Description: Reverse reads: At last she knows Columbus. You can imagine what an impossible task it would be to convey to a blind person a concept of the layout of Columbus but here, Emogene Ritteger, a seventh grade pupil at the Ohio State School for the Blind, Columbus is learning Columbus quickly and easily by running her fingers over a map built by WPA workers to show the streets, scale models of important and rough models of other structures. In 1837, the Ohio Institution for the Education of the Blind was established. In the 1900s, the school changed its name to the Ohio State School for the Blind, and the Ohio Department of Education took control of the school. In 1953, the school moved from Main Street in Columbus to 5220 North High Street. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_31_001
Subjects: Ohio State School for the Blind; Ohio Institution for the Education of the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Columbus (Ohio)--Maps, Pictorial; Works Progress Administration of Ohio (U.S.)
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: The Ohio State School for the Blind utilized models, like this one, to allow its students to perceive the shape of large buildings they would otherwise be unable to experience. Attached document reads: [PAGE 1] The negotiations failed; “Hath not the Bishop land of his own that he must needs spoil the Abbess’s? Varily he hath many more sites on which he may build his church than this Wilton,” was the reply of the Abbess to his demand. During his period of indecision, the Virgin appeared to him in a vision and commanded him to build his new church in a place called Myrfiled, or as some accounts have it Maerfield. He searched vainly for a piece of ground by that name, that he might obey the supernatural edict until by chance he overheard a laborer (or a soldier – the legends vary) talking of the Maer-field, and then having as he through identified the place, which appears to have been within his own demesne, he commenced to plan the present building. Misled by the similarity of sound, the name maerfield has been naturally enough interpreted to be Mary-field. Not only from the fact that the site was given by the bishop may we infert that the Poores were a wealthy family, but his brother, who was his immediate predecessor in the see, is described in the osmund register as dives et assiduous (rich and painstaking) and Richard Poore, before his enthronement, was a benefactor to the monastery of Tarrant in Dorsetshire his native village. Later we find he gave a large estate at Laberstook to his new cathedral. Hence, the old theory that his name was derived from Poor or Pauper, as it appears in several old chronicles is untenable. The external length of Salisbury Cathedral is 480 feet, and the internal length is 450 feet. The transept is 230 feet outside and 206 feet inside. The chapter house is 58 feet in diameter and 53 feet high. [PAGE 2] The cloister is 182 feet square and is used mainly for recreation such as religious activities, athletic contests, etc. The plumbery is used as a workshop. The height of the steeple is 404 feet. The height of the building proper is 80 feet. There are two entrances to the cathedral, outside of the gate to the cathedral. The one is by means of the proch which is used for special occasions, such wedding. The amin entrance is on the west side of the cathedral. The word cloister means a covered walk or passageway around a court. This word which comes from the Latin claudere, meaning to close, was at first applied to the entire space enclosed within the walls of the masonry cathedral or collegiate establishment of the Middle Ages. Later it designated the four cornered court in the center of the main group of building, which was surrounded on all sides by a covered, arched corridor. Sometime the term was applied only to those corridors; the central open space, which contained a wall and garden, was known as the garth. Within the cloister, the monks were accustomed to enjoy their recreation. Sacristy or vestry is a room in or attached to a church where there sacred utensils, vestments, etc., are kept. Nave is the long, narrow halls which ordinarily rises higher than the isles flanking it and which usually has windows on each side above the isle roof. Presbytery is that part of a church reserved for officiating prists, as the choir or sanctuary or both. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_18_001
Subjects: Models; Salisbury Cathedral; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: A blind student uses touch to explore models of what farm animals look like. Reverse reads: “Domestic Animals – The four animals – the horse, cow, hog and the sheep are made in high relief but scaled down in size. Each animal is made in the proper proportion to the other. The rooster and hen are scaled together.” View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_20_001
Subjects: Models; Schools--Ohio; Braille; Students; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: A student at the Ohio State School for the Blind uses her hands to explore a model which features realistic representation of a bird’s nest, positioned in a tree branch, and a song sparrow held below. Positioned beside the model are domestic animal models that also incorporate touch in order to teach students what farm animals look like. Reverse reads: “Girl counting eggs in bird’s nest. In her hand is a song sparrow which is made life size in high relief for comparison.” View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_21_001
Subjects: Models; Schools--Ohio; Students; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: The Ohio State School for the Blind utilized models, like this one, to allow its students to perceive the shape of large buildings and landscapes they would otherwise be unable to experience. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_23_001
Subjects: Models; Schools--Ohio; Students; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: The Ohio State Institution for the Education of the Blind was established in April of 1837 and by July of 1837 began instruction in rented rooms. The first school building was built in 1839, and could accommodate sixty students. This photograph, taken ca. 1935-1943, shows the four-story sandstone structure in the Second Roman style of architecture with a Mansard roof. It is located on the corner of Parsons Avenue and East Main Street in Columbus, Ohio and first opened its doors on May 21, 1874. Early in the 20th century, the Ohio Department of Education assumed control and the name of the school was changed to the Ohio School for the Blind. In 1953, the school moved to its current location on North High Street near Morse Road. The building has undergone several renovations, and once had a central tower which reached an additional three stories, and pointed spires on the north and south ends. It has since been occupied by the Ohio Highway Patrol and then by Columbus Environmental Health. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B01F11_013
Subjects: Schools--Ohio; Blind--Ohio; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: The Ohio State School for the Blind utilized models, like this one, to allow its students to perceive the shape of large buildings they would otherwise be unable to experience. Models of stagecoaches and covered wagons are seen being constructed in this photo. Attached document reads: In the time before railroad trains and automobiles were invented people traveled from one town to another in such a public conveyance as this coach. This particular type of coach was used as the trains are used today, a set rate was paid for every miles traveled. It was this coach that carried the early gold hunters across the great western prairies from Dodge City, Kansas, to San Francisco. These coaches all belonged to the Wells Fargo company who also owned and operated the Pony Express. One the inside of the coach six people could sit. This was considered the safest and most comfortable place to ride and was usually occupied by the women. On top, of course, was the driver who had the responsibility of the team of four or sometimes six horses. Usually there was at least one guard who rode with the driver, whose responsibility it was to see that bandits, both Indian and White did not molest the coach and its valuable cargo. The coaches were not as comfortable as they could have been. The seats were upholstered in leather, as a general rule, but the springs were made either of leather straps or very crude hand forged iron. It was difficult to turn the coach sharply or guide it very carefully since the body set on the axels and was not provided with wheel wells. These wheel wells were indentations in the body of such a cab which could have allow- ed the wheels to turn either to right or left much more freely. However, they were not to come for a considerable time as yet. So instead of having these wells, the axles were made very wide to enable the coach to turn more quickly. The passenger's belongings and freight were stowed in the little pen which is located on top of the cab. Additional freight could be fastened to a platform in the back of some of the coaches underneath the driver's seat. Of course, travel by this method was both dangerous and slow. The coach traveled only during the daytime, staying at wayside inns at night. The roads were poor, often only a patch across the plains. It was not particularly unusual to have a stage come into the town, the horses in full gallop, foam flecked and red eyed with fright. Often too they wrought the driver or guard or perhaps a passenger wounded or killed in an encounter with robbers or Indians. The passengers all went armed, as a matter of course, and often a running fight would take place with the lawless men of the plains. The days of Buffalo Bill Cody and the Wells Fargo Express were days of quick fortunes and quicker poverty, of a vast empire of gold and silver and rolling Oregon farms, a day which changed but did not entirely die with the coming of the Iron Horse. COVERED WAGON To understand the background and use of this wagon it will be necessary to go back to the days of immediately following the Revolutionary War. When General Washington dismissed his army and the war was truly over, the country was faced with a depression such as we have just witness in the last few years. This depression was caused by two things. In the first place the young country had no stable currency and the paper money which Congress issued rapidly became practically worthless. This fact added to the dumping of hundreds of soldiers backs onto the country means of supporting themselves. General Washington was actively concerned with the welfare of these men who had given so long and so loyally that the nation might be free. In the case where the men had ever owned anything in the way of homes, or farms, these had either been confiscated or ruined by the long years of neglect. What was to be done with these men and their families? After the purchase of the Louisiana Territory it was obvious that there was an enormous tract of very fertile and beautiful land waiting beyond the mountains for settlers. These settlers were not hard to find. They gathered their belongings and families and departed to new hope and a new life, after the horrors of the war, in a new home. The old soldiers remembered the wagons which had done such service in transporting ammunition during the war. They recalled that the conventional wagon of the day --- four wheels with removable bed resting on the axels --- had been converted into an ammunition conveyance by fastening hoopes of willow to the side of the bed so as to form a support for the canvas which made the roof. What could be more natural than that these men should adopt this same kind of wagon to carry their household effects and families over the mountains to their new homes. Countless stories could be told of the adventurers of the type of wagon which got its start then. Many times settlers in bands were attacked by Indians and all the members killed. Other times death met them in the form of disease or lack of food or water, but for every one who died many (the number is of course not known) lived to reach new homes, at first in Ohio, then choice sports further and further west, until the Pacific was reached. This wagon was the accepted means of conveyance for any who hoped to take his household with him. the method of locomotion varied with the person who drove and with the kind of territory through which the people were to travel. Sometimes mules were used, but more often oxen or horses did the heavy work of moving the cumberson and heavy wagons. The people who traveled in this uncomfortable conveyance were not, as may be suspected, the poorest and crudest in the country. There rests in the museum in Denver today definite proof of this. There is a tiny spinet (the ancestor of the modern day piano) which is built of beautiful rosewood, obviously expensive and probably imported from England. The story of this lovely piano is simple. It was found on a prairie not far from Denver by a band of settlers in the smoldering debris of what had once been a caravan of settlers. The people who had driven the oxen were all kead, killed by Indians, but the following band of settlers had been so close behind that they were able to come up before the fire had destroyed the wreckage of the wagons. Who owned that spinet and where they were going, no one knows. Wave upon wave of settlers continued to come despite the hardships and dangers and they came in their time proven covered wagons. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_25_001
Subjects: Models; Schools--Ohio; Students; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: Reverse side: A REPLICA OF OHIO STATE SCHOOL FOR THE BLIND - A workman is just fixing the girls' dormitory in place. Since this model has been started, scores of former students have requested an opportunity to "see" for the first time the school in which they spent several years. Model of campus: Length - 74", width - 72", height of building - 10." The school was established in 1837. At the time it was called the Ohio Institution for the Education of the Blind. In the early 1900s, the school was renamed Ohio State School for the Blind. At this time the Ohio Department of Education to control over the school. In 1953, the school relocated from its Main Street location to 5220 North High Street in Columbus View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_34_001
Subjects: Ohio State School for the Blind; Students; Education--Ohio; School--Ohio; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: This photograph is a relief map of a portion of the city of Columbus. It is used as a teaching tool for the blind students at the Ohio School for the Blind. As of 1941, it would take 81 models of this size to portray the whole city. This model is exact with the arrangement of the buildings, the street names and arrangements of blocks, it is considered a pictorial diagram rather than a to scale model. The buildings are labeled in Braille and in one corner is a wire arrow lettered to denote the directions, East, West, North and South. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F02_048_001
Subjects: Relief maps; Models; Schools--Ohio; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: This photo features a student at the Ohio State School using her hands to explore a scaled model of a log cabin to build a mental image of the building. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_17_001
Subjects: Models; Schools--Ohio; Students; Log Cabins; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: Fully equipped by the WPA, the model playhouse at the Ohio State School for the Blind gives children the opportunity to learn about the problems of home life. Reverse reads: “On School Life Magazine Cover. ‘Good Morning Neighbor.’ Model house, four rooms – living room, dining room, bed room, and kitchen. Completely furnished even to an electric stove on which they sometimes cook. Children learning features of a home.” View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_22_001
Subjects: Models; Playhouses; Schools--Ohio; Ohio State School for the Blind; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)
 

Description: Reverse reads: 22265. Photo by Wilson. Ohio, Columbus. Photo shows blind students getting this story of the Nativity from their fingertips on a model which was made by EPA workers for the students at the Ohio State School for the Blind. The Ohio Institution for the Education of the Blind was established in 1837. In the 1900s the name was changed to the Ohio State School for the Blind. The Ohio Department of Education took control of the school at this time. In 1953, the school moved from its location on Main Street, Columbus to 5220 North High Street in Columbus. View on Ohio Memory.
Image ID: SA1039AV_B11F04_24_001
Subjects: Ohio State School for the Blind; Students; Education--Ohio; School--Ohio; Blind--Education--Ohio--Columbus; Ohio--History--Pictorial works; Federal Writers' Project
Places: Columbus (Ohio); Franklin County (Ohio)