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1849 – A school for the deaf was founded at Cedar Springs by the
Reverend Newton Pinckney Walker and his wife, Martha Hughston Walker.
Five students, including three of Mrs. Walker’s siblings and two former
neighbors of Rev. Walker, were the first students. The school quickly
won the hearts of the people of the community and the state.
1855 – James S. Henderson was hired to teach blind students who had
applied to the Cedar Springs Asylum.
1856 – The State of South Carolina purchased the school and 157 acres
for $10,759, and the school became the Couth Carolina Institution for
the Education of the Deaf and Dumb and Blind.
1860 – The School moved into Main Building (renamed Walker Hall in
1955), designed by noted Charleston architect Edward C. Jones.
1861 – Rev. Walker dies from measles complications. Martha Walker
assumes management of the school.
1864 – A “Private Fund” is established to accept donations of goods,
services and money to assist the school. The school was forced to close
briefly during Reconstruction following the Civil War for lack of State
support, but reopened in 1869 under the leadership of its first
graduate, John M. Hughston.
1880 – The school begins to teach deaf students using Bell’s Visible
Speech method of voicing and reading lips. By 1929, sign language was no
longer being taught at the school.
1934 – The Spartanburg Lions Club begins its Christmas party
tradition for the students, and also took them out for weekly movies and
ice cream.
1942 – 25 acres of the school’s land was given to Camp Croft,
including Cedar Spring.
1944 – The school initiated a teacher education program for the deaf
at Converse College. The school begins to mainstream some students at
Spartanburg High School.
1961 – The aphasiac program is begun to serve students with multiple
handicaps or brain injuries.
1971 – Weekend bussing begins, allowing students to travel home on a
more frequent basis.
1977 – The School for the Multihandicapped is opened.
1978 – The federal government mandates that the public schools of the
nation “assume responsibility of educating all handicapped students.”
Many SCSDB students move to their home school districts.
1979 – The School’s private, non-profit fund raising arm, The
Foundation for the Multihandicapped, Blind and Deaf of South Carolina,
Inc. is chartered. (It wousl later change its name to The Walker
Foundation.) Sign language begins to experience a rebirth and classes
are offered for students, parents, staff, and others.
1981 – A. Baron Holmes IV, the school’s first president not a member
of the Walker family, is selected.
1986 – The Postsecondary Program is established.
1988 – The School’s first permanent Outreach Center in opened in
Charleston.
1999 – The South Carolina School for the Deaf and the Blind
celebrates the 150th anniversary of its founding.
*Special thanks to JoAnn Mitchell Brasington, author of The South
Carolina School for the Deaf and the Blind, 1849-1999, from which much
of the historical information above was taken. |
