[NFB-of-Delaware] FW: Jump Dummy

Thu Sep 18 00:02:13 UTC 2025

FYI… If you want to continue to receive these interesting stories, see details below.

From: The Blind History Lady <theblindhistorylady-gmail.com at shared1.ccsend.com> 
Sent: Tuesday, September 2, 2025 6:23 AM
To: cmkries at comcast.net
Subject: Jump Dummy

Jump Dummy

  <https://5tkhmc6ab.cc.rs6.net/on.jsp?ca=16022ea6-d2d7-4b75-a3e2-8b70ed2dfb25&a=1130730072702&c=0514426a-f8a5-11ef-b047-fa163e8d831b&ch=05147a50-f8a5-11ef-b047-fa163e8d831b> 

  <https://files.constantcontact.com/e7aa3c44701/2f7c3972-1a96-480c-bc44-915b6b532714.jpg?rdr=true> 

Jump, Dummy, Rubber, Trumping, are just a few terms used by competitive bridge players, including the blind. 

Arthur Dye became the 1,250th life master contract bridge player in the United States in 1956, and the first blind life master. It was his eighth year competing in the American Contract Bridge League. Most players take at least ten years playing competitively before they reach the life master’s level. Those who played with and against Arthur felt he earned his place as a life master. Since Arthur, other blind bridge players have achieved the life master level.

“It’ s like finally arriving at a goal,” Arthur told the press in the fall of 1956 when he won life master. Newspapers across the country carried the story of a blind bridge player, thinking it a novelty. The only difference between Arthur and other players was that he played with a brailled deck of cards that he brailled himself and asked that players announce the cards they played.

Bridge for Arthur began with a Wednesday night card group that formed in his apartment house in Charlotte, North Carolina back in 1925. A neighbor, Gilbert Pierce and two others formed their group and began to learn bridge. Gilbert and Arthur continued the group for more than twenty years. When they all moved out of the apartment building, they rotated the Wednesday night meetings at each other’s homes. 

Arthur found that bridge not only was relaxing but increased his ability to concentrate. The game improved his memory as well. All great skills for a blind man who could not refer back to a printed page.

In 1941, he played his first competitive Duplicate Bridge game in Raleigh, with a friend from Charlotte. Since that time, he traveled up and down the eastern seaboard, competing and winning.

In 1959, Arthur was presented with the Edwin A. Wetzlar Memorial Award, given annually by the American Contract Bridge League for the person who has done the most for the world of Bridge.

Another highlight of his bridge career was in 1964 when he played with the nation’s top bridge player and a hero of his, Oswald Jacoby of Dallas Texas. They were partnered together at the annual Mid-Atlantic, Spring Regional Bridge Tournament in Durham, North                  Carolina. 

“It’s like golf, it relaxes me,” Arthur said. Some have one hobby, bridge was his.

Arthur was not the first or only blind bridge player. New York hosted over 100 bridge clubs organized for and by the blind of the city by 1931. The American Red Cross put a bridge handbook in braille in 1933 for several of the New York bridge clubs. Lois Weber, a blind chiropractor from Chicago competed in national competitions in the mid-west. John Larson of Minnesota, also blind, made a comfortable living teaching sighted people to play bridge. J. Patrick Dunne from Florida was competing in national bridge tournaments along the eastern seaboard as early as 1937. In the 1950s, Mary Eastman, a blind teacher from San Francisco won several tournaments along the west coast. 

Once, in a tournament in the west, two blind players advanced to the higher levels. Tournament officials realized the two blind people could not play with or against each other as they both used separate braille codes for their cards. Pitting them against the other would have given the player with the marked deck an advantage. Since that time, the tournament officials have agreed on and provide a standard braille deck for competition to avoid this situation from occurring again. 

Who was Arthur when not playing bridge?

Arthur was born in 1896 in Pennsylvania into a family that moved around the country, from state to state. He graduated from high school in 1913 in Florida. That summer, Arthur went blind from an accident while playing baseball. A ball hit him in the face causing immediate blindness. 

All his hopes for his future were dashed. Arthur became depressed. Most people felt sorry for him. Only one friend from high school reminded Arthur that he only lost his eyes, the rest of him still worked. 

His family physician, Dr. Murray Seagers, suggested to Arthur that he investigate becoming an Osteopath. The doctor explained how an osteopath relied on a sense of touch to diagnose their patients. It was the first real career opportunity for a blind person that Arthur heard of that could make a living and build a future for himself. Dr. Seagers helped him find and enroll at the Florida School for the Blind. 

Arthur enrolled in the fall of 1915. He graduated in 1918. As an older student, already in college, he took blindness related classes such as braille, typing, handicrafts, and music. While at the school for the blind Arthur took two years of premedical courses through Davidson College in North Carolina. School staff helped him learn how to navigate through courses, not adapted for the blind, as a blind person. He entered the Kirksville College of Osteopathy and Surgery (KCOS) in Kirksville, Missouri. 

He married Annie Cooper in September of 1918, just before leaving for Missouri. Arthur hoped his new bride would serve as primary reader and guide at KCOS. They had no children.

KCOS already graduated several successful blind Osteopaths, both men and women and was accustomed to the few accommodations necessary for blind students such as having tests read to them by a professor. Only one textbook was available in braille to study from. Classes were hands-on. Full-sized skeletons and fellow students provided him with hands-on practice. During his academic career, all but one grade was an “A.”

He graduated in 1921, and moved to Charlotte, North Carolina and set up his business in the Professional Building in downtown. Over the years he became sought after by many, including Johnny Weissmuller who played Tarzan in the movies. Weissmuller flew into Charlotte just to be treated by Arthur. 

In the fall of 1933 Arthur and Annie divorced. He married Mildred Lewis Taylor on January 13, 1934. They had two boys. Son Arthur Jr was born in 1936 and became an osteopath like his father, graduating from KCOS as well. Son Kenneth was born in 1946. He served in Viet Nam, became a computer expert with Microsoft and a champion bridge player like his dad. 

The boys knew their father was blind, but never thought of him as any different from the fathers of their friends. Their father worked, helped around the house, and took part in community affairs. 

Arthur was secretary of the Mecklenburg Association of the Blind. He worked with local school districts to get more special ed teachers for the blind kids in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school system. His papers regarding the education of the blind were published in national blindness professional journals. 

He officially retired in 1976, after 55 years of practice. But he kept on seeing favorite and long-time patients until he died in 1980. 

Arthur was a charter member of the Charlotte Bridge Association in 1975 and served as its president twice. He also was president of the Mid Atlantic Regional Conference of the Contract Bridge League. 

Arthur adjusted his patients, adjusted to blindness, and adjusted bridge to himself. He was no “dummy.”

Do NOT reprint or repost without written permission from the author.

Peggy Chong is the 2023 Jacob Bolotin Award Winner.

To schedule The Blind History Lady for a presentation for your business, church or community group, email;  <mailto:theblindhistorylady at gmail.com> theblindhistorylady at gmail.com

Purchase a copy of my book, Don Mahoney: Television Star at is new low price at

 <https://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001lz4jhDEFqG6dx1_0p5OTVu8rfsNlw0ECQBnOktbaFI_gYyrnfe1xoLWcAo8DAeYizkn4emiKTu3v3hzbWxcpqJv9sNn4UoJO4zjrgcp-g3vYsNR0qtO4ppA06qc7Qr4LUCQ93a-65TriIqA7XTBifXZuKuWbK4j6jQCCFoDLwSxaJK-eAGT1BPTCuRVrKtXWA5cq2yWUmCUPC_jcuZtbAQ==&c=VHndmluZPTlMRK9jestiHyo0IFueGRyNOe2C9QHGeeN-rzdHMJCqTw==&ch=8fDVr5qMuuDBRs0k5oRGAJJo9OwwQkiNfaW41DHK_zII8gglkEPkUg==> Don Mahoney: Television Star: Chong, Peggy: 9781098082956: Amazon.com: Books

Please check out my other works at  <https://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001lz4jhDEFqG6dx1_0p5OTVu8rfsNlw0ECQBnOktbaFI_gYyrnfe1xoF0GjN8e4kto5hWuq_tVsEGh4ZdRwWmDpDEYbCgggVF2NqoCAX8bCjF3Yyw0uvPqC6LfSn2_N2ojZSmfC48984YUWyUc66bouUW1SqJp5AHVDPC2zrBOYT8lJV4DNmaAlA==&c=VHndmluZPTlMRK9jestiHyo0IFueGRyNOe2C9QHGeeN-rzdHMJCqTw==&ch=8fDVr5qMuuDBRs0k5oRGAJJo9OwwQkiNfaW41DHK_zII8gglkEPkUg==> https://www.smashwords.com/books/byseries/24325 

  <https://imgssl.constantcontact.com/letters/images/1101116784221/S.gif> 

www.theblindhistorylady.com <http://www.theblindhistorylady.com> 

.

The Blind History Lady | 14152 E Linvale Pl 201 | Aurora, CO 80014 US

Unsubscribe <https://visitor.constantcontact.com/do?p=un&m=001Cab_UttHGCg-764tpYXcSQ%3D&ch=05147a50-f8a5-11ef-b047-fa163e8d831b&ca=16022ea6-d2d7-4b75-a3e2-8b70ed2dfb25>  | Update Profile <https://visitor.constantcontact.com/do?p=oo&m=001Cab_UttHGCg-764tpYXcSQ%3D&ch=05147a50-f8a5-11ef-b047-fa163e8d831b&ca=16022ea6-d2d7-4b75-a3e2-8b70ed2dfb25>  | Constant Contact Data Notice <https://www.constantcontact.com/legal/customer-contact-data-notice>  

 <https://www.constantcontact.com/landing1/vr/home?cc=nge&utm_campaign=nge&rmc=VF21_CPE&utm_medium=VF21_CPE&utm_source=viral&nav=16022ea6-d2d7-4b75-a3e2-8b70ed2dfb25> 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://nfbnet.org/pipermail/nfb-of-delaware_nfbnet.org/attachments/20250917/89b62975/attachment-0001.htm>