[Nfb-seniors] Blind Mother's day - Story From the Blind History Lady

[Robert Leslie Newman]

Happy Spring to my Blind History Lady fans;

 

May is a month full of so many things to celebrate. This May I want to
acknowledge Mother's Day. This mother is one I have been researching for
more than six years. She did not leave a big paper trail. What she did leave
is a family who loves her still and are willing to share her story. She was
a blind mother who gave all for her family and gave us a song she wrote and
published to remember her by.

(From the cover of the sheet music)

Springtime

Words and Music by

Helen Dobbins Brown

Published by

Helen Dobbins Brown

Marshfield, MO

Copywrite 1937

Price 25 cents

Tis Springtime, sweet Springtime there's joy ev'ry where;

The birds with their war-blings are teeming the air.

The flowers are blooming, in vale and on hill.

While hearts with dreams of rapture thrill.

O Springtime, tis springtime, with in ev'ry heart;

When love is awakened by Cupid's true dart;

And yielding to kisses and armes that entwine,

Is rapt in ecstasy divine.

When Springtime is faded and summer is gone,

And Autumn has followed, the winter passed on;

Then lonely we linger, and wait but in vain,

For springtime flow'rs and songs again. 

 

This was written by Helen Dobbins-Brown when her youngest was 17 and she was
57. 

 

Helen Elizabeth Dobbins, born in 1880, attended the Iowa College for the
Blind and then  Oberlin College. She married a sighted man who fell in love
with her voice before he even seen her. Sounds like a fairy tale and Helen
may have even agreed that in many ways her life was a fairy tale. But, as
all good fairy tales, there needs to be struggles to overcome before the
happy ending. Helen had struggles in spades.

Helen married Eugene Brown, the man who had to find the woman that the
beautiful voice belonged to. In nine years, the couple had eight children,
Helen being over thirty when her first child was born. For a time, they
homesteaded land in South Dakota, living in a sod house.  A short stay in
Montana and then they moved on. There were no complaints from Helen. 

 

Although the South Dakota prairie had few close neighbors, she kept in touch
with family and friends. Her blind school chums had a circulating braille
letter. One would start the letter in braille, mail it to the next blind
friend on the list who read the letter, wrote one of their own, sent both
letters to the next friend on the list. The round robin would come back to
the original friend, who read all the rest, took his original letter out,
inserted a new one and sent the whole bunch on the way to the next. 

 

Soon the Brown's moved near Marshfield Missouri to farm land where they had
to once again, build a home, barns and wooden walkways to minimize the mud
and farm animal droppings from their shoes. This all took time. Helen cared
for her many children, cooked, washed clothes, cared for the chickens,
gathered eggs, tended a garden, put up produce for the winter, milked and
kept up the house. 

 

A farm wife back then was said not to be employed. REALLY!

Just as their house was almost finished, Eugene passed away in 1926, leaving
Helen with eight children to raise. They continued on as they knew Gene
would have wanted. Not once did she think of giving up her land or sending
any of her children off to live with relatives or become live in help for
neighboring farmers as many families with both sighted parents were forced
to do as the depression grew in the country. Helen had paid off the land and
homestead. They grew their own food and could live modestly and happy. 

 

The depression effected Helen along with her neighbors.  Helen re-invented
her land to support the family. She built cabins along the road boarding
their farm for travelers heading west for a better life. The road now was
called route 66. She built a gas station. Inside the station she sold ice
cream. During the migration west, Helen and the kids made a comfortable
living. 

 

The farm got electricity before the depression, another expense. But it was
necessary to operate the radio and hear the news. When the new talking book
player came to Missouri, Helen was glad to get hers and enjoy the many books
now on record that were not in braille. 

 

The Brown home was filled with music. They had a piano that Helen loved to
play and sing along with. The children enjoyed when Mom played. They often
sang along with her the old favorites, hymns and popular music. She sang in
the choir of her Methodist church. Sadly, although her children did
appreciate music, none of them turned out to be musicians.

All of her children finished high school. Several joined the military in the
mid 1930's before the second world war. At least one son made the military
his career.   Some became nurses, all lived very successful lives, thanks to
their mom. Each child loved Mom and appreciated all that she had done for
them. When it was time to leave the nest, each knew that Mom wanted them to
spread their wings just as the birds in the spring. Helen did not expect any
of her children to sacrifice themselves to stay with their "blind" mom. 

 

After the children left the home, Helen remained on the farm for almost two
decades by herself. She still grew her garden and canned for the winter. One
of her daughters came out once a week on the Greyhound to bring groceries
from town. 

 

As she grew older, her closest daughter asked Helen to come live with her
and her daughter in Springfield. Finally, Helen did move into Springfield
with her daughter. She found an organization of other blind persons where
she attended monthly meetings. Through the meetings she met good friends who
also enjoyed music and would get together to play and sing with each other. 

 

This brief sketch of Helen highlights just the love of family that she had
to her parents, her husband and children. I hope you also get the impression
that Helen's love was an example and lesson that was learned and passed on
generation to generation. Although she has been gone more than fifty years,
her descendants remember her warmly today. 

 

You can read more of my Books at  https://www.smashwords.com