At the age of 3, while playing in his father's shop, Louis Braille injured his eye on a sharp tool. The infection that set in soon spread to the other eye and Louis was left completely blind in both eyes.
As a teenager, Louis spent all his free time poking holes in paper in an effort to come up with a more efficient way to represent print letters and numbers tactually. He got his inspiration from Charles Barbier, a retired artillery officer in Napoleon's army, who invented a system of embossed dots to represent sounds (most of the soldiers were illiterate). This would have allowed notes to be passed among the army's ranks without striking a light and alerting enemy soldiers of their position. The army rejected the idea.
By 1824, Braille had the code in place that now bears his name. Braille is used in almost every country in the world today, and has been adapted to almost every known language from Albanian to Zulu. Before the invention of Braille, students had to read by tracing raised print letters with their fingers. It was painfully slow and most blind students never mastered the technique.
Louis Braille died on January 6, 1852 at the age of 43, having lived a successful life as teacher, musician, researcher, and inventor.
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