of the Deaf 64, no. 5 (November 1919). Originally published in the Minnesota Companion (October 22, 1919). 194 Vera Gammon that when Vera Gammon came to us, she stood at the zero point of knowledge, with the two main avenues to the mind—sight and hearing—absolutely closed to all sense perception. By the aid of the three remaining senses she has acquired an education of which people in full possession of their senses might well be proud. All honor to her and to her teacher! – EDITOR COMPANION.] The deaf-blind have fewer senses than others, but their world is not so narrow as people imagine. Unless a deaf-blind girl is below normal mentally, there is no difference between her and her sisters in full possession of their senses, if given an education, except that she can neither see nor hear. An untaught deaf-blind child will learn to connect certain things in her experience with certain objects from the sensations produced. For example, sweetness with candy; the vibration she felt and the broken pieces with a dropped dish. Only after she has a means of communication can she speak of them. For the deaf-blind there are three doors to the palace of knowledge, opened with the keys of taste, smell, and touch. The rooms are as large as the width and breadth of the world, for, through the hands of others, everything in the way of education is brought to them. Each room stands for a study to pursue. The doors of the palace are never closed, once the keys have been adjusted, for the deaf-blind are at all times seeking the light of knowledge. Since the sense of taste is practically the same in every one I shall not say much about it. Like their hearing and seeing comrades, the deaf-blind are able to tell whether an article of food is good or bad, sweet or bitter, and well or poorly done. In some cases, the sense of taste is stronger just because the deaf-blind make more use of it. It is well known that one’s perception and skill to do things increase in proportion to the training. A great deal of information and pleasure is derived from the sense of smell. People who have a mistaken idea that one should not speak of this sense are forgetful of the fact that there are both pleasant and disagreeable odors. When the blind and...