Sunday 7th March 2010

Gallery of Influential Lives #4 – Helen Keller

Helen Keller was born in Alabama, America on June 27, 1880. When she was 19 months, she suffered from meningitis and became blind and deaf as a result.

Helen Keller became the first blind-deaf person to effectively communicate with a world in which vision and sound are of such importance. Her teacher, Anne Sullivan, played a vital role in this achievement.

Helen graduated from college in 1904 (an achievement in itself!) and dedicated her life to helping people with these disabilities.

Her dedication, courage and determination which was based on her Christian faith, was recognized by many people. Winston Churchill called her "the greatest woman of our age"

Gallery of Influential Lives #5 – Elizabeth Fry

Elizabeth Fry was a Quaker minister who started visiting Newgate women's prison in London. This was an appalling place, overcrowded, filthy and degrading. There were also a lot of children in there as well.

She reformed the prison replacing the chaos with order and hopelessness with self respect. She organized bible studies and made bibles available to those who wanted them.

Elizabeth Fry also changed the treatment of prisoners being transported to Botany Bay and set up organizations to care for them when they were in Australia. She worked tirelessly on behalf of those women who were condemned to death, trying to get their death sentence reprieved and dealing with their distress.

For more than twenty years this work continued, based simply on her response to what God had done for her.

However her life changed again when, in 1820, a homeless child was found frozen to death on her doorstep. She set up nightly shelters for the homeless, opened schools, started hospital reforms and began training nurses.

This was all in addition to caring for her own family of ten children!