On the Recent Amazing Scout Race, Scouts had a first real life experience with deciphering Braille. We take it for granted that we can read and write, but for those who have eye problems, Louis Braille's invention is a great help and necessity.
2009 is the 200 year anniversary of the birth of Louis Braille, who developed Braille as reading and writing tool for blind people. A blind child or adult 200 years ago had no effective way to read and write indepentdently. Thanks to the ingenious invention of Louis Braille, people around the world can now read and write like their any normal sighted person does.
A very short history: Louis Braille became blind at the age of 3 (almost 4) and was sent to a blind school in Paris, where he learned to read with a cumbersome (and ineffective) system of raised letters A visiting French army Captain shared a system (called "nIght Writing") that was in use by the army and consisted of patterns of 12 dots and dashes to allow soldiers on the field to communicate top secret information without speaking. The system was too difficult for Louis Braille and he eventually changed the system to patterns of 6 dots as we know it today. Read more extensively about Braille here.
