Do Go On - 55 - Helen Keller (and FIRST BIRTHDAY!)

Episode Date: November 9, 2016

Happy Birthday to Do Go On! We celebrate our one year with a special announcement. AND we look at the life of an incredible woman, Helen Keller. There's broken marriages galore! AND announcing our Patreon! Find out how you can support the show and get heaps of rewards including exclusive bonus episodes... Twitter: @DoGoOnPodInstagram: @DoGoOnPodFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/DoGoOnPod/Email us: [e-mail] the show and get rewards like bonus episodes:www.patreon.com/DoGoOnPod  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serengy Amarna 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there. Canada, we are visiting you in September this year.

If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. Oh, and welcome to another episode of DoGo on. My name is Dave Warnocky, and as always I'm joined by two of my best pals in the whole wide world. Matt Stewart and Jess Bop Perkins. Hey!

Jess Bob Perkins. Thank you for trying to make that happen. I'm trying. I'm trying really hard. I love it. I love it. Does anyone start calling that in your real life outside of the pod? Like in the last week?

Yeah. Not really. Not catching on. Not catching on. Your mum did not get the memo. No, but she's probably a bit behind. Your mum's the first example. Yeah, exactly.

She's probably a bit behind on the pod, I reckon. So she might be a couple episodes back. How often do you see your mum? Not often enough. If I offered to pay for it, would you legally change your name to Bop Perkins? No. What have I paid for it? Yeah, but you're not, like...

Just doesn't get anything out of that. Then I get nothing out of it. Oh, I see how it is. If you paid... Not a team player. Okay, Matt, if I changed your name to Bop Perkins. Yeah. Do you pay per...

Like, if it's your surname... Per letter. Oh, okay. So Bob... If you wanted to change your name to Jess Parkins, that would be a lot cheaper. That's only $5 per letter. Yeah, sure. Okay, well, that's interesting.

I didn't know that. Would you like to be Jess Parkins? Nah. Perkins is fine. What about... Mess... Jerkins? Jerkins.

Oh, mess Jerkins is good. Mess Jerkins is pretty good. And I think that suits you. Yeah, I'm a mess. And a jerk. Yeah. Inns. Yeah.

Cool. Maybe you could just be mess jerk. Messy. See, my friend Liny is quite a thin person. So I always call her skinny lini. She would call me messy jessy. Oh, hang on. So mess works.

But you wear a mess. No, I'm not a messy person. So you've cleaned up, but has she remained thin? Yeah, she has. She has. Because it's hard to keep calling her. Skinny Lini if she got quite big. And then it's just like, it's expensive.

Until she gets really fat, then it's ironic. And probably still mean. Still offensive. It's still offensive. Unless you're like a, like a jail guy or like a, like a underworld figure. Like tiny is always a big dude. Junior is always massive. Yeah.

I'm called big dog. You'd be big Dave, obviously. Yeah, even though. You're a little man. Yes. See how comedy works, people? Do you understand? Sometimes we show you.

But guys, I don't know if you're aware of this, Jess and Matt, but today is actually our. our first birthday episode. You weren't sure what you're about to say there. I was going to say anniversary, birthday. They're both good. I mean, they're both appropriate, aren't they? It is our first anniversary birthday.

It is one year this week since we released our first three episodes onto iTunes. And today we're going to listen to our favorite bits. I wish we were doing your best. Today we're going to play all episodes back to back. I do go on clip show. We'll do a commentary on them. So it's us talking over us talking? Yes.

So that would be great. That was a great joke by Matt. I laughed out of at the time and now once again. It's just slightly less funny as time goes by. Because I've heard it before. I remember editing this podcast. I was up all night. This one took me plenty of hours.

This one crashed halfway through it to start again. That did happen one time. I don't remember which episode it was, but I cried. I wanted to cry. I had a horrible time with Burke and Wales. I was about to say, let's all share our worst moments. I worked full time on that for a week, trying to turn it into like a cohesive episode.

I had to get a voice actor in to play Dave. Yeah. Because I was unavailable. I will not re-record my own voice. I find it, well, it's patronising. No, I was getting the hang of the editing as well, but it was just, yeah, I told the story out of sync. So I had to, like, chop it up and put it back. Yeah, that's hard.

Which I haven't had to do since. Now my editing is like pretty minimal. And Birkenwills was, that was one of the first three we released. Yeah. Oh, that was my first episode, wasn't it? Yeah, it was, yeah. I thought my first one was AFL. No, I don't know.

I think it was Birken Wills first. There you go. Oh, now I don't remember. No, I'm sure it was. Is it AFL first? Oh, look. God, we don't even know. Talk about bloody inside baseball.

I mean, it is our birthday, though. If we can't celebrate on our birthday, I mean, when can we celebrate? You can't celebrate by vaguely remembering the past on our birthday. When can we? Do you have a favourite joke? Oh, fuck. I couldn't tell you a single joke. Yeah, because it's all very serious.

I was so wrong, man. I've just looked at it up. I've gone to the archives of which there is a growing number of episodes. That, as it happens, yes. Australian rules football was your first episode. Yeah, no, you're right, sorry. Pardon me. Pardon?

Pardon? B'on. That was definitely my favourite. Bobo. Oh, no. Oh yeah, Bob-B-B-B-B. And then closely followed by Dave's character of a rat catcher. The rat catcher.

We are actually doing a clip show. That was H.H. Holmes, I think. No. Yeah. Yeah, the rat catcher. They know the rules. And I lost it. Thank you.

You're very funny. You're both very funny. I've had a lot of fun doing the show, guys. It's been one year. We are going to get on with an episode this week. But last week I teased, we have an announcement. We have an announcement. We're not quitting while we're on top.

We're having a baby. No, we're not. We're going until we've lost every listener. That's the pled. No, we've pledged to go through the hat. Yeah. Which they're there and now legitimately hundreds of suggestions. Yeah, we're going to be going for a long time.

But because it's our first birthday, we've been thinking about this for a while. We have decided to launch a Patreon account. A Patreon account. If you're not familiar, Patreon, it's pretty much, it's just a crowdfunding platform. where if you enjoy something like a podcast or YouTube videos or it's mostly online content creators, you can pledge a certain amount of money per month to contribute to the show and in return you get different rewards. The more you pledge, the more you get back. So we'd like to say that it is still going to be a completely free show.

Yeah. It's just that if you would like to... We're not selling out, man. We're not selling out. We've never had an ad on the show before. So, you know, we've gone a year. And we haven't missed a week either, which I think is actually... amazing.

Look, I'm up for sale. And also, if anyone wants to, I'll personally, um, sponsor me, I will say your brand. You'll do shit.

I'll, I'll, I'll shave it into my head. Yeah. I'll tattoo it on my nut sack. I don't know. That's a very niche marketing strategy, admittedly,

but. How much? How much? How much would it cost to get your nut sack tattooed? I mean, just to do it. Jesus Christ. It would,

that would have to be, that would have to be a fair sum. That would be enough to set you up for life, right? I reckon that set me up for life amount. Because it would be very painful. Like those needles go into the skin. We did an episode about tattoos. You have a tattoo.

You know how painful it is. It's not even on your nuts. I was about to say you already have your nuts already tattooed, so you'll have to painfully have it removed to have Bunnings Warehouse tattered over the top of it. Bunnings might be out of afford a life change. It'd have to be a big thing. But before I go on with this Patreon announcement,

I would just like to congratulate. announcement. So one, first birthday, I actually have an announcement, and that is an award will be given out. The MVP, the most valuable player of the podcast, is in fact, you match, you have not missed an episode. Jess has missed one, I missed two, but you... To be fair, we were traveling and you have no life, but... But still, the most valuable player, most valuable podcaster is what MVP is. Yeah, you're our MVP.

Good on you, Matt. Little buddy. If it was me, if I obviously didn't get a vote in that, but... if I did. I would have given it to Jess's laugh. Well, not me, but the laugh.

The laugh. Well, if we do another year, Jess, maybe, your laugh can go in. Maybe. But back to this Patreon account. So we're going to be launching it this week.

We'll be tweeting out links and all that kind of stuff. But some of you might already be involved in Patreon, but if not, yeah, what you do is you just... It was actually suggested by a listener, like everything on this show. As a topic.

It's not as a topic. No, no. Dan from Lonsesson. was the one who gave us the idea. I'll put the idea in our heads that people might actually pay us to do the show. Well, no, yeah, he said that he'd love to, um, he said put together a Patreon so I can put some money towards it. Which is really lovely.

That is so nice. So thank you very much, Dan. And we'll pay for things like keeping the show going, the time we put into the stuff. We can start doing some advertising, not to you guys specifically, but for other people that don't know the show so that we can get more people involved. Pay for uploads, keeping equipment going, the studio where we go. It all will help. It may not sound like we put much work in.

And in the case of Matt and I, you're probably right. Look, I spend, it doesn't seem like a lot, but it still is like half a day or something. Not that I'm winging about it. No, no, but it's still half a day to do it. But when I realize I've got to do it on coming up, that day sucks. Yeah. It's fun. I find it very interesting to learn.

Yeah. But that pressure to do something that's going to be good enough for Dave Warnocky. And then you've got to edit and get it up on time. That's fun too. You're not doing it for the fans. You're not doing it for the listeners. You're doing it for me. Thanks, Matt.

Appreciate it. That's why you're the most valuable podcast to me. To be honest, I don't want to get a Nazi offside. No, you're right. You're not wrong. Long story, short. You couldn't help himself. Just to give you an insight as well.

So this is how a recording session would normally go down. So the episode's only to take, you know, maybe an hour and a half, let's say. We'd be here for three hours. By the time we get here, we talk to some other people who happen to also be at the studios, or we just talk to each other. and then one of us says, okay guys, we really need to record. And about 15 minutes after that, we might set up and actually start to record. Then we record.

Then we procrastinate some more. I usually drive Matt home. It takes a long time. Before tonight's episode, we, Jess and I sang a duet. We did. I'll put that in. No, no. We sang a rendition of Under the Boardwalk.

We shared a meal together tonight. We've got stuff going on. We definitely do. But so we're going to get into the episode real quick. Yeah, let's do that. But I'm just going to read out the... So we've got different levels that we've named after different references from the show. And the more you pledge, the more you get back from us, extra content and that kind of stuff.

Can we have one of the... Because David put a lot of this together. I'd love... Can you slot something in where someone can donate a six pack of beer? You know, someone was... Well, that can be our... You can set goals. That can be our first goal is to get $20 to buy a six pack of beer.

That's going to be our first goal. Because occasionally people like it when we drink beer. So maybe if they can fund our alcoholism. Is that what you're wanting from our listeners? Don't test them because Matt, they will, because people will love it when you drink. They'll fund a slab for you. Like when they tweet in saying, the next drinking episode, can you do this? Oh, God.

Matt, they're going to try to kill you. The way I take it is you're boring when you're sober. Yeah. Is that how you would read that? Yeah. It's more fun when you're drunk. When you've got personality. I agree with them, though.

All right, so that's going to be our first call, $20 to buy a six-pack for us to share, for Matt to drink the majority of. But I'm going to read out really quickly the rewards and what you get. But we must insist that you only ever pledge what you can reasonably afford to give. And if you can't afford anything, the best thing to do, if you love the show, I want to help it grow and support it, it's just to tell someone about it. Yeah, just talk about it.

Tweet about that kind of stuff. So if you feel like you've got no money, that's fine. Just tell someone about it or just keep listening because we love it. But if you would like to pledge $1 or more a month, You get, that's called the Keen for Pledge. No, it's called the hashtag Keen for Pledge. Thank you. You don't get a physical reward, but a big thank you for supporting us

and making sure none of us have to become accountants, especially Jeff. Thank you. Thank you so much. I won't do it. The $2 or more per month pledge, that's the Ruknamer, Rooknama. In exchange with that every three weeks, you can vote via Patreon, the thing that you're pledging money through. On what topic from the hat you would like Matt to do,

next report on. So from now on Matt is going to be a voice of the Patreon people. I like that because, I mean, even picking it out of the hat, there's pressure on that. I'd love to, I'd love to, I'm so indecisive, I'd love to push away as much of the responsibility as possible. You love, I know, you find that, it's overwhelming when you open up the hat and you're like, wow, look how many, hundreds of things. If that had a same, it'd be bloody bursting.

Probably does, to be honest. If you pledged $5 or more per month, you are the, the association. associate, in quotation marks, producer. Oh, hashtag ass prod. You're an ass prod. You're the associate ass prod. We'll give you a shout out at the end of an episode. So upcoming, we'll read out four or five names a week.

And a big thank you to anyone who would pledge it, so you get to hear your name. We'll also let you know about our upcoming episode topics a week in advance, if you're keen on that kind of thing. And you can also vote on what you would like Matt to do on his topic, his next report on. And we're going to do a Christmas thing. If you pledge anyone pledges $5 or more before December 15th, we will send you a personal do-go-on Christmas card. Wherever you are on the world, we'll write your little message. How about that? Put that on the fridge.

I'm so excited about that one. Show Grandma that on Christmas Day. Hey, Grandma, do you know these people? Nah. Here's an internet radio show. What's the internet? Grandma. $10 or more per month.

This is the Dreamboat Cooper Award. Once a month, you'll get an exclusive mini episode. We're going to record an extra episode on a topic, a mini one, that will send out to just the Patreon people that pledge $10 or more. I will also give you a free ticket to a live show if you ever do one near where you are. Wherever you are, if we're doing one. We're going to get around to them. We're going to do it.

You also know about the upcoming episode topics and get to vote on Matt's hat. And we'll send you the Christmas card if you get in before December 15. Then we have the $20 or more per month, which is crazy. But if you're up for it, it's the city. Sydney Shineberg deluxe package. Sydney! Hey, I'm Sydney! And I want you to sign up to this podcast because, hey, what else is going on in your life?

Right? You get all of the things that we've mentioned as well, as well as that. We'll pretty much do an episode on whatever topic you suggest. Your suggestion will go into a special exclusive golden hat, and we'll have to do a topic on that. The only stipulation is that it's got to have enough information on it. You can't just be like, do a topic on my dad's barbecue skills. Hey, I can talk for days about my mother, because girls. And lack thereof.

Oh. Yeah, he's hopeless. Burns everything. That was a sweet burn. Oh, Dad! Take that, John. And finally, we come to the final pledge, which we've limited to only three people, even though there'll be hundreds of you wanting to pledge $100 or more per month.

It's called The Doctor of Podcast. What I could have been if I'd continue to do a PhD in podcasting. Pretty much, you get everything we've mentioned before, We'll also do a mini episode about you and send it to you. And the way we'll do that is I'll email you. We'll do it about you and we'll send it to Gary Newman. He'll be confused. Who gives a fuck, right?

We've got your money. We've got money. Let's fucking party. Fuck it, Gary. We'll send it to a Gary of your choosing. Glitter, Abbott. We're not sending Gary Glitter. Gary Abbott?

Gary Abbott? I'm sure there's a Gary Abbott. It's got to be. Gary Abbott's a great name, actually. Gary Abbott. I like that a lot. Just to finally finish that off. So we'll do a podcast about you, send it to you,

and the way I'll send you a questionnaire, and then the rest of it, I'll make up the facts about your life, and then Justin Mac can play along like it's a real thing. So get in before December 15. If you want to get the bonus Christmas card, you can pledge any time, and, you know, pledge as much as you like. We'd appreciate that.

And I will say that we're not going to be banging on about, like, reading out the pledges every single week. So don't feel like you're going to... It's not going to be one of this podcasts where the first 20 minutes is us begging for your money. No. Hey, not that there's anything wrong with that if that's what you do on your podcast. Or if that's what you love about podcasts. Yeah, if that's the bit you listen to them, skip the rest. Turn off the...

I don't know why they're banging on about this report shit. Bored. Snore. I quite like the... I listen to a few podcasts and I like the pre-rambles that every... everyone whinges about. Not always, look,

to be honest. But sometimes, it's nice to just get to know what people are doing in the little times. It's like, it's not, I'm really tall.

In the little times. Oh my goodness. We did have, we did have a nice family dinner before. Are you a bit full now? You got, you got the full tummy sleepies. Yeah,

I'm a bit sleepy. That's okay. That's okay, that's okay, little buddy. I'll get you. We'll perk you up. I'll perk up

because you're doing a topic today. Perk up for Perkins. Perkins. All right. So thanks you, thanks for listening to that. Second favorite episodes are the ones that Jess does. To basically anything that you don't do.

Yeah. Yeah, fair enough. You know, mine are my second favorite too. Who's getting burnt here? Me. Yours are clearly everyone's favorite. Thank you, good. I do what I can.

Oh, no, I just wasn't figured out a question. Oh, make it up. Oh, hang on. No, we'll be right. I'll go. Another shit house report from Jess Perkins. Here we go. Just Bob Perkins.

Thank you very much. Just throwing it to. together at the last minute like it's bloody amateur air over here. I'm doing my best. All right. All right. Let's podcast time. Let's do...

Let's podcast. Go on. Jess. I know you just said you don't have a question, but please try and work on. Now the ones that are popping into my head are very funny. Oh, that sounds awful. Who is the most famous person named Helen in history? Helen Merrin.

Oh, fuck. Good one, but no. Helen Bonham Carter. Happy birthday, Helen. Oh, that's, no. Helen. Helen of Troy. Helen of Troy.

No. So we'll go for fifth most famous Helen. I would say Helen de generous. No, that's Ellen. I said it twice as well. I thought it, yeah, right. No, it's definitely not right. On her show, Helen.

Silent age. Also invisible age. The logo features zero ages. Oh, there's going to be lots of heron. Helens? Well, how many more of the other? Jess, can you think of any other Helens that aren't the one of your... My auntie, Helen O'Connor.

My other auntie, Helen Stewart. Oh, hang on, what's that... Oh, I think I know. Yep. Helen Keller? Bang! Helen Keller! Thank you very much.

Matt. Matt thinks that he always gets these. I always get these. Is that what you were about to say? Yeah, Helen Keller. Amanda Keller's mic. Can't fold that. Fuck you.

Helen Keller. Do you know who that is, Matt? Yeah, but this is not going to be a fun one, is it? Why not? Oh, cool. Yeah, let's have, I'm having fun. Why isn't it going to be fun? Because you're doing it and you're fucking useless. I want to refit, Jess, in the edit, can you put that on repeat?

So Matt can hear it back? You cold bastards. But, like, do you, what do you remember of Helen Keller to assume that this is a really tragic story? Well, because she used to, she hosts this weird show on Friday on Channel 7, and it's just It's awful. Like, they do home improvements. All right.

It's Friday nights on Channel 10, mate. All right. Oh, it's from your stable of shows. Asprod. Ashtag ass prod. All right. Helen Keller. Helen Keller.

This was from the hat. So this is suggested by John Titus at the John R.T on Twitter. So thanks, John. John Titus, getting $20 worth of value right there for nothing. Got to say that. Because we picked his eyes. idea here. Oh yeah.

Just going to put that at. Just saying, just saying. John Titus's handle. Do you have that? Yeah, I just said it. At the John RT. John Titus sounds like a condition that I'd want to get. Oh, I got a bit of John Titus.

Do you know. Yeah. I thought at first instinct was, oh, you don't want that. But then I'm like, no. You think about it. John Titus sounds fun. If someone's got it, I'm going to get real close. I can't think of any, I can't think of any diseases that I'm like, I want that.

Yeah, well, apart from chicken pox, until now. As we discussed. It's good to get. You saw the feedback we got. Someone message in saying that there's a, there is now a thingo that stops you getting it.

A thinger. Vaccine. Oh yeah, there's the vaccine. There's a vaccine, but if you do get it, then you're susceptible to shingles. Susceptible? That's a word.

Yeah. Good? I'm. You're tired. I'm right on the edge of a cliff. I feel like I'm falling off it. You're falling into my abyss? I'm free-fallen.

Oh, man. Not the abyss. Mate, I could not fit in your abyss, no matter how hard I tried. I want to talk about Helen Keller. Remember, we could get a little mash pee in there and that's it. I would also like to talk about Helen Keller. Helen Keller, do go on. Thank you.

So, Helen Adams Keller was born on June 27, 1880 in Alabama. Her family lived on a home. homestead called Ivy Green that Helen's grandfather had built decades earlier. She had two younger siblings, Mildred Campbell and Philip Brooke Keller, and she had two older half-brothers from her father's prior marriage. The names were James and William. Her father, Arthur H. Keller, spent many years as an editor for the North Alabamaian and had served...

Good title. Great title. He served as a captain for the Confederate Army. Her mother, Kate, was the daughter of... Charles W. Adams, who was a Confederate General. Now, originally, originally from Massachusetts, Charles Adams also fought for the Confederate Army

during the American Civil War, earning the rank of Colonel. The only reason I added this is because he was also an acting Brigadier General. Brigadier. Brigadier. General. Brigadier.

I love that. A lot. As soon as I saw her, I was like, that's got to go in. A couple of weeks ago, or maybe last week you asked what my favourite word was and I totally blanked on Brigadier. Brigadier.

That's probably number one. It's got to be. It's got to be. Brigadier. So Helen's paternal lineage traced to Casper Keller, who was a native of Switzerland. Again, the only reason I referenced this is that one of Helen's Swiss ancestors

was the first teacher for the deaf in Zurich. So that's kind of cool. Oh, really? Yeah, isn't that interesting? It has nothing to do with her. It's just kind of weird. coincidence. Now what I didn't know is so was that Helen Keller was born with the ability to see in here but at 19 months old she contracted an illness described by doctors as an acute congestion

of the stomach and brain. They're still not 100% sure exactly what it was but they some say it was scarlet fever or meningitis and this illness left her both deaf and blind. At that time she was able to communicate somewhat with Martha Washington who was a six-year-old daughter of the family cook who understood her signs. They kind of made up their own little signs together. And so by the age of seven, she had about 60 home signs to communicate with her family. But at this time, Helen's mother had heard about the successful education of another deaf and blind woman, whose name was Laura Bridgman.

And she sent Helen with her dad off to seek out a physician called J. Julian Chisholm, who was an eye, ear, nose and throat specialist in Baltimore. Are you reacting to that name? It's a great name. Jay Julian Chisholm. Yeah. I like it a lot. Jay Julian.

I was more into the fact that Jay Julian's into ear, nose and throat. Oh, ear, nose and throat. Oh. The quadruple. The big four. The big four. The big four. The big four.

The big four of thrash metal. The eyes, the ears. The nose and the throat. Now, Laura Bridgman, she was known because she was the first deaf-blind American child to gain a significant education in the English. language. And she, for like years, she was almost a bit of a celebrity. Like, she had this celebrity status because Charles Dickens met her during his 1842 American tour and wrote about her accomplishments in his American notes. And this is where Helen Keller's

mother had heard about Laura and was like, well, we've got to seek out like a similar sort of education for Helen, which is kind of cool. So the doctor, Jay Julian Chisholm, referred the Kellers to Alexander Graham Bell who was working with deaf children at the time famous obviously for inventing the telephone the bell

Give us a bell Is that where they're from? Yeah, that's where they come from And also Because wasn't Alexander Graham Bell's mother famously deaf? I think she was, yeah, I think I'd heard that so maybe that's why he was

working with deaf children I had an interest in working with that So this other girl has met Charles Dickens and Ellen. Who's met Alexander Graham Bell? Helen Keller. Helen Keller, sorry, it wasn't the other girl. No, the other girl met Charles Dickens. Pretty cool.

Both very famous people. Both very famous influential people. So they go Alexander Graham Bell. Now he tells them to contact, this is so good. The devil. No. I'm going to put my hand on your shoulder because this is so exciting for me. Bell advised them to contact the Perkins Institute for the blind.

Now we know why she chose the topic in the first place. That is not why it was a total bonus. I was like, yes, Perkins. Nice one. That was a school where Laura Bridgman had been educated. It was located in South Boston. Now, I found a little thing about the school. So the school was named in honour of Thomas Handiside Perkins,

one of the organisations Incorporators, and a wealthy Boston shipping merchant who began losing his site at the time of the establishment of the school. Jess, you're trying to protect one of your relatives' identity with that weird fake name? It's a weird name. Handicide. Handic. Can you look at that, Dave? Handicide?

Like, it's H-A-N-D-A-S-Y-D. Hand-A-S-Y-D. Hand-A-Sid Perkins. Hand-A-Sid-N-Syne-Shanberg. I just call him Tom Perkins, which is my cousin's name, actually. But he's not from Boston. But no relation. No relation.

To you. We think. Well, we could claim. Anyway, so another reason that it was named, I think it used to be called something different, but the reason they changed it to Perkins was in 1833, the school was just in the house of the father of one of its founders. It was just a small little school,

but it was starting to grow, and it was outgrowing that space. So Perkins donated his Pearl Street mansion as the school's second home, and in 1839 he sold the mansion and donated all the proceeds to the school. Does that hurt that he donated instead of giving it? giving it to your family? A little bit. A little bit. You could have had that mansion.

I could have had that mansion. But this gift allowed the purchase of a more spacious building in South Boston for the school. Like a mansion. So really, you've given up a mansion so some kids can have a school. Yeah. You're a great person. Thank you so much, David. I feel like people don't acknowledge that enough.

Yeah, Matt, come on. Matt. Come on. Have the Stewart's ever given a school to these people? Yes. Yes. Yes. There's a school for the blind.

Yes. There are multiple. I don't think there is. And we did it for the right reasons. Not like the purpose. What wrong reason is there to do that? What wrong reason? Definitely embezzling, I reckon. Everyone in the book.

What? Think about those. Yeah. Every last one. I've thought about it. What are you talking about? How about all of the wrong reasons? What are you talking about?

Name me a wrong reason. Yeah, exactly. You couldn't. Oh my God. Matt, I actually have changed my opinion now, Matt said that. You are a bad person. What? I argued a good case.

Well, happy one year, everybody. Yeah. You've ruined another birth. birthday party. You do this every time. You do this every time. You always fight and fight and friends. I reckon you should be a lawyer.

You're amazing. I am a lawyer. Of course you are. I can't believe everything you say. Yeah. You do believe everything I say. This Jedi stuff is really working. Yeah, it's really creepy.

I might just continue on with a podcast. I reckon, but at the back of my mind, I'll be thinking about how I do believe everything you said. But I just want his approval. Me too. I approve. Oh, happy. Oh, my God.

Of David. work. No, it's my report. Still feeling good over here, by the way. No, fair enough. Anyway, back to Helen. And Jess. I've written.

So, back to Helen. She has actually written so back to her. She knew that Matt would somehow derail the show. I took a leaf out of Matt Stewart's book and I wrote down the lines. I want to say. Word for word. I'm reading out every word. I'm writing.

Oh, no. He's lost his papers. Oh, no. The cat's just called over the keyboard. Okay, back to Helen. So Michael Anganos, Anagos, Anagnos. I'll never say his name again. I'll say Anagnos.

He was a school's director. He asked 20-year-old former student, Anne Sullivan, who was herself visually impaired, to become Helen Keller's instructor. This was at the beginning of a 49-year-long friendship, during which Sullivan evolved into Keller's governess and eventually just her companion. What's her name again? And Sullivan. She's Louise. She became a different form. People, like, that doesn't normally happen in the one lifetime.

Can you get further away, please? You are sitting so far away. You're at the door. He's sitting at the door. You okay over there? Yeah, I don't know why I've done that. I don't know why you have either. I'm going to come back in.

Okay. I'm going to keep talking while you do it. Anne Sullivan's a very key player in this whole story. Huge player. Hey, guys. Good to see you. Okay, thanks for joining us. and now Anne Sullivan arrived at the Keller's house in March of 87, 1887 that is,

and immediately began to teach Helen to communicate by spelling words into her hand, beginning with D-O-L for the doll that she'd brought Helen as a present. Okay, so Helen Keller has always sort of blown my mind, how is she learning what letters are if she went blind at such a young age? Just find it so, it's amazing. It is incredible. How could she know it? How would you associate that pattern, D-O-L, with the...

Just a lot of time and association. And it was really hard. Matt, were you going to say that? I guess it's just like it's a different language, right? So whatever that is to her, that means doll. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm sure it wouldn't be... She's not picturing the letters necessarily, like you would.

Maybe it's just a certain feeling. Yeah, I just find it so incredible. Oh, it's amazing. I know what I'm talking about, because I do. I'm an expert in this field and all others. But I think anybody signing even, sign language or lip reading and stuff is going to be different in their head to how we hear and say words. But at the end of the day, they're still able to communicate and understand. Is purple that I see the purple that you see?

Probably not. Probably not. You've got terrible vision. You've got terrible vision. He just put his glasses on and then took them off just for a dramatic effect. I rest my case. All right. you're not a lawyer.

So she... Objection. I ruled. So Helen was really frustrated at first because she didn't understand, obviously, because she doesn't understand this new method and she doesn't understand that every word, like every object has a word that uniquely identifies it.

So it was a real struggle for a while. At first she was kind of curious and then she was defiant and she refused to cooperate. But when she did cooperate, Anne Sullivan could tell that she wasn't really making the connection between the objects and the letters. She was just kind of like, yeah, whatever. She was cooperating in the sense of like not fighting it.

She didn't really care. Right, but she didn't look like she was learning. But she didn't understand fully. So she would get really frustrated. Helen would get frustrated and she would throw tantrums because she couldn't communicate and that would be incredibly frustrating. So finally, Sullivan demanded that she and the Helen, she and Helen be isolated from the rest of the family for a little time

so that Helen could concentrate. only on Sullivan's instructions, and they moved into a little cottage on the property, on the family's property. There was this really big dramatic struggle where Anne Sullivan was trying to teach Helen the word for water, and she helped her to make the connection between the object and the letter by taking Helen out to the water pump and placing Helen's hand under the spout. So as she's got her hand under the water, she's spelling out water in her other hand. And then eventually she finally, like it clicked.

She understood and she repeated the word. Like she wrote the word back on Anne's hand. So she understood and she wrote it back. And then she started, she like fell onto the ground and was like banging on the ground wanting to know what it was called. And so then she's spelling out letters. She's spelling out words for like ground to her as well. So you have to learn a series of patterns for everything. Yeah.

Rather than knowing that, because you wouldn't know what sounds are so you can't be like, G.R. Oh, that's a guru sound. Yeah. You'd just have to know that wall. Okay, that's W-A-L-L. Yeah. Wow, you'd have to learn so many patterns.

Yeah, I know. But it's ridiculous. But this is just a beginning. This is just how she started to be able to communicate. Amazing. Yeah. And so that night, so after they had this big breakthrough with water and then ground, Helen was like dragging Anne around the whole room and asking for every object.

She's like, what's this? What's this? And then just in that first night, she'd learned 30. words. So she's going from zero to 30. Zero to 30. She doesn't muck around. I love it.

Yeah. She must be like sort of abnormally smart. Like normal people couldn't do that, right? You would think so. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, you're right. I would not be able to learn 30.

How old is she? She was six. It's pretty amazing. Yeah. In 1890, so she's 10 years old. She began speech. classes at the Horace Mann School for the Deaf in Boston. So she would sort of work for like 25 years she would learn to speak so that others could understand her. She worked on

improving her communication skills. She was really determined to communicate with others as conventionally as possible. Over the course of her life she learned to speak and she spent much of her time giving speeches and lectures. Right so she 100% blind and 100% death? I believe so, yeah. You couldn't hear yourself back. But like they, a lot of deaf people, all now, all deaf people speak now pretty much. Yeah, but if you can't see all here, it makes it way more harder. It makes it much harder.

But when you say like, I find it so amazing. It's incredible. It's so fascinating. Yeah. But it's different. It's so interesting as well how, how the attitude has changed. Like one of my mum's sisters is deaf. And at the time, the, it's.

option, there was only like a couple of schools she could go to in Victoria and one would teach to sign but not speak and the other would teach to speak and not sign. So my grandparents sort of had to make the choice and sent her to the school where she learnt to speak and then as an adult she learnt sign language herself but was frustrated that she didn't know that already. So what does she mainly communicate with now? She speaks. She's had a cochlear ear implant as well so her speech has improved enormously. The other day I was at my grandparents' hand. The other day I was at my grandparents' house and the doorbell rang so I went to get it and my auntie went to get it as well and I said you heard that and she went yeah I can hear and I was like okay well I'm not wrong for

being surprised you were born profoundly deaf like I'm not it's not crazy that I was surprised by you um you started an argument with it yeah we had an argument about it that's an interesting decision yeah we didn't I feel like you probably came up well from that when she was a kid I won and she would like she would be fighting with her siblings and they would sort of with her, she would just close her eyes. Like, can't hear you. Your argument's invalid. I think that's genius.

That's very good. Very clever. Anyway, so yes, she can, Helen's learning to speak. She also learned to hear people's speech by reading their lips with her hands. So her sense of touch became really, really good. What? Yeah. How does that happen?

Again, she's not hearing it or it's not the same in her head the same way it is for you, but she's understanding them. You'd have to do another series of, all right, when they say the word water, they mean this. Yeah. Oh, yeah, that is tricky. Water, water, water, water.

Water. Yes, Jess is touching your lips. And saying water. No, but I'm saying an American accent because she's American. Water. No, she's South American, though. Southern American. She probably wouldn't.

She probably wouldn't have an accent then. She wouldn't have an accent She never heard anyone else Speaking Yeah, good point That's a great point Yeah Who knows

Yeah She also became proficient at using braille And reading sign language With her hands as well Okay, I reckon she's a genius Yeah She's got to be incredibly smart But she also worked really hard

Like she wanted to learn It was amazing Um So when she She became determined To attend college she was like I want to I want to...

But she had gone to school Yeah she's gone through school Yeah And she um She wanted to go to college And in Well that's what I was about Talk about her school

So in 1896 She attended the Cambridge school For Young Ladies Which was like a prep school For women Um And as her story started to become Known to the general public

Um She began to meet Famous and influential people One of them was the writer Mark Twain Who was very impressed by her And they became friends.

Very good. Yeah, that's kind of cool. Huckaberry Finn. Tom Sawyer. He introduced her to his friend, Henry H. Rogers. I reckon anybody with like a middle initial is cool. See, do you reckon I would get like a lot more respect if I was David J. Warnacky? That's pretty cool.

Matthew J. Stewart. Matthew J. Stewart's better than David J. Warnock. Maddie J. Stewart. No, Matthew. Maddie J. Stewart. No. I hate it. You sound like a 90s TV.

I hate it. Maddie J. Maddie J is pretty cool Maddie J Simpson That's good Jessica A. Perkins It's yuck Jess A Perkins

Jess A Perkins No no good If you were Jess H Perkins That is I reckon H Perkins that is the best one Yeah I reckon you're right William H Macy Very good

David H Warnackie L Samuel L Jackson L is good S sounds good too Matt S No not for you David S Warnakey

Oh yeah that's not bad That's not bad Unfortunately none of these are our names Jess S Perkins Sounds like the SS, like a ship. I was thinking more like David's bullies. No. Anyway, so Mark Twain introduced Helen Keller to his friend Henry H. Rogers,

who was an standard oil executive, and he was so impressed with her. No, like the standard oil. Not like, just do you have standard oil. Just a standard oil. The company is called standard oil. Was he an associate executive? He was not an associate of executive. He was a full executive.

Full, full. He wasn't an ass prod like yourself. Or an ass ex. He wasn't an ass ex. He was so impressed with Helen, with her talent and her drive and determination that he agreed to pay for her to attend Radcliffe College. So there she went to college. It was rad. She was accompanied by Anne Sullivan.

Are you laughing because I did this? I'm laughing at all. You're losing your mind. Anne Sullivan went with her to college basically and sat by her side to interpret her lectures and her book. and stuff like that. And standard oil man's paying. Yes. Yeah, he's paying for her education, which is really cool.

So by this time, she had mastered several methods of communication, most of which I mentioned before. So like touch, lip reading, braille, speech, typing, and finger spelling. I don't know what that is, but it sounds great. Yeah, you don't know. He's doing West Side. He's doing the West Side. What's the other one?

What's that supposed to be? Is that a V? What are you doing? What's going on here? Those are just two Ws. Matt's doing two M. M for Matt? Matt.

Matt's side. Bess side. Ugh. Um, uh, okay. Um, all right, here we go. We're doing some finger spelling.

He's pretty much doing... Me. You wrote me. He's doing like this gang symbols that we'll get him. Went killed. M's not a... That's not a gang symbol. M?

You're going to get yourself. side. That's a, that's a, that's, that's a W for Westside. Yeah. And you're just doing that upside down. You just do that upside down. We're not idiots. Does that make, you know, an upside W is an M?

Hey, an upside down smile. What about this one? What about that? That's an I. It is an I. I'm doing with my middle finger. It's a capital I or a lowercase L. What are you spelling there?

I'll. Ill. Ill. Ill. You the illest. I'm the illest. I'm feeling rather ill from your bullshit. Kind of got him on that one.

No, I didn't really. Anyway, so she's a very good communicator. And with the help of Anne Sullivan and Anne Sullivan's future husband, John Macy. How do they know each other? I'll talk a bit about him in just a Mo. John H. Macy. John Macy, but we'll call him John H. Macy.

Thank you. So with their help, she wrote her first book, which is the story of my life. Helen Keller. Helen Keller wrote a first book. It covered her transformation from childhood to a 21-year-old college student. And she graduated from Redcliffe in 1904 at the age of 24. She was the first deaf-blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.

Fuck. How cool is that? How cool is that? It's very cool. You have a Bachelor of Arts degree, Matt. I do, yeah. And it is very cool. So do I. So do you.

We all have one. Oh, no. And we're begging for your money. And she's just being amazing. We can't do basic things. So in 1905, Anne Sullivan married to John Macy. He was an instructor at Harvard University. He was a social critic and a prominent socialist.

And after their marriage, Sullivan continued to be Helen's guide and mentor. And Helen actually went to live with them as well. And they both initially gave Helen their undivided attention. They were both super supportive. Oh, I don't like the word initially there. Because gradually, however, Anne and John became distant to each other. Anne and John, they're your parents. Oh my God, they are my parents' names.

I didn't even realize that. Those are my parents' names. That's what I just said. I didn't even realize. Really? It's weird that Matt would. Yeah. That's weird.

My parents are Ann and John, but... They're from the Perkins. They're from the Perkins Institute of the Blind. Yep. And they've never mentioned this. So Anna John are splitting up. Is it because of Helen? You kind of.

No, it's not. Helen's fault. Is that what they told you? That's what they told you, isn't it? Is Helen and this Jess? Is this whole story about you? Yeah. You've got a bachelor.

I do have a bachelor. Your parents are Anne and John. It's all stacking up. My name is at Helen and I have 2020 vision. And I'm not deaf. 2020 vision. Yeah, that's pretty good. 2020 vision.

Anyway, so Anne remains really devoted to Helen and continues helping her. after several years, John and Anne separated. But they never divorced, but they did separate. Not my John and Ann, though. They're still going strong. Oh, I've got some many bad news. 30-something years. I don't remember.

That's a long time they've been together. Yeah, and they wanted me to pass on a message. What's that? Helen Kellan broke them on. Helen Keller. Helen Keller. She's back, and she has come between them. She's ruined another marriage.

She back. Yeah. Oh, she's really clever, but she's really good at ruining marriages. Yeah. She's vindict. She's a homewrecker. She just spells out, he cheated. But he didn't.

She just lied. She's a bad person. Wow, I did not come across any of this in my research. Because Matt and I have both cross-checked our sources. Wow. That's, wow. No, I'm sorry. I mean, as I say, I didn't put it enough into this podcast.

So I wasn't aware. So that's really interesting. Wow. That'll change the tone of the rest of the report, I think, yeah. What, that she broke up your parents' marriage Yeah. Which is not cool. If you're going to let that come between us and the podcast, then fine.

Yeah, I am. Be a little baby. But if you want to be a professional, you want to be a professional podcaster, I think you need to get back up on the potty horse. I thought you've got to be a journalist. You've got to be, like, separate yourself from what you're reporting on. And I believe you did study journalism.

You've become too involved, Perkins. You're off the case. Always. When you're right, right. Thank you. And I'm sorry. And I'd like to continue as a professional if that's okay.

That's right. Well, that's difficult, but you can definitely continue. You just said be a professional. Fuck you. You're just being impossible, mate. So, after college, Helen set out to learn more about the world and how she could help improve the lives of others. News of her story started to spread,

and she became a well-known celebrity and lecturer by sharing her experiences with audiences and working... I've broken up 17 marriages this month. You can too, which is my three easy steps. What are the steps? Lie, cheat and steal.

Boom. Everybody. Lie, cheat, still. Lie, cheat, still. You get a broken marriage. You get a broken marriage. Everybody gets a broken marriage. I love you, Helen Keller.

They throw their underwear out of. She can't see them. She's like, oh, God, this feels wet. Yeah, I can feel this. This is wrong. Anyway, she's actually doing some really good work. She's thrown wet underwear in appreciation. Oh, they appreciate all right.

What are you guys doing? No, she's not breaking up marriages. I reckon she is. She's working on behalf of others living with disabilities. Oh God, that's taking the fun out of the tone. Yeah. She's doing some good work. Throughout the first half of the 20th century,

Helen tackled social and political issues, including women's suffrage, birth control. This one was kind of interesting because I read about this later. She was like, I was appointed on a commission to investigate the conditions for the blind. For the first time, I, who had thought blindness and misfortune beyond human control, found that too much of it was traceable to wrong industrial conditions, often caused by the selfishness and greed of employers. This is where it gets interesting.

The social evil contributed its share. I found that poverty drove women to a life of shame that ended in blindness. So basically what she's saying there is that poverty drove women to prostitution. Prostitution led to syphilis. Siphilis led to blindness. So she was like, some of this is traceable and preventable. and so then she was kind of advocating for birth control. So the birth control stopped the syphilitic babies being born blind?

Is that what she's saying? Or is in birth control like old school dingers? Dingers. And I think syphilis would make you go blind, right? But like not immediately. Not immediately, but if it got, yeah. You know, prolonged. Yeah.

I was just thinking of birth control is in control of birth. But yeah, if it's like STD control as well. Yeah, that's what it is. STI or whatever. What are you, what are you, Safe sex is what she's. She's all about suffssex.

She loves the suffsus. Oh, mate, there's nothing hotter to me than if it's safe sex. The safer the better. The safer the sexier. Yeah, just wrap me up in bubble wrap.

Put a buddy stack out on me and let's go to town. If we don't touch, I don't get really, I get off. Yeah. I'll just... Why is your gut out? He's in his little tummy out.

Oh, this episode's loose. Okay. Much like Matt's pants. She testified before Congress, strongly advocating to improve the welfare for blind people. In 1915, along with the renowned city planner George Kessler, she co-founded Helen Keller International to combat the causes and consequences of blindness and malnutrition.

And in 1920, she said, helped found the American Civil Liberties Union. Like, so, like, she, hell. She's an over-a-cheever. She does so much when, oh, it's just, it's amazing. It's amazing. You know, it's hard because you don't want to be like, patronising. You don't want to be patronising, but it's like, she's already amazing for a person

without any of these disabilities. If she was fully able, you'd still be impressed with their life. Yeah, right? And she has this You'd be like, if that was me, if that was me in that situation, I would so comfortably just be like, well, this is my lot in life and I would sort of give up.

But for her to just keep going is amazing. But you don't want to talk about that too much because then you're being a patronising asshole for treating her like she's, like, oh, aren't you clever? Yeah, yeah. It's worse. It's, yeah, good topic choice, Jess. It was really good.

I thought it was an interesting one. It is very interesting. I haven't known a lot of this. Yeah, I didn't know a lot of this too. The American Federation for the Blind was established in 1921 and Helen became a member a few years later in 1924 and participated in many campaigns to raise awareness, money and support for the blind. She also joined other organisations.

Seems a little bit self-serving, don't you think? Yeah. She's trying to raise money for the blind. Is that an altruistic thing, Helen? Or you got a little interest in this? I mean, I mean, for all the blind people. But if I mean, I'm one of them. Yeah.

I'm one of them. If you want to swing a little cash my way. Once I'm sorted, I'll pass on the rest. Got to raise awareness for myself. It's all about branding. Yeah. She's on it. She's on it.

She's big in a marketing. She invented marketing. Yeah, she invented marketing. I was about to get to that. So it's very exciting. Good for her. I take this opportunity to remind our listeners of the Patreon account. We have created.

Self-serving? Self-serving? No, no. I would say altruistic, no doubt. For the greater good. First, we'll get rich, then we'll pass it on. We'll get rich. Did part of me think that Dave believes that on some level?

Yeah, they think it's like, this could be our full-time job now. If everyone on the planet gave one dollar, just one, we'd get, what, $6, 7 billion. That's pretty good. That's $2 billion each. That's too much, too much billions. Like everyone in the world To give one dollar each a month But you know what though

If we got Six billion dollars a month We could actually I'd probably give a couple of thousand a charity No Okay Look I'm not signing a contract saying I will But I probably would

No I'm being serious We could We could fix the world Yeah We could fix the world And we'd still live very comfortably ourselves We'd have to just get everyone in the world To first give us a dollar

Plunging themselves into further poverty only for us to give the money back to get them out of poverty. But we'd be redistributing lots of the wealth. Think about this, super wealthy people giving us a dollar, and then we end up giving heaps of that money to people who don't have homes, and then they have a home, and we get them a job, and we save the world, and then we're heroes. Are we better than Helen Keller? We're way better than Helen Keller.

Look, I'm convinced. Your Honor, I rest my case. I actually do rest my case. Done. Take that, Helen Keller. Do you doesn't even need an hour on this one. No. They don't even leave the courtroom.

They all stand up and start laughing. Look, to be honest, we've got billions of dollars. We own this jury. Yeah, that's right. We own this whole courtroom. No, but we don't, no. No, we're cool about it, though. We're cool about saving the world.

I mean, everyone's very cool when they're billionaires. Yeah, have you seen the shit cars we drive? That's just so we fit in with the clips. We're just saying, we're saying grounded. We're saying humble. We're humble and grounded. That's us. I've always said that about all three of us.

Yeah. Humble and all grounded. I've been telling everyone how humble I am all. week. It's amazing. I say, hello, I'm Jess. I'm very grounded. I'm very grounded. Thank you. Thank you for asking. Thank you. I do look humble today.

Oh, my goodness. Thank you. Well, aren't you just a little dear? A little duh. Oh, whatever. I don't need to talk to you. I'm better than you. I'm rich. I've got $6 billion from a podcast. I also developed an accent somewhere in there too. That's okay. Cool. That happens with money. Yeah. Money changes you. And your accent.

It changes everything. Money. Podcast. I'm going to start saying money. That's my new laugh. Matt's got enough money to remove the Bunnings Warehouse tattoo from his testicles. He's nutsack, I believe he called it. I've already booked it in.

Congratulations. Only 15 painful sessions away from having a normal nut side. They said that not much of the sack will remain. On our Patreon, I'm putting an option that's at the bottom. If you contribute $1 million per month, Matt will get these testicles. That is definitely true. I would do that for a million dollars a month, no doubt about that. Really?

But would you share that million dollars with us, or would you keep that milk? A little bit for us, come on. Yeah, we'd come to an arrangement. A month? Yeah. Yeah, fair enough. How about just one month you split it with us, and then you can go back to having a million a month? Yeah, you can have all that.

That's fine. I'm okay with that. Cool. I might just go on with a podcast. Oh, please. Who are we talking about? Oh, someone not as good as us, Helen Keller. Yeah.

I think what we were doing there was taking a little break away from feeling like we can't be silly around a perfect person. Yeah, she's pretty much the perfect person. I'm like, oh, let's have a real go at this. Let's just searching for an angle here. Yeah, it's a tough angle. She's going to have a, she'll show a little weakness, I'm sure. John, who suggested this for us. great topic.

Fascinating person. You're making our jobs a bit hard though. I think you'd have to be a miracle worker to make this topic funny. I reckon Helen Keller could make that reference. The miracle workers, a very famous play about the life of Helen Keller. That's a very famous play. Did you see how he said that? Looking down at it.

He actually stood up on his chair, literally looked down his nose at us. Well, because he can't, otherwise, he has to stand it on a chair because he's very small. And I said, look down. It was probably Lucas in the eye. Yeah. Which is the first time he's done that. What a piece of shit. Yeah, what a schemer.

So she's working to raise money and awareness for the blind, and she's also joined other organisations that are dedicated to helping the less fortunate, including the Permanent Blind War Relief Fund, which was later called the American Braille Press. Soon after she graduated from college, she became a member of the Socialist Party, most likely due to impart to her friendship with John Mason. There it is. She's a commie. New it all along.

Okay, so she's not perfect. Five minutes ago, you were telling us you were going to take a dollar from everyone and redistribute it to those in need. You did say that. Well, no, I don't. The difference between me and a commie is that I'd say that I'm going to do that. Actually, know that, and I keep the money. That's exactly what all communist regimes have ever done. So in many ways, I'm more communist than Helen Keller.

Yeah, she's a socialist. You somehow jumped. Okay. All right. So between 1909 and 1921, she wrote several articles about socialism, and she supported Eugene Debs, who was a socialist party presidential candidate. She wrote a series of essays on socialism. They were entitled Out of the Dark,

and they described her views on socialism and world affairs. And it was during this time, this is kind of interesting, it was during this time that Helen first experienced public prejudice about her disabilities. because she'd always been sort of held like a... So she claims that newspaper columnists who had previously praised her courage and intelligence, you know, before she expressed her socialist views, now called attention to her disabilities. So the editor of the Brooklyn Eagle wrote that her mistakes sprung out of the manifest

limitations of her development. Which is kind of fucked. Oh. And she responded to that editor, referring to having met him, before he knew of her political views. And she said, at that time, the compliments he paid me was so generous that I blush to remember them.

But now that I have come out for socialism, he reminds me in the public that I am blind and deaf and especially liable to error. I must have shrunk in intelligence during the year since I met him. Oh, ridiculous, Brooklyn Eagle! Socially blind and deaf, it defends an intolerance system, a system that is the cause of much of the physical blindness and deafness which we are trying to prevent.

Stop that, Brooklyn Eagle. Like that was very well said. Like she slammed him. Yeah, what a smack down. Like, oh, you didn't, we thought I was so clever when I, before I expressed an opinion, a socialist one. A little piece of work, mate. Your bloody piece of work. Dirty dog.

In 1936, Helen's beloved teacher and devoted companion, Anne Sullivan passed away. She'd experienced health problems for several years, and a few years earlier in 1932, she'd lost her eyesight. completely. And so a young woman named Polly Thompson, who's a good name. Polly Thompson. I trust her. I trust her with my life. Polly, definitely. She'd begun working as a secretary for Anne and Helen in 1914. So, you know, several years earlier, she became her, Helen's constant companion when Sullivan passed away. So now Polly's sort of looking after her and accompanying her everywhere. In 1946, Helen was appointed

Counselor of International Relations for the American Foundation of Overseas Blind and between 1946 and 1957 she travelled to 35 countries on five continents. In 1955 at age 75, Helen embarked on the longest and most grueling trip of her life,

a five-month trek across Asia. Through her many speeches and appearances, she brought inspiration and encouragement to millions of people. She didn't bring any to me. Well, okay, Right, you're old, but not that old. Oh, wow, that's the biggest compliment you'll ever get on this podcast.

Yeah, you're not that old. You old piece of shit. I've called you a piece of shit a lot today. Maybe one of the Patreon things should be called a piece of shit. A piece of shit award. That's no good. I'd put money in the right. That can be $10,000.

So, Helen's autobiography, the story of my life, was used as the basis for the 1957 television drama, the miracle worker. and in 1959 Jess hasn't heard of that even though she wrote it down today In 1959 The story was developed into a Broadway play of the same title starring Patty Duke as Keller and Anne Bancrofter Sullivan

It was a wacky musical And Bancroft Yeah Played Anne Sullivan Wow really cool And it was It was one of those ones where they're like She's behind you

Oh no no no But a pantomime Pantam Yeah But the conversations there are the blindness, I did not intend. Okay. And I think the Miracle Worker, it's, I've seen it made fun of on, like, comedy shows.

Like, it's a... South Park? It's on South Park. And other shows where they, like, it might be a recurring play that people put on. American listeners, do people put on the Miracle Worker like they imply in American TV shows? Like, it might be a thing that people put on their high school a lot. Oh, okay, one of those, one of those plays, it gets a good run. Like, our version would be,

that one about the guy who was the last man hanged in Australia Oh what's the No that's not it What Our version would be like What are you talking about Oh

We've lost him What's his name The last man hanged in Australia Wasn't it's in there a play I just You guys are the drama boys People What surely you would know

What The big Aussie drama play would be at high schools and stuff. Not the Aussie one. There's not a lot of Aussie. Annie was always big. That's not Australian. Not Australian at all.

That's what I'm just saying. Our big ones are Don's Party. Hotel Sorrento. You know the best one I read in uni when I was a drama major was Norman Ahmed and it was excellent, a really good play. It's just a little fun fact for you. But it's not one that they're going to use like. because it has swearing in it.

Summer of the 17th doll? What kind of swears? Racial ones, actually. Okay, let's move on. Very powerful in the context. That sounds like I'm like, no, but the racism's fine. It's definitely not. What I'm saying is it's a great play.

Anywho, we're nearly done here. So they also made a film of the miracle worker in 1962, and those actresses played those. And Bancroft. And Bancroft. I don't know what that means. It sounds good, though. Yeah.

And Bancroft. She's an actress. And Bancroft. And Bancroft. And Bancroft. Now, during her lifetime, she received many honours in recognition of her accomplishments, including the Theodore Roosevelt Distinguished Service Medal in 1936, the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1964,

and election to the Women's Hall of Fame in 1965. She also received honorary doctoral degrees from Temple University and Harvard University and from the universities of Glasgow, Berlin, Delhi and Johannesburg. Wow, so she's like a doctor on every continent. Yeah. Additionally, she was named an honorary fellow of the Educational Institute of Scotland, so she's got that too. Did she win a Victoria Cross?

No, Victoria Cross. We're all asking. No Victoria Cross, unfortunately. She was robbed. Robbed. Robert Danny Jr. won that year. Robbed. She suffered...

What? I was pretending like it was an Academy Award code. Robert Downey Jr. Yeah, he won the Victoria Cross at the Academy Awards. In the 1960s, Matt. Keep up. Matt, I know you're tired. We're all bloody tired, champ.

And the act of being beaten by Robert Downey Jr. is called being robbed in any pursuit. You got Robert Downey Jr'd. Anyway, um, hell. She suffered a series of strokes in 1961 and spent the remaining years of her life at her home in Connecticut. She died in her sleep seven years later on the 1st of June, 1968, just a few weeks before her 88th birthday. She lived a long life. She lived a long time and she got a lot done. It was really amazing.

It was a service held in her honour at the National Cathedral in Washington. And her ashes were placed next to her constant companions, Anne Sullivan and Polly Thompson. So that was at the Washington National Cathedral. All right. All right. But Anne Sullivan's husband, that Helen broke up. Nowhere to be seen. It's probably still on the run. He's still alive.

I don't know what from. Yet again, the man loses out. My face is so smart. Okay, I've got a couple of fun facts to finish on. A couple of fun facts. All right, I'm in. All right, I'm in. All right, I'm ready?

Couple. I don't know how fun they're going to be. It's tricky because it's been a barrel of laugh so far. Where to from here? Where to? Somehow I'm going to make it even more fun. Can you lift the fun factor at all? I'm going to make it even more fun.

I doubt it. So far, I'm just feeling really inadequate as a human. Are you? Yeah. I've just done nothing with my life. Oh my God. I also have a Bachelor of Arts degree. Oh.

Well, there you do. He does as good as her. You're right. I'm just as good as Helen Keller. I've got a master's. I've got a master's. Does she have one of those? She's got doctors.

But they're honorary, so I didn't earn them. academically speaking. Not worth the paper they're bloody printed on. So. So in a way, we're all better than Helen Keller, is what we're saying. This is just the typical comedian

inadequacy that we're like, yeah, well, whatever. We can't just be like, well, that's fascinating. What a wonderful person.

Have you ever done a joke on stage in front of 15 people and made 12 of them laugh? Yeah, Helen Keller, have you? That's a good, right? You've done that one again. That's good. I probably should have said 12 out of 50,

shouldn't I? If you were being realistic, I've seen you before. Oh, brutal. But no, fair. Oh, okay, fair enough then. Fun facts.

Yes. In 1916, when Helen was in her 30s and world famous, her teacher and companion, Anne Sullivan, fell terribly ill. This is before Anne died, obviously. Anne's a strange husband sent Peter Fagan, who was a 29-year-old Boston Herald reporter, to be Helen's private secretary to fill in while Anne is sick. The pair quickly became infatuated.

Romance. Also, it's a friend of the Anne Sullivan's husband that she later broke up. Yeah, yeah. So Peter learns, you know, how to speak to her. It learns the manual finger spelling language and he's, he... What a sweet way to flirt. I know, like learning their language. Spelling words out on each other's hands.

He's like, he, but he reads, like, he spells the contents of letters and newspapers and articles and books and stuff to her and so, like, they get all, and he's, like, passionate about politics, and he loves. her zest for life and they fall in love. He's pretending to be passionate about politics, but he's just passionate about getting in her pants. The only problem is I don't know what happened to them. Like they fell in love.

Apparently they attempted to elope, but because, you know, it was a different time, you guys. Helen's family, a teacher's society around that time were kind of like, well, no, they felt strongly that women with disabilities shouldn't marry or have romantic desires. So it's like... Shouldn't have desires. Yeah.

Like, apparently should. She used to read, like, romance novels. Romance. She used to read romance novel, and Anne Sullivan would be like, stop reading that trash. Like, she wouldn't let her read. You don't have desires. You don't have feelings.

And she wasn't like, get married. I don't really know what happened to them. Apparently they attempted to elope, but it obviously didn't happen. So from then on, she decided to ruin marriage after marriage. Oh, that makes more sense. I'm down with it. If you can't be married, no one can. And the lady who stopped her from getting eloped was Anne Sullivan.

The marriage that she broke up. Oh yeah, fucking cop that dickhead. Boom. I bet they don't talk about this in The Miracle Worker. They're too afraid. They probably don't. Yeah, they probably don't. That's why this is high art, and that is a piece of fucking shit in a bucket.

There, we said it. We said, look, it's been sitting there. I reckon somebody has done a shit in a bucket and put it in an art gallery. I've done it myself. Yeah. I mean, we weren't even pretending it was art. That was just a desperate situation. Hey, every desperate situation has an out.

Out of his butt. Yeah, obviously they're just tiny pellets, but... But I feel that bucket. Small bucket. It was more of a thimble. The word bucket is generous. He's a fooling room. He's my height.

He's my height, but his butt is the size of a hamster. A hamster's butt. Get to verify. I was like, that's pretty big. It was a big butt. Anyway, this is the last fun fact I have. It's really, it's kind of interesting. That last fun fact was more that she was not allowed to have a love life.

Yeah, no, it started kind of interesting and then because it was fun fact. Fun fact. She died tragically alone because society respected her mentally but didn't let her have sex. Like, you couldn't have gone out and found a less fun fact if there were no restrictions on where you could look. I'm doing my best. Here's a piece of a tragedy. Fun fact A bit of I

Bundle it up as a fun fact Dress it up a little bit Thanks for the suggestion to John Yeah John Helen Caller is really fun I don't know if John was saying He's a fun one No he's just saying he's an interesting one

He's right When Helen visited Japan in July of 1937 She inquired about Hachiko The famed Akita dog That had died in 1935 She told a Japanese person That she would like to have

An Akita dog and one was given to her within a month with the name of Kamakazi go and when he died... What? Yeah, he unfortunately died. Did he? What was the name like that?

Kamakazi. What did he just... Jumped out of a plane of a parachute. Straight to a battleship. When Kamakazi died, his older brother, Kenzan was presented to her as an official gift from the Japanese government in July 1938.

So it died a year later. She did not look after that dog and they gave her another one. point of death. Here's another one. Does it set off a chain of events? Well, what's interesting is that... She owned a 95 dog in a lot.

It's interesting is that Helen is credited with having introduced the Akita dog to the United States through these two dogs. She bought over several thousand dollars. She started that breed of dog in the States. Akita's a beautiful dog. Well, thanks Helen Keller. That is...

Says America. That is a fun fact. That is fun. Was that fun? She introduced the Akita. Was there finally a fun fact in there? Yeah. Thank fuck, because I'm done.

That's the end of the fun facts. I'm out. The end of the report. Perkins out. Boom and I'm gone. That is my report on Helen Keller. A hell and girl. An incredible woman that was very difficult to laugh at.

But maybe we should... But we could laugh with. We could definitely laugh with her. What a life, eh? And admire her at. We could definitely admire at her. Not admire her with. No, no.

I never would. I wouldn't dream of it. I wouldn't dare. Don't even think of it. asking me to. So there we go. Very suggestible. If you pressured me

even for a brief manitom, I probably would, to be honest. Well, we're all going to stop talking because that is the end of episode 55. Thank you so much for listening in. And as we talked at length with at the start of the show,

we have launched our Patreon. We'll be tweeting, we'll be Facebooking, we'll be probably Instagramming. We're doing all the things about that. And you can also use those mediums to get in contact with us at DoGoOnPod,

on Twitter, and Instagram we do go on pod on Facebook and do go on pod at gymar.com on email if you're interested in getting involved in Patreon maybe you've got a suggestion for a thing that you'd like us to do in exchange for a reward we're new to this.

Yeah. So yeah, you're flexible on what rewards are offered. Yeah, like if you like... If you guys want... I don't know. Because some people are really into Patreon and I know other things. So if other people do Q&As or things like that

that you're interested in or... Yeah, if you want to ask questions. And maybe on the mini reports, we could answer your questions. We can all happen to do that. Tell, just, you know what? It's all about open communication, you guys. Just tell us what you want from us, and we will do our best to accommodate you. That's right.

And we'll end this episode by reading out some names of the people we assume will be contributing to the Patreon. Great. Okay, let's all do one. Okay, so Helen Keller. Obviously. I think she respects our art. Obviously. Matt, who do you think we'll be contributing to the Patreon?

I would have thought in his first public appearance in many years, DB Cooper is going to... Dreamboat, DeBomb. I don't know, do you call that a public appearance? If he tweeted... Public reappearance. Yeah, public reappearance. And if he contributed to the Patreon.

Yeah. He does it in a very subtle way. If anyone wants to create an account called DB Cooper and then contribute, that would be like a thing that would probably make my life worth living. Wow, that's sad. I make my life complete. All worth living. Because it's been pretty good so far.

I'm just missing one piece and that's it. And then you can die. Is that what you're saying? Yeah. Cool. Jess, who do you think we'll be contributing to the Patreon? Queen Elizabeth, obviously. The first or the second?

First. Great, I thought so. The second is not up for this, but the first. She's not that interested. But I reckon we'll get her, but the first one, definitely. She tweets every week and she's like, oh, Zom my God, love you. I'm like Yeah, she's a big fan

Big fan So that's nice Well, it's great It's great to have celebrity fans But if you want to get involved We would appreciate it Thank you so much guys I'll be back next week

With the report of my own Episode 56 We'd like to say thank you for everyone That's listened to all the episodes In our first year Year 2 starts next week Hey happy happy birthday slash anniversary guys

Happy anniversary guys I love you very much I love you too And I just hope that Helen Keller will not come between us. Like all those marriages. No, she won't. Oh, thank you.

You took your time getting to that sentence, but thanks, buddy. I mean, as per you, Warnocky and Perko, just talking all over me. I'm being trampled over here. Can't get a body word in it, boys. I feel like Matt's going to fall asleep, so we probably should sign up. So I will say...

I am dreaming, I know. Well, we are pretty dreamy. Bye! Goodbye. Good night. You're not going to say later? Laders. Thank God.

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